A Revised look on Self-Compassion
Hello! Good Morning! Happy Monday!
Now that we are solidly into February, let's talk about loooooove. But in this case, we are talking all about self-love. More specifically, today we are talking self-compassion.
Like any good dive into a word or phrase, let’s start by breaking down the definition of its parts. First, compassion:
Compassion: Sympathetic consciousness of others’ distress together with a desire to alleviate it.
In researching this definition, turns out that I’m not a fan of how it is generally defined. There is greater focus on suffering, failure, etc with an after thought of “oh and we should help people too”. Perhaps it’s the nature of my job, social workers do tend to be strength-based, rather than problem-focused, or it’s that historically we tend to focus on the negative before we head into positivity. All in which to say, here is how I would define compassion if a dictionary company allowed some input:
Compassion: The warm understanding of others’ when they experience struggle and the desire to move towards them with the motivation to help.
See, doesn’t that feel a little better?
The other part of self-compassion is Self. You may be thinking, we don’t need to define self, because self is I and I am self. Which is true, but I’m going to lead us to look at self in a perspective of a model that I very much enjoy using, Internal Family Systems (IFS).
In this model, the way we think about Self is the truest version of who we are as a person. It’s the version of ourself that isn’t bogged down by worries, fears, diagnoses, neuroses, internal judgment, negative self talk, etc.
In fact, in IFS, Self experiences what we call the 8 C’s: Compassion, Curiosity, Calm, Clarity, Courage, Connectedness, Confidence, and Creativity as well as the 5 P’s: Playfulness, Patience, Presence, Perspective, and Persistence.
Before we move any further, I encourage you to sit with those words to see if those are regular experiences you have when you are sitting with yourself/your mind. In theory, we all have the ability to access those experiences within us. And I say in theory, because it can be super hard to allow ourselves to access that version of us for numerous reasons. Check back when I do a deep dive on Internal Family Systems!
Okay, back to it! Self Compassion!
From the breakdown of Self and Compassion lets see if we can find a definition that may lead us to understanding how we can be more compassionate towards ourselves.
Self-compassion: The warm understanding of our own experience with struggle with the desire and patience to move towards ourselves with the motivation to help.
What do we think? Do we think that Self-Compassion may be a little easier to understand now? Or maybe it feels a little easier to have compassion towards ourselves?
Let’s wrap this up by thinking of some examples of how we can show ourselves compassion:
Giving ourselves the benefit of the doubt.
Listening to our internal thoughts (mindfulness) for sources of negativity and shine a little ray of positivity and love.
Allow ourselves to have the treat that we have been thinking about all day.
Being our own cheerleader.
Treating ourselves like we treat the people we love in our lives.
Do you move towards yourself with self-compassion? What do you think stops you? Sit with the idea of self-compassion this week, maybe it’s the week that we begin to love on ourselves just a little bit more than we did the week before.
If this has been an eye opener to how you treat yourself, take note of that and know that it’s not a forever feeling. You have the ability to change your relationship with yourself. And you don’t necessarily have to do it alone. I’m talking therapy. Therapy is a great place to explore your relationship with yourself.
Virtually yours,
Sara Barber MSS, LCSW, CCTP
P.S. Remember if you are reading this (and you aren’t one of my clients) I am not your therapist and you should take what I share with that in mind. I’m here for the laughs (mostly at myself) and the education. If you’d like me to be your therapist or are interested in finding a therapist, email me!