I RECEIVED a phone call from a good friend in LA asking if I would interview one of the leading figures in the world of compassion and psychotherapy, Professor Paul Gilbert. “What an honour,” I replied to my good buddhi Patrick in LA, followed by a very quick yes. Prof Gilbert is the founder of what is called compassion-focused therapy and leads the way in research into the benefits of self-compassion. It’s a no-brainer this, a practice designed for our planet on many levels and the good news is that it can be measured both individually and collectively. I might be wrong and I might even be called naive but when I recollect early years on the Falls I picked up on this sense that we had for each other and what was evident throughout our struggle was we looked out for each other. How we knew and felt injustice and were willing to risk our lives in the face of the tyranny of injustice. It’s as simple as this: the more we looked out for each other the more we experienced oneness and unity. I must add that I was also aware that this oneness and unity transcended divisions of us and them, and I would name that which divides us as ignorance. There were and still are visionaries that guide us towards that unity and here I must add that the unity that I see is informed by compassion. I was lucky to attend a meeting in the Waterfront Hall last Wednesday evening to hear great speakers transcend that ignorance and what I picked up and brought away from that meeting was hope. Hope for a new future for all, jobs, housing, benefits, travel, education, and health for us all. I felt that everyone within that arena shared that experience. This is reality and this is now. In what appears to be an insane world, I picked up sanity.This is the theme of my conversation with Prof Gilbert tomorrow night. How can we become a compassion-focused Island. An island for all, a place that transcends division, inequality, hate and greed. An island where the other no longer exists as that is where the separation begins, when focus through the eyes of division rather than compassion. I can’t wait to hear what Prof Gilbert has to say. I personally believe, from what we all have been through, the suffering, the heartache, that now is the time more than ever to wake up to the possibilities of a bright future for all. This is our task, we know what to do and we know how to do it. Let’s practise compassion in all our affairs, remembering that it starts with you.
