Self Compassion

What is self-compassion?

According to Christopher Germer “self-compassion is simply giving the same kindness to ourselves that we would give to others.”

Why is self-compassion important?

David Burns states that those who rate high on self-compassion tend to be less critical and have a higher self-esteem. It is also associated with having less anxiety and depression.

Furthermore, if we are honest with ourself, we all know we tend to be our own worst critic, so I believe that learning how to be a bit more self-compassionate towards ourself will go a long way.

The opposite of self-compassion is self-criticism. The more aware you become of your own critical voice towards yourself the more you can work towards your self compassion.

Here are a few problematic thoughts that will clue you in to when you are being self-critical:

- [ ] Labeling: making global statements about ourselves “ I am such a failure” - [ ] Shoulding: unreasonable demands “I should have...” - [ ] Overgeneralization: taking one negative instance and applying it to everything.

So this week I would like for you to work on becoming more aware of your inner critic. You can not change what you are not aware of. So let's start there.

Name the stinking thinking you are doing and keep track of how often you do this and how it makes you feel.