Self Compassion Now? Really?

Does Self compassion have a place in these times of high anxiety?
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Absolutely……..

As you know in your everyday life, you will from time to time be hard on yourself.  Or at the very least, forget to be REALLY GOOD to yourself.  Its pretty natural, pretty normal……truth is, your next door neighbour, your boss, your cousin, sibling, and even your spiritual mentor will need to have practices in place to keep self-compassion at the forefront…and in effect, reduce or prevent the strategy of anxiety to show up.  And during times of high anxiety....we need these practices in place that much more.

Strategy?  Anxiety is a strategy?  You mean it’s not here to torture me?

​Yes, Anxiety is a biologically, pre-programmed survival strategy.  No, it's not here to torture you.  We need it.  It’s necessary for our survival.  
It's a great strategy when a car or lion is leaping toward us.  The fight, flight, freeze response gets us desired results.

It becomes problematic when we think or believe we are in danger or are in survival mode ALL the time.  Then all of the mechanisms of our body involved in this strategy, overrun, burnout, have us on edge, in fear, perhaps numb and listless……feeling powerless and helpless.  

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Furthermore, if we are resisting this strategy, our physical, emotional, and psychological messengers of distress, we add another layer of suffering and pain to the already uncomfortable dis-ease of anxiety.  Not like its enough that we are feeling anxious a lot of the time, but now we might make it all wrong, make ourselves wrong, minimize it, distract from it, etc.  At different points in our lives, we just want to give up when we don't know how to get out of this vicious feedback loop.
Do you ever notice the more you resist something, the more it pushes you to pay attention?  Aren't we just amazing mechanisms of resolution?
Its in the practice of self-compassion, that the anxiety will soften and calm down.  Being kind to oneself is not some gift relegated to a few.  As the practice of self-criticism was once learned, self-compassion can and is a learned practice as well.
How does it apply here?

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Allowing yourself to feel what you feel, to be with it, find ways to soothe that part of yourself……the scared part, the sad or angry part…..whatever part is expressing itself……find ways to soothe it as you would a dear pet, child, or loved one…… it too will calm down, feel protected and taken care of.  It is only in the “being with these feelings”, listening to what it's asking for, giving it that which it seeks (soothing), that you will find ground, peace and comfort.  How do you figure out what it wants?

​Imagine a beloved child or pet whimpering for something.  They don’t have the language to articulate what they need, and if they did, they don’t really know what they need.  What could you offer them? Would it be a hug, a cup of soothing liquid, an activity that they enjoy or gets them into their body and out of their spiraling thoughts?  Would you give up in 2, 5, 10 minutes and walk away from them, frustrated that you could not find the solution, or would you persevere and keep trying to find that action that would make a difference?  You see {!firstname_fix}, these parts of ourselves often present themselves as the child that wants the "knowing" adult (we all have this adult) to show up.

This is how you want to approach your own anxiety.  It’s asking you to find the soothing action it needs.  It needs to be comforted, seen, heard, to know that you have its back, that it can rely on you to in fact take action, when action is what is needed.

Some findings of Self-Compassion research:

• Being Self Compassionate can fuel the motivation to try new things, to be in the unknown.  Beating ourselves up just tells us that the consequences to trying is painful.
• Self Compassion reduces anxiety around the unknown, because failure is seen as a means to success, as providing valuable information as to how one wants to proceed,  and not a reflection of one’s worth.
• Self compassion in fact helps us build confidence in the face of failure, as it always recognizes our worth, our efforts, strengths and qualities in our endeavors.
• Self compassion releases us from performance anxiety.
• Self compassion helps us see projects through, despite failures.

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What to do:

• Treat yourself like you would someone you love.
• If you are struggling, could you look at that “part” of yourself and ask that “part” what it needs in that moment, like you would a child or relative.
• Remind yourself of all the times you have heard other people’s imperfections and feel relieved and proud that you are part of the community called Humanity, join in and be embraced by this crowd.
• Mistakes and failures “ARE’ supposed to happen, this IS what life looks like when its working!!!
• Connecting with others during these times is what in fact has us feel less alone and part of a community of people who make it ok to make mistakes

Most importantly when you are starting something new and you don't know how:

ITS NOT IMPORTANT TO KNOW HOW.......BEFORE YOU DO IT!!!  ITS IMPOSSIBLE TO KNOW HOW TO DO SOMETHING NEW........WITHOUT LEARNING HOW TO DO IT.  AND DOING IT, NOT GETTING IT RIGHT PERHAPS SEVERAL TIMES, IS PART OF LEARNING.  AND LEARNING IS PART OF DOING SOMETHING NEW.  IN ESSENCE, NOT KNOWING HOW and NOT GETTING IT RIGHT IS WHATS NEEDED TO LEARN SOMETHING NEW.

I hope you give yourself permission to not know what you don't know this week, to be awkward, vulnerable, and kind to yourself if you are afraid, unsure, feeling unsupported or without direction.........and for that matter, wherever you are during this time of your life and this global crisis.

I hope you take the time to learn some new strategies that will have you arrive exactly where you want to be when all these unknowns lift.

I hope you have a wonderful week......and if you want to explore your situation further, I am just a CLICK away.

Till next time and with warmest regards,

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