Understanding Compassion

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Compassion is a type of meditation therapy which is used recently. As a new topic, at least for me, this encouraged me to learn about this topic and gave me the idea for my paper. Compassion has many definitions, one of these definitions is the feeling that emerges in witnessing another's suffering and that motivates a following desire to help (Goetz, Keltner, & Thomas, 2010). Hofmann, Grossman, and Hinton (2011) describe compassion as a path leading to greater awareness, aimed to focus awareness upon alleviation of the suffering of all sensitive beings. Moreover, compassion is thought to have arisen as the affective element of a caregiving system, designed to help raise vulnerable progeny to the age of viability (Goetz, Keltner, & Thomas, 2010).
About the compassion history, self-compassion has been discussed in Eastern philosophy (Buddhism in particular) for centuries (Allen & Leary, 2010). One of the key principles emphasized within many schools of Buddhism is learning to be compassionate which is supposed to help individuals develop their ability to recognize and motivate themselves towards meaningful change. In addition, compassion within Buddhism is seen as a way of helping individuals to practice their minds, which can drive to a general improvement in well-being and eventual enlightenment (Pauley & McPherson, 2010).
Although self-compassion has been discussed in Eastern philosophy (Buddhism in particular) for centuries, it appeared recently only with Neff’s publication in 2003 (Allen & Leary, 2010). Neff (2009) reported that self-compassion is a relatively new construct in the field of personality and social psychology. Furthermore, self-compassion conceptualized in three primary features by Neff; self-kindness, common h...

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... practitioners for this purpose.
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In compassion meditation interventions, participants must receive detailed instructions pertaining to the meditative technique that they are to practice in class and then at home for the following weeks (Desbordes et al. 2012). The intervention programs must be examined or tested in cultural context in order to explain the protective power of self-compassion in a clear manner (Ozyesdl & Akbag, 2013). In addition, therapy may be further advanced by improving ways of accessing and facilitating the development of different forms of interpersonal safeness and compassion and addressing the fears of compassion (Gilbert, 2010).
Acknowledgements
My deep appreciation and thanks go to my husband Dr. Feras Alzboun for his support, and for Dr. Hasan Alomari for his close supervision, and valuable advice for completing this work.

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