Understanding...

I've been having some talks with my roommate about what it means to truly love someone.  We started talking about compassion and how that leads to love, but then we started asking how to develop compassion.  We believe that it is through understanding that we are able to gain compassion and that leads to the rest.  Jesus always sought to understand where people were coming from which allowed him to help them in the ways that were necessary.  It seems to me that we need to hang out with people, and get to know them and then as we gain more understanding about who they are, we can truly serve them.  When we love, it leads to action, when we have compassion it leads to love, and when we have understanding it leads to compassion.  It all starts with trying to get to know someone better.  I mean even if you look at 1 Corinthians 13, it is pretty much saying love is all those things, and it is through understanding that all those things become valuable.