"I wish I knew what this means but I wish that about a lot of things, so mostly I enjoy not knowing."  

-Brian Andreas

This 2009 book is a must-read for those hungry for ideas that place compassion front and center in both individual lives and societies. Written by Paul Gilbert, a practicing psychologist and professor at the University of Derby in the UK, the 500 pages are filled with ideas written for the general public.

In the first half of the book, he reveals the evolutionary and social reasons why our brains act so readily to both threats and kindness. In the second half he gives a lot of practical advice and exercises to make it more natural to live a life of true compassion.

In the 2009 book, On Kindness, Adam Phillips and Barbara Taylor contend that until 250 years ago, Western civilization treated kindness and compassion as treasured. Now Western thought mostly relegates kindness and compassion to the weak. Instead, we value individualism, materialism and toughness in daily life as well as national politics.
Phillips and Taylor clam that in reality human beings necessarily face deep inner conflicts over personal kindness and community compassion. It is time to resurrect kindness, and armed with compassion, begin to repair our lives and social institutions.

Can the common good work as the main objective of a  business model?

Three marketing students from Lake Constance, Germany decided to break some rules of business by insisting that they and their customers serve the common good. Their first business partners are incarcerated convicts, who make handbags. The students wrote a marketing plan, help with the distribution of the products, and developed a strategy for channeling the profits back into improved inmate rehabilitation programs. Their story first appeared in German in Spiegel Online on December 27, 2009. An English translation, along with a photo of the students, can be found at Fortune 500 Global.

What is most interesting about this student project is that it began with their desire to build a business model that was limited to products that help others in a direct or partly direct way.

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After President Obama stated that he would use “empathy” as one criterion for selecting a candidate for the U. S. Supreme Court, negative responses flooded the media.
President Obama talking in press conference about selecting a Supreme Court Justice gave his criteria as: sharp and independent mind; honors the constitution; respects the judicial process; and holds the judicial values upon which the country was founded. Then he mentioned an additional consideration: empathy.