Thich Nhat Hanh Quotes

Give me ... a compassionate heart, quickly moved to grieve for the woes of others and to active pity for them, even as our Lord Jesus Christ beheld our poverty and hasted to help us. Give me grace ever to alleviate the crosses and difficulties of those around me, and never to add to them; teach me to be a consoler in sorrow, to take thought for the stranger, the widow, and the orphan; let my charity show itself not in words only but in deed and truth.

True compassion means not only feeling another's pain but also being moved to help relieve it.

If you're in trouble, or hurt or need - go to the poor people. They're the only ones that'll help - the only ones.

Though we cannot relieve all the distressed, we should relieve as many as we can.

Learn to succor the distressed

If I see a down-and-out I can't walk past, it really gets to me and I want to do everything I can.

Writing about a person whose struggle you wish you could solve is an act of compassion and also, frankly, opportunism.

We all, as individuals, can and should act compassionately and charitably. We can volunteer our time, energy, and dollars to help the underprivileged. We can feed the hungry, house the homeless. Most of us feel a moral and ethical responsibility to do so - to 'do unto others.'

You never know how many people are compassionate about something, especially when it's not happening to you. You just hope somebody's out there helping.

If you care about people, then you're willing to act not just with compassion, but you're also willing to act with courage.

we come to realize that other people's welfare is just as important as our own. In helping them, we help ourselves. In helping ourselves, we help the world.

Compassion is a mind that removes the suffering that is present in the other.

Compassion is our most important practice. Understanding brings compassion. Understanding the suffering that living beings undergo helps liberate the energy of compassion. And with that energy you know what to do.

Compassion being action without motive, without self-interest, without any sense of fear, without any sense of pleasure.

A good motivation is what is needed: compassion without dogmatism, without complicated philosophy; just understanding that others are human brothers and sisters and respecting their human rights and dignities. That we humans can help each other is one of our unique human capacities.

I always thought it was great to be able to make people feel better. It was a little like being God.

The surest way of finding peace of mind is that which helps the greatest number of others to find it

I could see how you could do extreme things for the person you loved. Adam One said that when you loved a person, that love might not always get returned the way you wanted, but it was a good thing anyway because love went out all around you like an energy wave, and a creature you didn't know would be helped by it.

The aim is not for me to be right. The aim is to make sure that we keep the focus on the people who are suffering. That's what we're here for.

By compassion we make others' misery our own, and so, by relieving them, we relieve ourselves also.

Real strength has to do with helping others.

Alyosha's heart could not bear uncertainty, for the nature of his love was always active. He could not love passively; once he loved, he immediately also began to help.

I would say that the thrust of my life has been initially about getting free, and then realizing that my freedom is not independent of everybody else. Then I am arriving at that circle where one works on oneself as a gift to other people so that one doesn't create more suffering. I help people as a work on myself and I work on myself to help people.

Why should my love be powerless to help another?

True compassion is not just an emotional response, but a firm commitment founded on reason. Therefore, a truly compassionate attitude toward others does not change, even if they behave negatively. Through universal altruism, you develop a feeling of responsibility for others: the wish to help them actively overcome their problems.