Compassion

Compassion and caring are not synonymous. Nor are compassion and empathy. Compassion is a developed mental practice. Caring stems from simple animal attention, based in personal survival. If I am a wildebeast in a herd, I may well care if the wildebeast next to me is being attacked by a lioness. As a human being, I have the mental capacity to empathize by superimposing my own identity on the identity of someone else. "Yes, I felt the same way when..." is an example.

Compassion entails an attempt to understand and accept the suffering of others as they experience and perceive it. Empathy alone cannot take a human mind there. Those of us who have spent our vocational lives tending the mentally and physically ill must develop compassion to be successful professional healers or caretakers. The range and depth of human suffering far exceeds the personal experience of one human being. The professional healer must put aside empathy at some point. He/she must simply listen and observe to understand the suffering of others in order to intervene. 

Try an experiment in a public place. Sit alone and observe passers-by. Do not try to interact with them. Simply watch with an attention to human suffering. The child with a leg brace. The elder with a walker. The heavily pregnant woman. Just observe and allow yourself to experience your inner reactions to what you observe. Distinguish between identifying with what you see and your feelings about what you see. This is the beginning of developing compassion. Consciousness of my own reactions when dealing with the suffering of others is a crucial element in my practice as a caregiver or healer. 

Humanism is based as much in compassion as it is in science, education and developed mindfulness. The humanist reaches out to the environment and tries to understand it. The humanist then tries to act responsibly to promote peace, joy and health in that environment. This is different from being an atheist or being religious. The weight of responsibility of the humanist is much greater. The humanist does not trust in a magical being to fix the environment, like a religious person. The humanist does not retreat into shoulder-shrugging narcissism, like some atheists. I see the humanist path as one of practicing daily self-development through mindfulness and compassion in action.