The Measure of Our Becoming

Why Compassion Begins With Remembering That We Are Always Choosing

Every human being carries within them the full spectrum of possibility. We can think with clarity or distortion, feel with tenderness or indifference. We can act in ways that heal or ways that harm. We are never only one thing. In every moment, we are choosing (whether consciously or not) who we are and who we are becoming.

Yet so often, we forget this quiet truth. We rush to label people as good or bad, heroes or villains. But life resists such neat divisions. The neighbor who cuts us off in traffic may also be the one who shows up with soup when we are sick. A leader who stumbles in one season may grow into someone who inspires in the next. We are never only what we have been. We are always what we are choosing, here and now.

A Lesson From the Road

I first learned this lesson in an unexpected place: the living room of a family in the American South. I was traveling with Up with People, a global education program that placed us in homes around the world. My host father welcomed me warmly, eager to share his stories. Some of his values and beliefs clashed with my own, and I found myself withdrawing into silent judgment. But then I noticed the tenderness in his voice as he spoke about his daughter, the pride in his eyes, the gentleness in his tone.

It struck me in that moment: here was a man of contradictions, capable of both narrowness and love. And wasn’t I, too, a mixture of the same? That realization softened me. I began to listen differently, to see him not as a fixed identity but as someone still becoming. That night shaped me. It taught me that compassion begins when we resist the temptation to reduce people to a single story.

Leadership and the Courage to Choose Again

Years later, as a coach and leader, I would witness this truth again and again. A young leader once came to me in despair, convinced she was failing her team. She described herself as “the problem,” weighed down by conflict and mistakes. Yet as she spoke, I also heard her deep care for her colleagues, her longing to build trust, and her vision for what her team could become. She was not only her missteps. She was also her potential.

When she began to see herself through this fuller lens, she found the courage to try again. She began making different choices: listening more deeply, leading with vulnerability, building trust one conversation at a time. Over time, her relationships shifted, and so did she.

Compassion in leadership is not about ignoring shortcomings. It is about remembering that no one is only their shortcomings.

The Small Choices That Shape Humanity

Most of us will not face choices that make headlines. But every day, we are presented with opportunities to tilt ourselves (and humanity) toward compassion or away from it.

• The parent, weary at the end of the day, has a choice when a child asks for attention: irritation or presence.
• The neighbor, seeing a storm-damaged house, has a choice: to turn away or to offer a hand.
• The stranger on the bus has a choice: to meet another’s eyes with indifference, or with a smile that says, I see you.

These choices may seem small, but they ripple outward. They shape not only our own lives, but the collective story of who we are becoming together.

Why Acknowledgment Matters

Acknowledgment is where compassion begins. To acknowledge another’s humanity does not mean excusing harm. Accountability matters. But no one is only the worst thing they have done (or the best). When we deny this truth, we dehumanize others and diminish ourselves. If I label you entirely bad, I blind myself to the ways I might stumble in similar directions. If I see you as entirely good, I miss the reality that you, too, are still in motion.

But when I hold both truths (your shadow and your light) something shifts. Space opens for dialogue, for growth, for change. Compassion ceases to be an abstract ideal and becomes the most practical, life-giving response we have.

Choosing for Ourselves, Choosing for All

The deeper truth is this: our choices don’t end with us. Each choice joins the collective current of humanity. The way I speak to you lingers not only in me, but in you, and perhaps in how you will go on to speak to another. Your choice adds to mine. Together, we weave the fabric of the future.

This can feel daunting. But history shows us that collective change is built from countless small acts. A culture of compassion is not built from words alone. It is built from daily, imperfect choices to see each other fully, to listen more deeply, and to live with awareness.

So the invitation is simple, but not easy: to remember, as often as we can, that we are always choosing.

• Who am I becoming through this choice?
• What am I adding to the collective story of humanity?

We will falter. We will choose poorly. But even then, the invitation remains. We can notice, reflect, and choose again.

Imagine if more of us lived with this awareness. We might listen more deeply. We might speak with greater care. We might extend patience where it feels easier to close our hearts. In doing so, we might discover that compassion is not a distant hope but a present possibility: waiting to be chosen, again and again.

At the end of the day, the measure of our humanity is not perfection. It is the willingness to choose, to stumble, and to choose again. We are not set in stone. We are living, breathing, becoming. As we remember this (about ourselves and about one another), we may begin to create a future woven with compassion, belonging, and hope.