111. What Compassion Demands

There are moments when you must ignore the rules in order to do what is right. You must keep this in mind, lest you adopt the false belief that you are always constrained by the rules. If you believe this, you might do wrong by quietly following the rules instead of doing the right thing, which also happens to be forbidden.

Fortunately, such occasions are rare. You can usually live congruently with others, in the ways they understand and appreciate. You can do this while also creatively bending and changing the rules where it’s possible for you to do so, in order to live a life that is free, joyful, and meaningfully yours. In general, congruence is beneficial, because others will then accept you as one of them, and this is part of building solidarity and community.

But there are also times when you will need to take a bigger risk. Times when you will need to do something that will shock the sensibilities of your community because it violates the rules they hold dear. You need to take this risk when you see that if you do not, compassion will be denied, either now or in the future.

It is essential that compassion be the motivating force in such a decision. If it isn’t then you risk breaking the rules for the wrong reasons, possibly even reasons that benefit the strong and abled at the expense of the weak and disabled. When you act from compassion, you are attentive to the needs of others, in particular the needs of the disadvantaged, and you will act in support of those needs.

More often than not, the disadvantaged group will include you, and so there will be those who will oppose you simply because they see you will benefit. But in truth, we all benefit from a more compassionate world, so compassionate actions are always also self-interested actions.

When compassion itself is actively threatened, when the world itself is headed towards greater suffering and violence, then you must act. You will act because you see the inescapable necessity of action. You will do whatever is necessary, regardless of the personal cost, regardless of the rules that will be broken. You will act decisively, clearly, and without hesitation to do exactly what compassion demands of you in this moment.