groups

This forum group on compassionate living is directly linked to the website www.CompassionSpace.com

It is the only website totally dedicated to compassion information. As founder of this group there are times that I do not check in frequently. When that is the case it is because I am working on the website, or another book or my college duties. But ANYONE can send me an email off of the website. Contributions to this forum, ideas discussed, and questions presented, often become part of that website. Please feel free to contribute.

We are "young", as a culture, in our understanding and practice of compassion. We all can make a difference in how compassion is understood and practiced. The first steps are to seek compassion development and to pass it on.

Visit StraightFromMyHeart.net

Here you will find a graphic novel that is presented in episodes twice a week. The lives of characters unfold as they face the question of how to live compassionately.

Feel free to post ideas in this forum that you think should be explored in the graphic novel.

I have a question. All definitions of Compassion appear to apply to people. Does this mean that there was no Compassion in the entire universe before there were people? That is, the universe is a place without Compassion unless someone is there to give it some? If so, then at who was the first person who invented Compassion? If there was no Compassion before people, then how do you define Compassion in a world without people?

The compassion research continues on CompassionSpace dot com. There is a new "I support compassion" form where we ask folks in what direction compassion research should go.

The site has a new "look" with the appearance of our new Compassion Information Institute logo. Soon the institute will have not-for-profit status and hopefully we can raise funding for both research on compassion and teaching the information we discover.

Our Google rankings are also now on the front page and are updated weekly. It helps to illustrate our main mission - to disseminate information about compassion.

We will be expanding the number of links to others compassion sites as well as the number of articles and books reviewed.

Thank you all for your support.

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY

"If you've never been thrilled to the very edges of your soul by a
flower in spring bloom, maybe your soul has never been in bloom."

~Audra Fuveo

I guess since this group stated with a flare and then faded that perhaps compassion is a difficult topic to write about. I have been told this, and certainly I have struggled with it for a couple of decades. Maybe it is the cynical nature of our culture? Maybe it is just the nature of the topic? Maybe we just haven't learned how to enter into such discourse?

I don't think there are any right or wrong answers to these questions but rather a path to be explored. Can we at least hold the possibility of moving a few steps toward a culture of compassion?

Your thoughts?

The work continues! There is now a new website www.aclashofcultures.com
which presents the idea of teaching people the basics of compassion in a virtual world.
Drop by and take a look.

I am close to having enough completed surveys from the compassion site www.compassionspace.com. Thanks to all of you who helped. Eventually the results will be posted on the survey page and as a chapter in the Handbook.

I just finished a draft of the second chapter for the Compassion Handbook. This chapter speaks about a philosophy of compassion. Basic ways of thinking about human nature and the world which are tied to a compassionate mind. This can also be found on www.compassionspace.com under handbook.

Finally, the college agreed to include my class on compassion within their catalog! This makes it official. There is now a college class totally dedicated to teaching about compassion.

I hope that you find this update encouraging. Please feel free to post replies, or post your own contributions to compassion awareness in your community.

I have been away from actively writing in this group, but not distant. The reason is that I have been engaged is my continued research on compassion. This year the research has been along three avenues. First there is the survey on compassion that is free and confidential on the website www.CompassionSpace.com. In the future, after we get more responses, I will do a compilation and discussion of the results. Second, I taught my first college class that was totally dedicated to the topic of compassion. The subject of how to teach compassion is of great interest to me and I hope to write a short paper on this soon. Finally, and the project that has consumed much of my time, there is the virtual world compassion training simulation. Building a virtual world from scratch is no easy task and I am doing almost all the art, the history research and the conceptual design. You can see some of the art on the compassion website.

And, if all of that wasn't enough to keep me busy, I volunteered to do a second website realted to my boyhood hobby. It is called HerkimerHistory.com

Please feel free to post your thoughts and ideas about compassion, or PM me, it will all be passed on to help, and teach, others.