Thoughtfulness and Compassion

Thoughtfulness - I wrote recently about wisdom, specifically "discernment" and "judgment", which is only part of what I interpret Thoughtfulness to mean. The other part is mindfulness. I learned about mindfulness theory by reading Ellen Langer's acclaimed book. In that book, Ellen sought to differentiate mindfulness from mindlessness, awareness from routine. But I take the idea of mindfulness to mean more than being aware; it is having a confident, positive, imaginative mindset. For a more indepth explanation of mindfulness theory, please check out Ellen's book or look up her research online (findarticles.com, for example, has a few articles on the subject).

Compassion - I define this quality as simply being humane or caring about humanity. I read a few years ago in a book about virtue ethics that compassion is essentially doing the things we would for someone we actually loved. Take for example a homeless person on a street corner who is terribly hungry: we don't "love" this person in the sense we do a loved one, such as a family member, but if we are compassionate, we nonetheless care for this person and treat them "as if" this person were close to us. Also, much like love, compassionate acts are selfless for the most part and never self promoting.