Whether or not we follow any particular spiritual tradition, the benefits of love and kindness are obvious to anyone.
Whether or not we follow any particular spiritual tradition, the benefits of love and kindness are obvious to anyone.
DALAI LAMA
All of the traditional religious doctrine express values that are consistently pointing towards kindness and compassion. Despite the differences in the parables and other lessons found within them, the majority seem to focus on a perspective in life that delivers everyone to a kinder and more gentle world. It might be argued that some who have leveraged these principles have perhaps distorted some of those teachings in favor of power struggle, but there is a core truth across all disciplines that if we are more willing to be patient with other human beings, we are far more likely to succeed.
I believe the goal in life is to thrive and to enable all those around us to do the same. How might this best be accomplished? Given that we live in a competitive world and resources are not always abundant, how then are we able to watch out for our family while simultaneously being fair and considerate to everyone else?
Perhaps the answer lies solely in the value of kindness. In the choice to adopt kindness as our overall approach, we are more able to engage with everyone around us with minimal friction and increased focus on allowing everyone in our sphere of influence to encounter a warmer side of our personality. This may not always be achievable, and there are certainly those who do not warrant such treatment, but as an overall approach, you are hard-pressed to find any over arching life strategy that is wiser, stronger and more continuously successful than the application of kindness.
Various religions express the lesson to “love your fellow man,“ but there are most certainly ample circumstances in which this proves to be near impossible. So as an absolute, the philosophy that the Dalai Lama expresses, is incredibly valuable, but almost impossible to universally employ.
Just because something is not 100% applicable, does not negate its value collectively as a life discipline. There are many reasons for our continued need to practice an approach such as this one, even in the face of its inability to be completely overarching. We live in a world that is so continuously overrun by stress, conflict, duress and other intense variables, wouldn’t it make the most sense for us to accelerate a value system that works on as many friends as possible, to mitigate some of these variables?
Taking the time to embrace philosophy such as this adds one more layer of positivity to life in the larger sense. When we find ourselves the recipient of such, doesn’t it make us feel that much more appreciative of the things in life that truly matter?
Happy Friday!
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