Compassionate life

Do you always put yourselves in another person's shoes? When you see a homeless person or a beggar on the street, what do you feel towards them? Do you feel pity or you just walk away as if you did not see the person? When someone is suffering, do you somehow feel their pain? How do you help them? Do you think that our world lacks compassion? Or we just choose the people with whom we should show compassion?

When I found out that this week's writing prompt by @JonicaBradley was about compassion, I cannot think of anything to share. I have experienced being compassionate towards a person but I just cannot put it into writing. Then few days ago while I was back reading the messages of my aunts in our group chat, they were talking about my cousin.

I just found out that my cousin is the type of person who loves helping people. Whether he has a job or not, he would sometimes give money or food to anyone. He would give to a homeless person, security guard, food delivery riders and even garbage collectors. I did not know about it because I do not see it in him. Then my aunt would say not to give too much money but my cousin would respond that it is ok since their job is hard. Then I instantly thought of my brother. My brother likes to give money or food to beggars. He is also generous in giving tips when he and his family is dining out. He also gives tips to food delivery riders and gives gifts to almost all of his officemates. Then when my mom would see how big the tip he gives in a restaurant whether it was an excellent or bad service, my brother would say that they deserve to be tipped whether the service was bad. He knows how hard it is to work in a food industry. Whenever I would hear that from him, my heart melts. I do give tips but not as generous as my brother. One of my aunts remembered their late father by the compassion that my cousin had for other people. She remembered her father by the care and kindness that my cousin showed to other people.

For me compassion is putting ourselves in somebody else's shoes. We sometimes ignore the suffering of others. I know it is not easy to give money to the beggars as most of us know that they are being run by syndicates. However we still have the option to give them food. Most people who are compassionate towards other people are the people who understands or shares the feelings of other people or who have experienced either the same pain, experiences and sufferings that they do. Just like me, I feel a lot of compassion towards the people working in the food industry because I know how it feels to work in that field. I have also experienced being humiliated by a customer in front of lots of people. That is why if I were to complain about the service or the food, I will calmly talk to the manager. I am not the type who will post it right away in social media because I know how big the damage it will do to the company. There will always be some people who will let you feel that they are superior to you. That is why I want to erase that saying, "the customer is always right". I suddenly remembered one video of an Asian Uber driver that was insaulted by his passenger. The driver decided not to drop his passenger to his location because of the insaults that he received. He was insaulted because he was Asian. Discrimination. Racism. Is the customer/passenger still right?

I hope that even if we have not experienced any pains or sufferings in life, we should still show compassion to other people. We should always have to think of other people's feelings. Like what I have said a couple of times, putting ourselves into their shoes. What if we were in their situation? Remember that the world is round. We should treat everyone the way that we want to be treated. I know that there are some people who have different perspecitve with regards to compassion and helping other people especially the needy and we should respect it. But if we want to have a better world to live in, we must continue or learn to live a compassionate life.

"True compassion means not only feeling another's pain but also being moved to help relieve it." — Daniel Goleman

This is in response to JonicaBradley's Writing Prompt #7 Compassion

Challenge rules:

1. Write anything about compassion
2. Write 100% original content
3. Write at least 600 words
4. Tag @JonicaBradley
5. Have fun

P.S. lead image is a photo of the cable man who fixed our internet connection few months ago. He wore a PPE as a safety protocol despite the extreme heat. All we can do is offer him the electric fan, some cold water and a few snacks.