The Compassion Course - a resource for personal growth

[JenniferSmith]

I like to share this resource each year, in June, when the course starts, as I think folks in this community would get a lot out of it. 

The Compassion Course is a wonderful program that helps you explore practical ways to understand, process, and become more in-tune with your feelings and as well as to connect, understand, and communicate with others.   People from all around the world participate so its a very diverse community, which I personally find inspiring as each person who joins is someone who is seeking to bring more empathy and compassion into their life. 

Participating in this course has made a big difference in my life, and has helped me transform and heal on a very deep level - both in terms of how I relate to myself, as well as to others. When I first joined the course, I thought it would mostly help my relationships with others, and it has. But what surprised me was how much this has helped my relationship with myself. That is where the deeper transformation has happened. The effects are subtle yet powerful and tangible.

The basic process of the course is this:  you get an email each week, with a lesson as well as some practices to help you learn the lesson. By having just one lesson per week, it gives you plenty of time to reflect and absorb the material. Then there are monthly zoom meetings to discuss the lessons from that month. You can join those live or view the recordings. There are also zoom practice groups to discuss and practice the lessons with others from the course, and a number of special trainings focused on specific topics, such as working with anger. 

What I appreciate is that you can choose how much or how little to engage with all of these various options, and so its very adaptable to your own schedule. If you want to get more involved and engage with others in the course, there are lots of ways to do that, and if you have more on your plate, or prefer to work in a more solitary manner, you can do that as well.

For the quality and depth of what this course provides, I feel the cost is extremely reasonable and as they don't want the cost to be a barrier, they offer a sliding fee scale. The course starts on June 19th. https://www.compassioncourse.org/