Similarities or Differences: What Do You See?
How Do You See the World? (HDYSTW) is a very important question and reflection for us all to consider right now. What kind of world do we wish to create for ourselves, our loved ones, each other and future generations? For what we do today creates our future. So from the book entitled HDYSTW, we are asked to consider when looking through a lens of empathy, are we more likely to see our similarities or do we focus on our difference? And does this make us feel?
I know when I focus on differences, I can feel this deep in my body; how placing my attention here creates a separate self, an isolated self, often lost in the belief that I have to make a “go of it” all on my own or how no one else could possibly understand what I am feeling. Albert Einstein defined human suffering as a mind-made prison in which we view ourselves as separate… and “our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.” Sounds like a pretty good thing to strive towards right now.
When I was writing this book, I deliberately chose the word empathy over compassion because I thought empathy would be understood by more. I regret this decision now for the difference between empathy and compassion rests in taking action. As empathy is the acknowledgment of another's feelings, compassion is defined by our desire to alleviate suffering, whether it is our own or someone else's. And right now we are being called to act, to take action towards justice, towards peace, towards inclusion, towards love and compassion. This is something we can do, an action we can take.
“To love is to recognize yourself in another.”