Mindful Compassion

Compassion is the basis of morality. – Arthur Schopenhauer

The goal of this life is to stand in a positive light in order to raise your awareness of the ultimate reality which is adrift upon a cosmic sea as wide as a trillion times a trillion times a trillion oceans. This shining life prepares you for advancing onto more brilliant planes of existence. The richness of life experience translates to recognition of superior accomplishments. This does not mean, as the affluent elite like to impress upon us, a rich life is based on extravagantly traveling the world in luxury to exotic locales and risking their lives leaping out of non-burning airplanes and other extreme activities that get the adrenaline flowing. No, a rich life is one filled with mindfulness and compassion – focused awareness of your experiences and those around you.

With the advent of global media, the prosperous simply re-market immoral selfishness as traditional economic policy while recasting the so-called less fortunate as slothful and unskillful. Anyone without a stock portfolio is viewed as a low-life shirker incapable of understanding the complexities of the jingoistic mumbo-jumbo spouted minute by minute from the million mouthed media. The fine examples of success foisted upon the common men and women are all wealthy. Occasionally a self-sacrificing example, such as Dr. Martin Luther King, will be added to the cacophony of money-making ballyhoo, but only so the boosters of revenue enhancing tableau can further obscure the hidden motive of world-shaping in which the greedy lifestyle is portrayed as superior and that of the so-called less-fortunate is dire and dreadful.

The truth behind the labyrinthine fiscal house of mirrors the majority of humanity must navigate is simply the opposite of what they have been told. Greed is not good; it is evil. Money does not make one a winner; happiness is the blue ribbon of life. Basics of goodness, such as simplicity, kindness, and integrity, are the keys that opens the golden door to paradise on earth. We live at the gates of heaven. Our lives are lived in interpersonal interactions, and we are defined by our deeds not our words. All of us are born knowing this. These are the blood memories of thousands of generations whispering to us across the continuum of humanity and instilling within us the basic notions of the great teachers to be good and to do good.

Throw off the blinkers of guilt associated with low economic status. Those at the top of the heap are to be pitied for they are truly the soulless and the lost for there is no bank account valid across the universe; but there is an accounting of the individual character, and it is inscribed with the tally marks of compassionate acts of civility and decency. Be happy in your life. Be good in your actions. Be at peace in your heart. Shine a loving light all around you.