The courage to be self-compassionate
I had a big change in my life at the end of December 2013, and, in the following January, I moved to Auckland with a new contract. With my marriage over, both my kids out of high school and months between contracts in a new city, it was hard going. I got good at thinking about how many ways I wasn’t making it and getting into depression.
I don’t remember being hard on myself as a small child, although when I talked to myself from when I was at school, it was often about how I wasn’t quite good enough. And, probably falling for a lie, I believed that being tough on myself was the way I could get more things done. And so I became my own worst 'frenemy'.
So, if you feel your to-do list at the end of the day and there’s not enough done, or you criticise yourself and go over how many things you did badly, then like me, you’re beating yourself up. Mine was a daily ritual. A self-fulfilling prophecy about the downward spiral of my life. It’s often women that don’t show themselves a little kindness. I’m not talking about going and having your nails done or going shopping with friends if you’re unhappy. That’s called pampering, girlfriend! And please note that pampering is for enhancing appearance.
You might not have read the research, but as women, we are socially conditioned to be critical of our bodies, to be self -conscious about how we look and act, especially in front of men. Men are taught to view their bodies quite differently. As boys, they are asked by parents and others to challenge themselves with how high, how strong how fast they can use their physical self. Even t-shirts show how we’re socialised. Boys T-shirts are about heroes and strength, while girls’ ones are about looking pretty and fairytale princesses and unicorns. Girls are praised for their beauty, not their brains. And so we hold that in our deep subconscious, the early deep thoughts we’re not aware of, and review our looks in a way men don’t. Women, on average, check out how they look up to 15 times a minute. All of this is not deliberate, it’s just the way we’ve been since there’ve been t-shirts on the planet – and that goes back a long way, baby!
And if we’re not chosen by the handsome prince or were discarded, we criticise ourselves for the way we behaved. And if we don’t know any different, like me, we start to blame ourselves for so many things that don’t work out. And the unicorn on our t-shirt even flies away.
So what has this to do with self-compassion? Well, until I had a great coach, I didn’t realise that beating myself up was an unconscious habit of mind. When I realised and had the courage to reflect on what I was doing to myself I could see I hit a continual self-destruct button. It took courage to admit my stinking thinking, courage to review what that thinking was, and courage to make some changes to such a subconscious and therefore deeply ingrained way of life. And in the face of the unknown, If I dealt with this negativity, did it mean I was going to be like some post-women’s course veterans and never wear a bra again, take hold of my favourite piece of fat and love on it, never wear make-up or frocks? That itself was overwhelming.
How could I find my own groove of being self-compassionate? I was, taking courage in hand, going to give it a try. Staying where I was self-destructing seemed like a worse option. I came across this great quiz on being self-compassionate, and with it, the work of Kristen Neff. She describes what I was doing to myself so well! I was self-judging, isolating and catastrophising.
“Self-compassion involves acting the same way towards yourself when you are having a difficult time, fail, or notice something you don’t like about yourself. Instead of just ignoring your pain with a “stiff upper lip” mentality, you stop to tell yourself “this is really difficult right now,” how can I comfort and care for myself in this moment?”
I knew from her amazing work I could learn the three aspects of self-compassion.
They are:
self-kindness
accepting my humanity (that we all fail and it’s OK)
being ‘mindful’ (which she describes as objective acceptance of thoughts and feelings, so that we aren’t overwhelmed by them)
Basically it meant giving myself a break!
It meant not dwelling on the past.
I am now much better at catching myself giving myself bad press. And to really do it justice I do nice things for me and treat myself like I’m my best friend! I pick myself flowers, I tell myself how lovable and cute I am, I have fun by looking up bad puns only I laugh at, I jump in puddles, I dance crazy when I’m the only one there to enjoy it.
It does take courage because admitting something so fundamental, so core and changing it is anti-social. It’s not socially acceptable to say that I love me and I’m the best thing that happened to me! And it takes courage to find the cause of socially pervasive beat-up thinking and change it - and keep at it until it becomes a new habit.
I hope you learn the gentle art of self-compassion – be kind, accepting and self-aware. Because, in the near-words of that famous movie “You is smart, you is kind, you is impo’tant, you is funny”
““Self-compassion involves acting the same way towards yourself when you are having a difficult time, fail, or notice something you don’t like about yourself. Instead of just ignoring your pain with a “stiff upper lip” mentality, you stop to tell yourself “this is really difficult right now,” how can I comfort and care for myself in this moment?””
