Empathy is a rose flower. If you have allergies, please turn off any jokes about allergies and say you don’t have any for five minutes. Be mindful and intentional of the story. 

Fully bloomed, adding warmth and beauty to everything around it, the rose is recognized everywhere as a symbol of Love.  While its beauty is extravagant, its scent, can touch even the darkest of hearts. 

In order for us to enjoy it, we must gently position our nose over it and smell its aromas. 

The smells can be the most intoxicating thing in the world. It can fill you with joy, laughter and warmth. 

That is what empathy is at its most glorious level of Love. 

The Rose of Empathy

Like a rose, Empathy can be the most beautiful thing radiating in the room.

Ever have someone walk in a room with a smile that radiates joy and happiness.  That person, everyone just smiles when they walk in. Even though, maybe, no one knows them. That is the real power of Empathy radiating energy into a room. 

It is also something that if we approach it delicately and with respect to the care it needs, we too can enjoy its beauty. 

The Rose for all its beauty is but a fragile creature. Even the simplest breeze can cause a petal to fall forever.  

The Rose also has a side of it that attacks when Empathy is lost; and we become arrogant, self-centered and uncaring. 

The Sword

Thorns will stick and attack us and destroy anything in its way.  Without the soft gentle care of empathy a rose garden becomes nothing more than a wasteland of thorn bushes. A world without empathy becomes a world of thorn bushes. 

Empathy is the core of what is needed to walk our Spiritual Path in this world. 

The Path of Mindfulness says that every time we approach someone, whether for millionth time or the first time. Always approach them with the gentle empathy of smelling a rose. 

The Destroyer

The Maya Express bullet train of life is not a place for Empathy.

They will deploy lots of weapons to combat empathy. They will unleash their entire arsenal if they have to. Jealousy, envy, greed, lust, complacency, addiction, and the list goes on and on.  

Distrust is one of Maya’s favorite weapons versus Empathy.

Just the other day I was at the mechanics for a quick oil change. I told them last year I was handing them my trust of car care and all I ask is the same care back.  They have delivered. 

As I sat in the waiting room with other customers, another customer started cussing up a storm to the rest of us customers. Apparently the mechanic was checking tire pressure while doing the oil change.  

Me:”they do that with the oil change you asked for, it’s just standard practice”

Them:”well in Minnesota I got screwed over by a mechanic for doing this and this and this”

Me:”we aren’t in Minnesota and these are good guys”

Them:”well I just have a hard time trusting 🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬”

Old man beside me:”so and so brings his car here”

Angry man:”oh I guess I can trust them then”

The lack of Empathy made the anger in this man rise and rise.  He was almost ready to barge into the bay area just because they checked his tire pressure. He was not mindful at all of where he was, he was lost in distrust and anger.

The Soothsayer

His Empathy is so broken that he has to have someone he trusts say the same words I did, before he will listen. When the trusted person injected a little Empathy, only then, did he calm down. 

Empathy slows the bullet like speed of the Maya Express and makes us more aware of the other passengers on the train cart of life. 

They cannot have us influencing the passengers in such a way.  The goal of Maya is to keep everyone on board and off their Path.  They need you there, lifetime after lifetime. Allowing any kind of serious Empathy would be detrimental to their coveted passenger size. 

The Greeter 

The Path of Mindfulness though is the brick foundation that can’t be blown over by the wolves of distrust.  It’s here to stay. Once when we take the trip in our hearts down the Path of Mindfulness, Empathy locks in forever. For the rest of the time we are on this train cart of life, we are a solid weapon of Empathy.  

How do we truly walk the Path of Mindfulness?  Same way the words on the Methodist Church T-shirt said on the Path of Christianity. Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors, Open Tables. Walk the Path of Walking.

Every living creature that approaches you, approach them as if they have never done you any harm. Approach them as if they are the most interesting creature you have ever met.  If they are human, approach them as if you are meeting your best friend for the first time in a decade.

The Forgiver

While Empathy does require forgiveness, it isn’t to the other people on the train. It’s for your own Mental Health.  Tethering our minds to another person negatively, ties us to the train of Maya.  Even while trying to walk our path, it will trip us up. 

Empathy doesn’t say let the other person go unpunished. It’s the understanding that we aren’t in control of how they are punished, we are only in control how we handle ourselves around them. 

Do we let the past influence our tone and inflections or do we humble ourselves to greet them as a new soul. 

The Protector

Remember Empathy doesn’t view the world just through rose colored glasses, but with a wall of sharp protective thorns also. 

Try to approach each person mindful that while we’re all the same souls, we are a different person every time we meet each other. 

The Path of Mindfulness becomes the protector and thorns for the Rose of Empathy. It will keep you intentional and mindful to protect you from any harm. 

If they exhibit signs of past wrongs, walk away whenever possible. They are not ones we want walking on our Path of Association. 

After speaking to the man, he started ranting again, he was just having a bad day and he wasn’t going to continue to stay calm.  So as I waited on my car, i went outside, walked a path back and forth, and started writing this story.

The Self

Above all else, be Empathetic to your own Soul. Love yourself first.

Be forgiving for mistakes, encourage yourself, discourage saying hateful things to yourself. Walk away from those who don’t have your best interests at heart. 

Don’t place unnecessary thorns on yourself or strangers getting an oil change. 

You can’t share your rose of Empathy if your thorns are too many. 

One of my favorite ways of self-care and Empathy with Love is up next, through the Path of Music. 

Yours Forever Grateful.