What Reincarnation Can Teach Us About Compassion

Growing up in the Buddhist tradition was sometimes a bit confusing. As a child, I would be angry at someone and instead of justifying it an adult would say, “Just remember: that person was your mother in a past lifetime.”

What? How is that useful? Well, whether we believe in reincarnation or not, thinking about the mere possibility that the person we’re pissed off at has shown us the same kindness our mother has, is often enough to snap us out of our storyline and to consider them with compassion.

There is a beautiful Buddhist text dating back to the fourteenth century known as the 37 Practices of a Bodhisattva. Bodhi can be translated from Sanskrit as “open” or “awake” while sattva can be translated as “being,” so it is an open-hearted being. A meditation master known as Ngulchu Thogme composed these verses so that we could live a full life with open hearts, in order to be helpful to those around us, including the people we have a hard time with. He has a verse that specifically encourages us to consider the complex concept of reincarnation, but as a way that we could actually generate compassion for the people that cause us anguish:

From beginningless time your mothers have cherished you.

If they now suffer, what good is your own happiness?

Therefore, in order to liberate limitless sentient beings,

Giving rise to bodhichitta is the practice of a Bodhisattva.