Compassion: The Most Important Aspect of Love

Compassion: The Most Important Aspect of Love

I have felt love for a pet, love for a person, love for a car, love for a home, love for a vacation spot, and love for a friend. But, never have I had compassion for anything or anyone until I learned to love myself. This kind of love includes acceptance of the past and all future mistakes, love of your physical body, true kindness to yourself in the form of challenges you may have in certain physical or mental arenas, and most specifically kindness to yourself when you are healing from a traumatic event.

Compassion is not something that is earned—ever. Compassion is the ability to come outside yourself and the situation and become an observer in a God-sense. Compassion is the ability to look at the entire picture of life—sometimes with many pieces missing in the puzzle—as if you were writing the plot and the characters, then challenging each of character to his/her highest self.

I remember a time in my life when I was a minister in NYC trying to live a life of total celibacy. I had been completely celibate for about five years when an old friend and the first person I truly loved re-entered my life.  I was trying to live life without sex primarily, because, at that time, I thought it was a sin to be gay. So, I cut myself off from sensuality completely as a form of punishment for feeling a way, I thought, I shouldn’t be acting on.

When Tim came back into my life, he was happily practicing a homosexual lifestyle and felt completely comfortable with himself. I remember wanting to set him “straight” and tell him that his behavior was out of line from God’s will.

Then something hit me—hard! I heard the voice of spirit say to me, “You are not to tell Tim anything. It is YOU who needs to consider that your feelings are more about jealousy that Tim accepts himself fully and you don’t accept yourself at all.”

As I had been taught by ministers and overseers, I tested the spirit speaking to me, “Are you of the spirit of God and believe that Jesus died for the sins of the world?” (That was the prayer I was told to say whenever I heard a voice speak to me in an audible voice. We believed, then, that many spirits had the ability to speak, so you had to be very specific about what voice you listened to. I would still consider this belief true. However, I may just listen to my heart to decide if the voice was from God or from my ego.)

I tested and tested the spirit for confirmation that it was God. It was, indeed, God talking to my heart. There was no ridding my mind of the inherent struggle that was “not loving myself as a Son of God.” I recognized in that moment that my wants and desires as a human were not something I needed to stifle, but something I should run toward to understand myself and love who I had been created to be even more.

It took me a few more years of fighting with my inner feelings, before I left the ministry and fled New York to come to Nashville to “find myself.” I figured if I couldn’t love and be compassionate of me for the exact person I had been created, then I needn’t go any further in trying to teach others to love.

My journey to loving and accepting myself has been a long one. I think it is only recently I truly believed that I deserved true love from a wonderful person without diminishing myself in the relationship.

I had lunch with a friend today. We traded stories about diminishing for others to keep love active in our lives and how detrimental it had been to our psyches. The conversation was another reminder that I am only as strong as I can be compassionate—first, for myself, then for others.

My strength is in my ability to look at myself and others through the loving lens of God’s compassion. Everyone has a story, a background, and a past. All of these attributes contribute to his/her actions and the inability to love fully and completely. Most people don’t truly love themselves, so it would be right and correct to say that the majority of the people you meet in a day are not going to treat you with the compassion and love you deserve.

Should that stop any of us from treating others with compassion and love? I certainly hope not. Every day, I seek to let go of expectation of how others should behave and focus solely on maintaining my authentic self. I hope you can try with me to do the same today.

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Bo Sebastian is a Hypnotherapist and Life & Health Coach, available for private sessions to QUIT SMOKING, Lose Weight, New Lap-Band Hypnosis for Weight Loss, CHANGE YOUR MIND, CHANGE YOUR LIFE! at 615-400-2334 or www.bosebastian.com.

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