COMPASSION vs. SENTIMENTALITY,
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article by Jenka

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Most of us are not comfortable with compassion. Given a choice, we are much more likely to retreat into sentimentality because it's a "feel good" sensation and strokes our ego while compassion, which sometimes requires administering a swift kick in the posterior, is much less satisfying and at its most effective seldom "makes nice."

The people I remember, and am most grateful to, are the ones I considered cruel and unfeeling when they were being truly compassionate toward me.

Sentimentality is a belief in illusion and is very effectively exploited by the Barracudas of our world.

In fact, the information presented to the public is usually carefully culled and slanted, if not always for the benefit of the few in manipulating the many, then at the very least to reflect the personal bias of those presenting us with that particular perspective.

The real world for each of us, the only one we have the power to change, is the one we can take part in physically and observe with our own eyes. So it is much more productive and "real" for us to invest our money in our own backyard.

When you contribute to faceless organizations, more often than not, much of that money never goes beyond assuring the survival of the organization and providing its executives with the lifestyle to which, thanks to you, they have become accustomed. Even assuming the best of scenarios, your money will seldom end up where you intended it to or imagined it would.

Organized charity has become "big business" and its true colours are starting to emerge, thanks to some journalists, like, O'Reilly.

Do not give up control of any aspect of your life to other people.

Giving money to an intermediary, is not charity. It is just a way to make ourselves feel good about who we are, without actually having to "do" anything. Shirking our responsibility never works. When we empower other people to take care of our charity for us, they will surely use that power to further their own ends and not ours.

Institutional charity, such as government programs, is also the product of sentimentality. We have more than ample evidence that institutional charity does not work. The anonymity of the process makes it the perfect avenue for the people who follow the road of least resistance and are not constrained by moral or ethical standards.

I once drove someone, who happened to own a business, to a welfare office and watched another lady in a mink coat, dripping real gold jewellery also collect her check. She told me that our government paid fourteen hundred dollars a month for her apartment as well as covered her utility bills.

I asked one of the welfare workers how that could be and was told that their department was not allowed to force anyone to live at a lower level of income than they were accustomed to.

I also knew one man who collected four separate welfare checks, each under a different name, with only mail boxes for addresses. By the time I met him, he had been doing that for several years without getting caught. I watched him enjoy other people's tax dollars, work when he felt like it and only if he got paid under the table.

These are not isolated incidents, despite the assurances of the programs' proponents, nor are they a new phenomenon.

While still in high school, I recall asking my classmates about their career plans and being frankly shocked when one of them announced that she intended to get pregnant, right after graduation, so she could go on welfare.

Despite the overwhelming evidence of such abuses, there are people who say that they would rather give to ten con artists, just to make sure that they do not miss the one truly needy person among them. That is sentimentality and is, in great measure, responsible for creating an entire underground culture of permanent dependents.

Many people who beg are not interested in getting back on their feet. In fact they may not even be grateful for our helping hand. More often than not, they have contempt for the working lifestyle. So all we are succeeding at is enabling them to continue in their parasitic existence and reinforcing their opinion that, those of us who work for a living, are fools.

I recall asking one young woman why she did not go to work instead of sitting on the corner all day and asking everyone who passed by for change. Her response was a total surprise. Dripping contempt in her voice, she declared that she wasn't about to become a slave, like me, and sit in a box all day pushing papers for the rest of her life. I could not pass up the opportunity of pointing out that she was obviously not too proud to take money from a boxed-in paper-pusher.

One day I found myself across town from where I lived and decided to wait out the rush hour traffic over a drink. As I walked into a posh cocktail lounge, I noticed an elegantly dressed man looking at me in a strange fashion and immediately recognized him as the shabby looking beggar I regularly ran into coming out of my neighbourhood supermarket.

He smiled wistfully at me and said that I had just ruined a good thing for him because now he would have to find another corner to ply his trade from. I was genuinely curious as to why a grown healthy man would prefer to beg rather than go to work. He could not keep from bragging that he averaged fifty to fifty-five thousand dollars a year, tax free, and didn't have to put up with a boss.

Do not trust appearances. It is only the users who take the Trouble to cultivate the right image and spout the right words to get under our skin. The really needy, who are struggling to get on their feet, are usually awkward and too embarrassed by their circumstances to be effective beggars.

Sentimentality does not work. Compassion, on the other hand, works because it is personal. It requires more than throwing money at someone, so we can feel good about ourselves. Compassion requires a commitment to do what is right, but not necessarily "nice."

I once was approached on the street by a lady who wanted money for a cup of coffee. I replied that I would not give her cash, but I would be glad to buy her a cup. She ordered some designer concoction that cost as much as a meal and we sat down together.

I found out that the county had provided her with several jobs, but she thought that the people she was sent to work for were too demanding. She admitted that she was receiving financial support from the government, and said the reason she had no cash left was because her nephew wanted to drive to the coast, so she gave him her last seventy dollars.

She also mentioned that she probably should not have dressed so well because people were more reluctant to give you money.

Obviously she had done that before, and intended to do it again. Sure enough about a week later, there she was, on that same corner, asking people for coffee and cigarette money.

One guy wouldn't just settle for change. He asked for five dollars so he could get a particular type of meal. I asked him why he was begging and was told that he could not get work as a carpenter. Apparently, when you are a carpenter, it is better to ask others to feed you than to degrade yourself with other types of work.

In California, the beggars have gone one step further. They now threaten you, if you refuse to give them your money.

Spending some time with the people we believe we are helping is a great way to open our eyes to the "real world."

If enough individuals gave up sentimentality in favour of compassion, not only would we have fewer beggars running around our streets, but those in power would have a much harder time manipulating the masses to fall in with their personal agendas and propagating the types of emotional overreactions we are now so frequently seeing around the globe.

Jenka Author of "A Heaven on Earth" (Human Alchemy Through The Practical Use Of Universal Principles) © - 2002 - Jenka Publications - All rights Reserved. Additional Articles at: Send comments to: heaven@jenkapublications.com

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