By Laurie Seidel
These are challenging times for all of us. In just a few weeks we’ve made huge changes in our lives to protect our health and that of our families, friends, and community in the face of coronavirus. Right now there is much uncertainty as well as constantly changing conditions, stretching our resilience to the max.
What is the Charter for Compassion?
Aware that compassion is at the heart of all we are doing right now, both individually and collectively, we want to introduce you to the Charter for Compassion. This community initiative will seek to grow, deepen, and strengthen the bond between us all. We believe strongly that we are in this together, and that we will get through this together. And there is no better time to show compassion than these current times.
Organizing Compassion in Our Community
We often consider compassion from the individual perspective, but what about a community? Is it possible for a community to become, each day, a more compassionate place? Compassion is heart-centered, with a strong desire to alleviate suffering whenever, wherever, and however it presents.
What It Means to be a Compassionate City
A compassionate city is a mindful city, an intentional city. It is a place where organized, spontaneous, personal, and collective acts of compassion occur. Also, throughout that city citizens recognize suffering and act to alleviate it. In simple terms, compassion is a verb.
Well over a year ago, the Mindfulness Institute of the Roanoke Valley began an inquiry regarding the Charter for Compassion (charterforcompassion.org). One of our board members had learned about the Compassionate City designation of Louisville, KY, including their multi-year journey led by Mayor Fischer. We reached out to members of our city government and had a series of conference calls with compassionate leaders in Louisville. Often in these discussions, someone would say about Roanoke “We are a community that already has many shining examples of compassion in action, like ______!” Aware of these strengths as well as the opportunities to deepen and broaden this work, those shining examples led us toward a compassionate community initiative of our own.
We want to be warm, caring, and compassionate human beings, but what does it mean to be compassionate? The Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford University School of Medicine states that “compassion, a prosocial trait, is innate to us and lies at the very centerpiece of our common humanity”.
Space for All To Participate
We’ve learned through this exploration of the Charter for Compassion that compassionate acts in a compassionate city have no limitations; there are no prescribed methods for alleviating suffering. Compassion fosters and supports an environment of invitation — each citizen, individually and collectively, is asked to be compassion however they are called to alleviate suffering.
With no prescribed methods, compassion can become the fluid, dynamic lived experience of organizations and individuals within the community. Each organization and each individual creates unique expressions of this collective intention through compassionate action. In this work, no one is left out, everyone is seen, and we lean into suffering where it manifests within our community.
A Vision for a Compassionate Community
Can we envision a community in which the practice of compassion is understood to be as important for the health and well-being of our citizens as other health initiatives? Additionally, can we envision a community where we teach and apply compassion as a principal that ties us all together (our common humanity)?
The Mindfulness Institute looks forward to facilitating and supporting this work, as Roanoke, Virginia becomes the first designated Compassionate City in the State of Virginia. But we don’t want only to support the creation of visions; we want to help empower and enact visions; we want to help measure how enacting those visions affect Roanoke; we want to help adjust those visions to make them better.
Stay tuned; there is more to come from our Mayor, our City Council, and the Mindfulness Institute of the Roanoke Valley. In these challenging times, let’s continue to let our concern for others lead us through.
Click here to read the official Charter for Compassion (CFC) here on their website.