In order to make your sense of closeness more vivid, you could take a further step in connecting to the people who have benefited you from afar. You could take a look at the labels on the clothes you are wearing to see where they were made. Taking advantage of the easy access to information and images that the Internet affords you, you can investigate to actively educate yourself about working conditions and the experiences of factory workers in the place your clothes were made. Do not wait for news of their lives to reach you. Extend yourself and connect with them. Do this with the awareness that, no matter how different the backdrop of their lives appears, just like you they yearn to be happy and free of suffering.
17th Karmapa
from the book
Read a random quote or see all quotes by the 17th Karmapa.
Further quotes from the book Interconnected :
- The full vividness of direct contact
- Self-discipline
- Inner conditions of interdependence
- Dismantling the walls that separate us
- You exist in connection with others
- Remaining indifferent to the suffering of animals
- The opportunity to love
- Our life is like a vast net
- Time to act
- Extending gratitude in all directions
- The air we breathe
- An important source of closeness and love
- The imagination to see the other as free and happy
- Self-reliance
- Knowing more is not a substitute for feeling more
- Acting against self-serving impulses
- The interdependence between us and the world
- Noticing the collective effects of our individual actions
- Webs of interdependence