THE ABUSE OF COMPASSION

I am becoming increasingly irritated at the double standard of virtues. As though everyone is very aware of what they are and the definitions of them, but not how easy and common it is for someone else to abuse the virtue by twisting it into a double edged sword that works to someone elses advantage no matter how it is applied.

     Compassion seems to be the worst of them, because while we are so desperately needing to be seen as people having it, we seem to be expected to employ almost godlike amounts of it from others, and on their conditions and not ours. It is the very thing that reveals us as the kind of people we truly are inside and should attract other compassionate people up as more human than others, but ironically attracts the kinds of people that can use and exploit it; their very nature to have and take, magnetically drawing them to prey on us and our need to express it as being the very thing they need to enable them achieve it to their standards.

     Compassion is the most gracious act of kindness when it is offered freely, but when it is expected and demanded, it is simply a tool to use your own empathy for an apathetic goal. You are expected to be a better person; to excuse and forgive when you have been slighted or debased,or insulted and disrespected regardless of how deeply. This can happen for days, or weeks, or even years, with no care or thought given by another to the extent of damage that is incurred by the person who endures it. They finally, just like anyone else, reach the breaking point, and begin to express well deserved anger at the blatant disregard. Whatever befalls an undeserving person for the abuse of compassion SHOULD be their just deserts, and the consequences for their actions, whatever they may be, well deserved. But compassionate people are different. They actually feel what it is the other person could not. They are, again, prompted by a higher inner voice to employ the other side of compassion. mercy and pity. This is the abuse of compassionate people.
It's a lot like having an angry dog barking at the end of a chain whose wish to get off of it is so badly wanted that it very nearly chokes itself to death. It heaves on the chain expending every ounce of energy until its eyes roll back in its head and it froths at the mouth.

     Any truly compassionate person would see this plea for assistance as being a greater need than the original insult. And so they lean in and do the very first thing that will alleviate suffering, and take the dog off the chain. Which, to no great surprise, turns on them immediately and bites them in the face.

Compassion is a virtue of the highest order, and to have it, and be seen by others as possesing it, is the very reason why we are so often destroyed for it. Because it serves the same purpose on either end by being what allows them to be gracious regardless of whether we recieve it, and merciful if we do not.

Compassion is another one of those virtues that I believe needs to be admired in other people for its ability to be balanced, and not so much as simply having an overabundance of it that it turns self sacrificing people into unrecognized martyrs.

We have a word for forgotten martyrs. It's called a victim. And what we need to do to stop being exploited by our virtue is to understand that we become victims when we simply allow other people to define the concept of compassion and expect ourselves to live up to it to be seen as worthy.

     I have been told, on more than one occasion,that I have the compassion of a saint, but in the same breath, also told that I am an utter fool for giving so much of myself in places where it is simply not being appreciated or returned. I agonize over the fine line that I try to walk between being as useful and helpful as possible without going so far as to be seen as a door mat. But the trick is to be aware of the fact that the line is MINE to draw. Not theirs. If I were to allow someone else to draw the line between what is just and fair, and what they wanted, the line would be as far as the horizon of their wishes and wants. And for each person, you would be expected to extend yourself to theirs as well. It should comes as no surprise that when you are trying to satisfy everyone by keeping a foot at the edge of everyone's horizons, that you can't help but feel stretched thin. As though it is your job alone to satisfy the needs and wants of others without the recognition for your desire to accomplish it to their idea of acceptance. This is a very hard thing for compassionate people to understand, but there has to be a certain degree of 'quid pro quo' for the things that you do to be seen as compassionate. The 'this for that' mentality is counter intuitive to a person who is raised and led to believe that it is better to give than receive, but maybe that is because compassionate people were never taught the unspoken axiom of more greedy people. That being 'it is better to want and to take, than it is to have and to give'. Compassionate people don't understand this. They see it every day, and endeavor to be the epitome of its opposite, but in doing so become the very vehicle to perpetuate it if they can not see that the line between the two is for them to discern and not for others to define.

Be compassionate for things that strive to uphold the idea of decency and respect to other people and things, but do not be so quick to give absolution and excuses to those who saw no need to express it beforehand, toward you. Forgiveness and absolution should be reserved for those who endure to never have it be required of them in the first place. Mercy and pity are the secondary gifts compassionate people give to others when they try and fail regardless, not the second chance to be given to abusers of compassion that give them the strength, ability, and opportunity to do it again without consequence.

    Sooner or later, the epiphany has to dawn on us all. Self-sacrifice has its own rewards, but no so long as those who demand it of us rely on it as the impetus for their own lack of respect. Because then, you are not seen or respected as compassionate. You are merely a pawn in a game that has no use of true compassion to begin with.