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1-Page Summary of Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life

Overview

The 12-step program has been immensely helpful to alcoholics. It helps them get a grip on their lives and live soberly. The steps of the program can be applied to other areas as well, including compassion. In today’s world where violence is rampant and people are divided, we need more compassion. However, starting with compassion isn’t easy because it means giving up selfishness and mistrust in others.

There are many important ideas in this passage. It discusses why people should study those who they don’t like; why we should take the time to learn about Greek tragedy and how it was used by Shakespeare; and how religions have a common theme of suffering.

Big Idea #1: Compassion is our natural ability to put ourselves in somebody else’s shoes.

When you turn on the TV, you’ll see a lot of bad news. There are refugees who can’t get into countries, war is brutal and people are starving and poor around the world. This calls for more compassion to balance out all that bad news.

When we talk about compassion, what do we mean? It comes from the Latin word patiri which means to experience pain or suffering. When you feel compassion for someone, you essentially feel that person’s pain as if it were your own.

In practice, compassion can be summed up by the Golden Rule: Treat others as you would have them treat you. It motivated philanthropists such as Florence Nightingale to take action and inspired Martin Luther King Jr. to fight for civil rights and lead the movement.

If we are to have compassion, then it must come from somewhere. That place is our brain. Compassion and selfishness are both hardwired into the brain, which means that they are in us since birth.

Humans have evolved over time. We’ve developed a neocortex that allows us to think and feel compassion for others. This is the part of the brain that helps us create art, religion, and other things that make life more meaningful than just having creature comforts.

The neocortex and the limbic system are linked to positive emotions, such as joy and maternal affection. As a result, our brains have been in conflict since we were born.

In order to have compassion, you must first understand it. The following steps will help you achieve that:

Big Idea #2: There are 12 steps to a compassionate life – the first is to learn.

We seem to be a million miles away from compassion. How can we even begin to change things for the better? To start on that journey, the author compiled research and created an easily followable program—one aimed at replacing egotism, prejudices, violence, and self-righteousness with compassion.

Her program has 12 steps. Each step includes a new discipline that builds upon the previous one. For example, in Alcoholics Anonymous, you are expected to practice each of the 12 steps until they become part of your daily routine. Therefore, transformation is slow and incremental; it doesn’t happen at once but rather over time as you learn more about compassion by reading different traditions such as Buddhism and Greek philosophical rationalism. You can form groups where you discuss these texts with others who are learning about compassion so that you can help each other expand your knowledge on this topic. Keep a notebook for passages or excerpts that inspire or mean something to you personally.

You should immerse yourself in the teachings of great sages such as Buddha, Confucius and Socrates. These teachings will help you become compassionate because they focus on refocusing your mind to develop a reflective self that is separate from your selfish instincts.