Walking Pilgrim 7: Compassion

What moves us? Walking Pilgrim asks, moved because the old woman gave him money. One person sees a homeless person and sees "social garbage"; another sees the same person and feels sympathy or compassion. It's hard to say why. It's just the affects of a lifetime of experiences, a lifetime of thinking, and patterns of thinking, that affect us in numerous ways we can't see. Oh, and me? I guess the suffering of people moves me. Knowing that there are starving people in the world moves me, and motivates me. I try to look at the big picture, however. Tossing a few coins at a homeless person may not solve anything; in fact, it might make the problem worse.