What is Self-Compassion?
Self-Compassion is the ability to hold oneself in kindness, extending grace and understanding and a willingness to be with our own suffering as we practice unconditional acceptance of our humanness.
The word Compassion means, “To Suffer With”. When we open our hearts to another person and connect to their suffering, we feel compelled to extend care, love and support, which eases their burdens and supports them in feeling less alone and disconnected. This is what we also want to offer ourselves.
What is the purpose of Self-Compassion?
The purpose of self-compassion is to soften the hold of the inner critic and to support ourselves through our own perceived failures, mistakes, shortcomings and suffering. Building self-compassion helps to diminish anxiety, depression, shame and fear of failure. It fosters greater self-esteem and helps us to make better choices as we begin to accept ourselves more unconditionally.
It gives us a sense of stability when life doesn’t go the way we hoped it would. The more compassion we have for ourselves, the more compassion we have for others. It creates greater self-regard which helps us to expect better treatment from others in our lives, which translates to better relationships. In order to have Compassion for others and Compassion for ourselves, we need to fundamentally understand one really important truth.
We are ALL human! To be human is to make mistakes, to experience loss and difficulties, to measure ourselves against others and to feel inadequate and have limitations. We all encounter shame and experience rejection, fear, overwhelm, disappointment and being excluded. We all feel humiliation and will encounter failure many times throughout our lives.
We live in a culture right now that perpetuates a deeply conditional human state. We’re surrounded by marketing and social media that mostly shows people’s successes, the high points in lives or their most polished moments and images. This is NOT reality, and it messes with our ability to stay connected to our humanity and to meet ourselves and others when life doesn’t reflect these cultivated storylines and images. We contrast our own life and believe that we are wrong for being human and therefore not deserving of compassion and grace.
It's vital that we remind ourselves that every living person, (cultivated images and stories or not) is on the same level playing field when it comes to our humanness. Nobody escapes vulnerability and we all perceive ourselves as flawed or defective at times.
“We need to remember that we've never done anything in our lives that was not our best strategy to meet a deep need at the time.” Dr. Marshall Rosenberg, author of Nonviolent Communication
Exercise to cultivate greater self-compassion:
Visualize a small child, maybe 3 or 4 years old who is lost and alone in a store, feeling afraid and crying because they can’t find their mom.
You could also imagine a fluffy, little puppy romping around, who takes a wrong step and face plants and begins to cry.
Notice the first thing you feel when you think of these images?
What is your first impulse?
How would you respond to the child or puppy?
I want you to hold those feelings in your mind and really pay attention to how they feel in your body.
Notice how the area around your chest feels.
Does your heart open up with a feeling of love and concern?
This is compassion.
Now I’d like you to think of a non-traumatizing experience when you felt mildly afraid, overwhelmed, insecure or a little embarrassed about something. Maybe you said something awkward in a social situation or you made a mistake at work. Maybe you are feeling anxiety, or a sense of dread and you can’t really pinpoint why. Perhaps there are things on your plate that just feel overwhelming, and you feel exhausted and stressed.
I’d like you to recall the way you felt towards the child or the puppy and see if you can take those same feelings and turn them towards yourself in the situation you just recalled.
Image that the part of you who is feeling afraid, insecure, overwhelmed or embarrassed is actually a small child.
How might you normalize your own experience for that part from a human perspective?
Can you step back just a little bit and see the humanness in yourself and recognize that the part that feels the pain is worthy of kindness?
Can you extend some understanding, validation, and grace to that part of yourself?
Can you hold space and allow that part to just feel what it feels without needing to change it?
If you feel that you made a mistake, can you offer forgiveness to yourself?
This is Self-Compassion.
Some Tools of Compassion, Comfort and Kindness:
Putting your hand over your heart or any part of your body where you are feeling strong emotions and speaking comforting words to yourself as you would a child.
Swaying or allowing yourself to have spontaneous movement that expresses what you are feeling.
Making up a silly song about an upsetting experience you are going through that acknowledges what you are feeling. You can even just hum to yourself as you think reassuring thoughts.
Taking a moment to ground and orient to your environment to help yourself regulate.
Doing the butterfly hug.
Writing a permission slip to yourself to make a mistake or fail at something.
Creating a mantra for specific situations that you may often experience that reminds you to be kind to yourself.
If you are still struggling to understand how to turn compassion towards yourself, consider working with a therapist or coach who can support you by offering perspective, reflection and actively demonstrating compassion. It can be enormously helpful to learn self-compassion through another person, especially when we have little experience in our lives where others have encouraged kindness.
Internal Reflection Questions:
How do you feel when other people share their vulnerabilities and challenges?
Is there a person you admire who is good at showing their vulnerability and humanness?
What are some ways that you currently practice Self-Compassion?
What are some things that block you from feeling compassion for yourself?
How do you think being able to practice more Self-Compassion would impact your life?
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