Widening the Circle of Compassion

What if you received an email from your boss inviting you to an all day seminar?  Suppose the only information that you receive is the name of the man conducting the seminar. So you "google" that name and can't find much information. You're pretty sure he's a Spanish historian, but that's it. Do you go?

You may have been to corporate seminars in the past, where the top boss tries to motivate everyone with team building cliches and then sequesters himself in his office for the next nine months. 

Or how about one of those employee attitude training days?

I remember one in which the boss decided that we needed to have more fun, so he started a new policy of calling us all every Thursday and leaving a voice mail telling us that the next day we would be  "Hawaiian Shirt Day,"  " Red Sweatshirt Day," or "Purple Bermuda Shorts Day." We would be expected to come to work on Fridays in the required goofy uniform to demonstrate our team spirit.  

I recently received an invitation to an all day seminar with Spanish Historian Dr. Luis Martin. Because I trust the people I work for, I figured it would be different than my past corporate meetings and agreed to attend. 

I am glad I did. 

I entered the meeting room feeling nervous about how I would be perceived by my boss and co workers and left at the end of the day seriously in love with them all. (Not eros, more like philia or agape).

Dr. Luis Martin has the unique ability to reach that place in us that recognizes truth and desires beauty. He creates an experience in which the self-conscious silliness drops away and makes room for the profound. What was extraordinary about that seminar was the opportunity that it created for growth. I'm still unpacking it today.

Sometimes all we can do is point to truth, or beauty, or wisdom so that others can discover it themselves.

Dr. Martin invoked, Einstein, Plato, Aristotle, The Declaration of Independence, Teresa of Avila, and Ignatius of Loyola and intertwined them with the hopes and dreams of each of us in that room. He challenged us to examine our lives and our work anew.

He opened the doors. We chose whether to explore inside.

What continues to resonate with me today are these words from Albert Einstein

“A human being is part of a whole, called by us the ‘Universe’ —a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts, and feelings, as something separated from the rest—a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. 

Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”

Dr. Martin also asked us to remember the last sentence of the Declaration of Independence, which also works amazingly well today.

"... and for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each others lives our fortunes, and our sacred honor."

Wow! What if we conducted our lives and our businesses that way today.  

So as I seek to widen my circle of compassion I give thanks for Dr. Luis Martin and those with whom I work.