(September 15, 2015) “The Dalai Lama often says that being more compassionate can make us feel less stressed. This might seem incredible, since compassion depends on acknowledging the unpleasant facts of our own and others’ vulnerability and suffering, but science agrees…With a compassionate shift of focus from our own narrow self-agenda (and the heaviness that tends to go with it) to others, we feel lighter….For what makes our normal response to stress so stressful is how it weighs us down and how we fear it will overwhelm us. Compassion, on the other hand, lightens us up. We feel our individual burden lift a little. We see it in perspective. We realize we’re not carrying it alone.”
Yangsi Rinpoche’s “Mindfulness and Compassion: Mind Training” class this week discussed this quote from: Jinpa, Thupten. A Compassionate Heart: How the Courage to be Compassionate Can Transform Our Lives. 2015:17
