By Meg elvidge
“You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”
Please join me on a quick imaginative journey. You are enjoying a sunny day on the beach and decide to go for a swim. As you head to the ocean, you don’t quite make it around the piece of driftwood in your path and end up getting cut. Instead of taking the time to clean and put a band-aid on the cut you get angry and rub sand into the cut, making it worse. Now, you may be thinking, “Why would I do that? That is just going to hurt me further? Why not help myself instead?”
We see this situation and it just makes sense to want to help ourselves. To turn to antibacterial wipes and band-aids, tools that will help us heal. And yet, when we accidentally get an emotional cut or stumble when facing an emotional challenge, we double down. We don’t go running for emotional tools to help us heal but instead run to rub the equivalent of emotional sand in our wounds. This not only hurts us more, but it also makes the healing process more difficult. Somehow, this has become normal and acceptable in our culture. We have become accustomed to restricting this love and care when we are suffering. Instead, we turn to self-criticism in the false hope that it will help us grow or become better. Looking at it this way, it seems counterintuitive. And it is! This is not healthy or helpful. So how can we change this? We can change this by practicing self-compassion!
The words self-compassion might bring to mind a bubble bath and someone in a face mask relaxing while they eat chocolate strawberries. This is what I thought of when I first started learning about self-compassion as well. However, while this is an example of what self-compassion can look like, it is not the definition. On the My Best Self 101 website, they have the best definition: “Self-compassion, therefore, means wanting ourselves to be free from suffering. It means being kind to ourselves and wishing the best for ourselves. It involves turning toward our emotional pain and responding with kindness and understanding. It means bearing witness to our pain. With self-compassion, we give ourselves the loving kindness we might more instinctively give to a good friend.”
This definition highlights an important truth that we need to embrace. We need to see ourselves as people deserving of the same love and affection that we are willing to give to others. We need to understand that we are worthy of this love and affection not because of what we do, but because of who we are. Now, accepting this truth is not a prerequisite for practicing self-compassion. Self-compassion will help you accept this truth as you practice it (Albertson et al., 2015).
Unfortunately, we do not become perfectly self-compassionate beings overnight. Accepting this truth may not come easy and that is ok! Our world is becoming increasingly individualistic and competitive. We seem to be constantly pitted against each other in a competition to be the best at this or that. Accepting that we are going to make mistakes and that making mistakes is ok is hard in such an environment. Practicing self-compassion requires strength and diligence. It might take a while to create healthier thinking patterns and processes and discard old, self-critical ones. Thankfully, there are strategies that can help us along this journey.
A good place to start is being aware of our bodies and what we are feeling, or mindfulness. Most times with emotional suffering we will try and push it down or avoid it. We try not to confront it and instead tell ourselves harmful lies about the suffering. We rub the emotional sand in the wound so to say. Being mindful of our suffering and the emotions we are experiencing will allow us to process our emotions in a healthy way and accept them without pushing them away. We can better understand what we are experiencing and how we can help ourselves heal and move forward. We can better give ourselves what we need in the moment. This makes the healing process shorter and leaves us with the energy to grow in productive ways.
Another way to practice self-compassion is through guided meditations. These meditations help you practice giving yourself the love and compassion you need. Some might start out with giving this compassion to yourself and then extending it to others. One of the wonderful benefits of this is that you not only become more compassionate towards yourself but also towards others. These meditations may also draw upon the concept of common humanity. This just means that all of humanity will experience suffering and difficulties in our lives. That we all have common goals to be happy and to feel loved. Accepting and internalizing this concept can help you connect to others instead of isolating, which is so common because of self-critical thoughts. Over time, these guided practices will help practicing self-compassion become a more natural response.
Now, let’s dispel some common myths about self-compassion. Some might think that if you aren’t harsh or critical with yourself then you won’t have the motivation you need. However, studies have shown that being self-critical actually activates our threat defense system. This causes hormones such as cortisol and adrenaline to be released which might be beneficial for short-term motivation. However, this will undercut long-term motivation which is detrimental. On the other hand, practicing self-compassion helps us feel safe and secure. This prompts the release of oxytocin and opiates that create the perfect environment for motivation to thrive.
Self-compassion is also not indulgent or selfish. These practices will help us throughout our lives to become emotionally healthier. As stated above, practicing self-compassion will make the healing process shorter as we are better able to meet our emotional needs. This in turn will put us in an emotionally stable position and give us more time to help those around us. Practicing self-compassion is truly the best option not only for ourselves but for those around us.
Along with the benefits listed above there are several other benefits to practicing self-compassion. Various studies have shown the important health benefits of practicing self-compassion such as its positive correlation with psychological health (Yamaguchi et al., 2014), supporting seeking medical help (Terry & Leary, 2011), exercising (Magnus et al., 2010), helping you become more emotionally mature in relationships (Neff & Beretvas, 2013), etc. If you want to learn more about this topic and the research done, the My Best Self 101 website has more resources and strategies to check out!
Self-compassion and developing this self-love will take time and effort but we all deserve it! As we practice self-compassion it will become more natural to us, and we will see it benefit us as well as those around us. You are worth it!
“To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.”
References
Albertson, E. R., Neff, K. D., & Dill-Shackleford, K. E. (2015). Self-compassion and body dissatisfaction in women: A randomized controlled trial of a brief meditation intervention. Mindfulness, 6(3), 444-454. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12671-014-0277-3
Magnus, C., Kowalski, K., & McHugh, T. (2010). The role of self-compassion in women’s self-determined motives to exercise and exercise-related outcomes. Self and Identity, 9(4), 363- 382. https://doi.org/10.1080/15298860903135073
Neff, K. D., & Beretvas, S. N. (2013). The role of self-compassion in romantic relationships. Self and Identity, 12(1), 78-98. https://doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2011.639548
Terry, M. L., & Leary, M. R. (2011). Self-compassion, self-regulation, and health. Self and Identity, 10(3), 352-362. https://doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2011.558404
Yamaguchi, A., Kim, M.-S., & Akutsu, S. (2014). The effects of self-construals, self-criticism, and self-compassion on depressive symptoms. Personality and Individual Differences, 68, 65-70. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2014.03.013