A Quote by Tara Brach

Compassion can be described as letting ourselves be touched by the vulnerability and suffering that is within ourselves and all beings. The full flowering of compassion also includes action: Not only do we attune to the presence of suffering, we respond to it.

Tara Brach

Quote Topics

Action Also Beings Compassion Flowering Full Letting Only Ourselves Presence Respond Suffering Touched Vulnerability Within

Quote Author

Tara Brach
American - Psychologist
Born: May 17, 1953

The essence of love and compassion is understanding, the ability to recognize the physical, material, and psychological suffering of others, to put ourselves "inside the skin" of the other. We "go inside" their body, feelings, and mental formations, and witness for ourselves their suffering. Shallow observation as an outsider is not enough to see their suffering. We must become one with the subject of our observation. When we are in contact with another's suffering, a feeling of compassion is born in us. Compassion means, literally, "to suffer with."

Nhat Hanh

Training in compassion is a mental activity. but our mind should also be brought to the level where every action we take is influenced by compassion. That means engaging ourselves in compassion in action.

Gelek Rimpoche

If we take the time to look deeply, we see that understanding and compassion arise from suffering. Understanding is the understanding of suffering, and compassion is the kind of energy that can transform suffering. If suffering is not there, we have no means to cultivate our understanding and our compassion. This is something quite simple to see

Nhat Hanh

The root of compassion is not empathy; that is kindness. Kindness is great, but it is not the ultimate compassion. Ultimate compassion relieves the suffering that comes from separateness. The suffering that comes from separateness is relieved only when you are fully present with another person, not when you are separately present.

Ram Dass

Compassion is our most important practice. Understanding brings compassion. Understanding the suffering that living beings undergo helps liberate the energy of compassion. And with that energy you know what to do.

Nhat Hanh

Ours is not a culture that respects the sick, the old or the vulnerable. We strive for independence, competence, and mastery. In embracing such 'frontier' values, we may become intolerant of human wholeness, contemptuous of anything in ourselves, and in others, that has needs or is capable of suffering. The denial of a vulnerability is the ultimate barrier to compassion.

Rachel Naomi Remen

Understand the suffering of worldly existence. Abandon its causes of ignorance and selfishness. Practice the path of meditation and compassion. Awaken from suffering within Great Peace.

Gautama Buddha

Character is revealed in the power to discern the suffering of other people when we ourselves are suffering; in the ability to detect the hunger of others when we are hungry; and in the power to reach out and extend compassion for the spiritual agony of others when we are in the midst of our own spiritual distress.

David A. Bednar

One of the primary conditions for suffering is denial. Shutting our mind to pain, whether in ourselves or others, only ensures that it will continue. We must have the strength to face it without turning away. By opening to the pain we see around us with wisdom and compassion, we start to experience the intimate connection of our relationship with all beings.

Sharon Salzberg

To the extent that our experience of suffering reminds us of what everyone else also endures, it serves as a powerful inspiration to practice compassion and avoid causing others pain. And to the extent that suffering awakens our empathy and causes us to connect with others, it serves as the basis of compassion and love.

Dalai Lama

Suffering comes from not understanding or a full potential or full powers within ourselves to heal, to nurture, to nourish.

Maya Tiwari

You can have compassion for someone who is suffering and try to help this person but if your relationship with mankind is only one of compassion, it is only another form of contempt and it prevents feelings like admiration, empathy which to my mind are much more positive.

Pascal Bruckner

Contemplating the suffering which is unbearable to us, and is unbearable to others, too, can produce awake mind, which arises from the compassion that wishes to free all living beings from suffering.

Dalai Lama

Having compassion starts and ends with having compassion for all those unwanted parts of ourselves. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.

Pema Chodron

The world is full of suffering. Birth is suffering, decre- pitude is suffering, sickness and death are sufferings. To face a man of hatred is suffering, to be separated from a beloved one is suffering, to be vainly struggling to satisfy one's needs is suffering. In fact, life that is not free from desire and passion is always involved with suffering.

Gautama Buddha

Compassion is not sympathy. Compassion is mercy. It is a commitment to take responsibility for the suffering of others.