30 July 2010 - 12:36am

There are two types of empathic responses that you use when you connect to others, compassion or pity. One is empowering, the other is disempowering. One focuses on limitation, the other holds the energy of expansion. One is helpful and the other is not. With one you disempower both yourself and the other person and in so doing risk re-opening karmic cycles with them that you may have already closed.

You make the choice to connect with compassion or pity in a single instant and then you either become part of others' drama or step aside and allow them to light their candle from the light you extend to them.
The less helpful of these two responses is pity because through it you agree with someone's helplessness, lack of power, confusion, doubt and lack of faith. You connect to them from your own woundedness and are reminded of your pain. With pity you are in agreement with their pain and feel the best solution is to offer your wound to show them they are not alone in their suffering. Sometimes others want to be rescued when they are in a powerless place. Are you willing to play the role of their rescuer?

Compassion requires more effort because with it you release the need to be 'doing' something for others. Compassion does not ask you to do anything, other than to see others in their best light, highest vibration and full potential. Even though their wounds remind you of your own, you can respond from your healed center instead of remembering your own pain. You can be a powerful example for others but you cannot be powerful for them.

Those who ask for pity are seeking validation for their suffering. They may respond to your offer of compassion with anger because you are reminding them that suffering is a choice, just as being powerful is a choice. Do you need to be reminded that you once suffered like them or are you grateful to have found your strength and can show others that they can find theirs too? In times of transformation use compassion to remind others of their ability to heal any wound, that they can find their shining light within and do not need pity. They will find the way to end their suffering when they remember who they are and are able to rescue themselves through their powerful inner light within.

Article Copyright ©2010 by Jennifer Hoffman. All rights reserved.