Do You Care for Your Cow Only When She Gives Milk?

I've spent the better part of the last two weeks thinking about compassion. What is it? If it is supposedly engrained in our DNA why aren't we using it fully?
We Americans are fantastic in a crisis. Give us a hurricane and we'll rush to your side and help you rebuild. Don't get me wrong, it's a wonderful trait. But, sometimes it seems as though we need a crisis of historic magnitude to empathize with someone. So, it begs the question, is it compassion? Are we rushing to the other side of the country because we feel their pain or because we are desperately in need of some major karma points? Does it even matter?
Over the years of ups and downs I've noticed a few things. Truly compassionate people are the walking wounded. We know what it feels like to be disenfranchised, how much pain truly affects all aspects of a life, how deep the black hole of loneliness truly is. People who have lived a fairly benign, uneventful life tend to look at someone at the very bottom of the social ladder and offer a quick fix. When the need continues past their own imagined deadline they bolt, physically or emotionally, and decide the person never really wanted to be helped in the first place. They simply cannot comprehend the idea that true compassion means not just rescuing someone from drowning, but also sticking around long enough to teach them to swim. As a result, it's as though the person gets saved from drowning only to be pushed out of the car on the way home. It doesn't mean you are now responsible for that person the rest of your life. Love finds its way and you always know at what point it's time to send them off on their own journey. ]
Compassion never means not having to say your sorry; rather, it's a connection so deep you can't imagine hurting another in the first place. But, even the compassionate are human and pain is inevitable
In striving to become more compassionate I have learned to love, and accept, myself. You can't truly care for someone else if you don't care for yourself. However, in learning to truly love myself I have also had to discover who I am. That means acknowledging the good traits, but also, the bad.
I am only beginning this journey and I know I have a long way to go. I hope that one day I can look back and know I lived my life compassionately.