Teaching Kids To Live A Compassionate Life

Children learn what they live. This is as true in developing compassion as it is with anything else. So to instill compassion in our children, we must live a compassionate life.

Fortunately, even if compassion does not come naturally in your household, there are many ways you can develop it. The first step is identifying what compassion is.

Be Aware

Compassion is being aware and sensitive to others’ emotions, encompassing the desire to alleviate their sadness. What a beautiful notion, for each of us to be aware and empathetic to others’ feelings. Wouldn’t the world be a better place if each of us practiced compassion in our daily lives?

There are many things your child can do to help them learn to live a compassionate life. Volunteering to help others is the most important way to teach compassion. Start your children out slowly by getting them involved at your local animal shelter. Many people find it much easier to be compassionate with animals than with other people.

Volunteer

Perhaps it is their helpless nature or the fact that we don’t see an animal’s misfortune as something they caused. Regardless, volunteering with animals will teach your child that there is so much more going on around them than their own lives.

Once your child has spent a few months volunteering with animals, they have graduated to the next level, volunteering to help other people. In each community, there are hundreds, if not thousands of people in need. Check with your local nursing home, veteran’s hospitals, youth organizations, and area churches to see what volunteer opportunities are available in your community.

Live Compassionately

Talk to your child about the many opportunities, why these people need help, and ask your child how they would like to help. Being aware of the many hardships in your community is one of the best ways to develop compassion in your child.

When it comes to developing compassion in your child, it’s more about what you do than what you don’t do. Lead by example. If compassion is not something that comes naturally to you, spend some time developing your own compassion. Each day, perform a new act of kindness.

Whether it is stopping to let a pedestrian cross the street, offering a homeless person a meal, or expressing sadness at others’ misfortune, these acts of kindness will help you make compassion a way of life for you and your family.

Instilling compassion in your family’s life will improve your life and the lives of countless others. Not only because you see the joy or appreciation in someone else, but because being compassionate brings a feeling of joy to yourself.

Developing compassion as a way of life means living a fulfilled life of passion. It is a life that struggles and strives towards improvement always, every second, and every hour of every day.

If ever the lesson of leading by example was more fitting, one need only look at the followers of Christ. If we live our lives, Christ will follow as others will follow.

Please share this post and leave a comment. I would love to know how you live compassionately!