Aesop Archives - The Year(s) of Living Non-Judgmentally

Posts Tagged With: Aesop

Day 3968: World Kindness Day

Posted on November 13, 2023 by Ann Koplow

Today is World Kindness Day, so let’s do our best to show kindness to everyone in the world, including those we don’t agree with AND also ourselves.

I’m going to begin by extending kindness to myself about waking up too early. When I started composing this kindness post in my head, I thought it was close to 5 AM, the time I wake up on Mondays in order to catch the ferry into Boston so I can practice kindness during the one day per week I work in person at the hospital. When I realized it was 3:20 AM, my first impulse was to judge myself about not doing a better job staying asleep, but I immediately modulated that with kindness.

I’m also showing kindness to myself about getting a flat tire last night when I was on my way to check out a venue for my concert of original songs this spring. Kindness seems like the appropriate response, doesn’t it?

I don’t know why it can more challenging to show kindness to myself than to others, but I know I’m not alone in that. That’s why I made up the Platinum Rule: Do unto yourself as you would do unto others. Of course, that works best with kindness.

I appreciate your kindness in sticking with this post as I share my images for World Kindness Day.

Apparently the Daily Bitch is unaware that today is World Kindness Day. Shall we tell her?

Here’s what I find when I search for “world kindness day” on YouTube.

That video about World Kindness Day and Week reminds me that I’m thinking of donating any profits from my album of original songs to a charity benefiting those who deal with mental/behavioral health issues.

How are you going to spend World Kindness Day?

Thanks to all who show kindness, including YOU!

Categories: personal growth, photojournalism | Tags: Aesop, Barbra Streisand, cats, Joo Roo Tv, Lessons in Chemistry, November 13 2023, Robert Jay Lifton, The Daily Bitch Calendar, The Platinum Rule, Twitter, World Kindness | 12 Comments

Day 2474: Compassion

Posted on October 10, 2019 by Ann Koplow

In yesterday’s Coping and Healing group, the members chose to focus on the topic of “Compassion.”

What is your personal experience of compassion? What gets in the way of you experiencing compassion? How could you bring more compassion into your life?

In my responses to those questions about compassion, I mentioned self-compassion and also this song:

I had the compassion, just now, to choose a version of “Shower the People” by James Taylor that includes lyrics and which (I think!) is accessible to all my readers.

Here are some quotes about compassion:

“Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive.”
― Dalai Lama XIV, The Art of Happiness

“Compassion hurts. When you feel connected to everything, you also feel responsible for everything. And you cannot turn away. Your destiny is bound with the destinies of others. You must either learn to carry the Universe or be crushed by it. You must grow strong enough to love the world, yet empty enough to sit down at the same table with its worst horrors.”
― Andrew Boyd, Daily Afflictions: The Agony of Being Connected to Everything in the Universe“

“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.”
― Plato

“Our task must be to free ourselves… by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and its beauty.”
― Albert Einstein

“Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.”
― Leo Buscaglia

“No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.”
― Aesop

“When we give cheerfully and accept gratefully, everyone is blessed.”
― Maya Angelou

“It is easy enough to be friendly to one’s friends. But to befriend the one who regards himself as your enemy is the quintessence of true religion. The other is mere business.”
― Mahatma Gandhi

“Compassion is the basis of morality.”
― Arthur Schopenhauer

In the group yesterday, we also discussed the opposite of compassion, which some people thought was indifference and others thought was cruelty. Do you see compassion or the opposite of compassion in any of my other photos from yesterday?