Practicing Self-Compassion: As being a Friend to My very own Mental Health
Practicing self-compassion can create positive impacts on our mental health and in our relationships with other people. I believe of self-compassion as a way of acting just like a friend to myself. All of us wish we're able to see ourselves through the eyes of the people that love us and think highly of us, and self-compassion is a act that can bring us closer to that goal.
A large number from the mental health journey is reflection however, whenever we think about our very own struggles, shortcomings, and mistakes, it may be simple to spiral into negative self-talk and judgment. Practicing self-compassion might help us acknowledge where we're at and accept that we're human and can struggle and make mistakes. We can all take advantage of treating ourselves more gently – just like we'd with those we love them about the most.
According to this article from Psychology Today, “Having self-compassion means having the ability to recognize the difference between making a bad decision and being a bad person. When you have self-compassion, you understand that your worth is unconditional.”
We all face issues and make mistakes, and self-compassion is really a proven method of confronting our shortcomings and treating ourselves kindly as we sort out them. Instead of indulging in negative self-talk and judging ourselves, self-compassion helps us acknowledge our humanity with gentleness and love.
How Self-Compassion Can Benefit Our Mental Health
Practicing self-compassion can offer multiple advantages to our mental wellbeing. Some of these positive impacts include:
- Strengthening emotional resiliency
- Reducing feelings of shame, anxiety and depression
- Boosting self-esteem, self-worth and happiness
- Improving healthy emotional connections with others
- Cultivating a greater understanding and compassion for others
Practicing self-compassion can bring impacts that reverberate not just through other aspects of your mental health but additionally within the relationships and connections you've with others.
Self-compassion involves finding harmony between both our need to improve and accepting ourselves and requires practicing a lack of judgment or unhealthy criticism. Self-compassion can be a way of truly seeing ourselves and caring for every part of who we are. Rather than considering it as complacency, self-care is really one of the most fundamental stages in growing into who you want to be.
Putting ourselves down concerning the things we don't like only causes those pain points to fester and grow larger, but self-compassion is an excellent method we are able to love ourselves because we're human. We get some things wrong and struggle, instead of loving ourselves despite this stuff.
Ways to rehearse Self-Compassion
One of the very most impactful methods to practice self-compassion is to acknowledge your own humanity, understanding that we will get some things wrong and face hardships. Being kind to ourselves through those mistakes and hard times is how we grow from them. So practicing self-care is all about showing ourselves kindness and understanding, rather than unhealthily judging ourselves.
Some of the methods to practice self-compassion are:
- Give yourself permission and support yourself through mistakes or hardships
- Pretend you're someone you care about and think about how would you support them
- Treat yourself as if you would a family member or perhaps a young child
- Practice mindfulness with verbal meditations centered on self-love
These practices are meant to help ward off the hurtful areas of our minds contributing us to evaluate ourselves and are also designed to allow us to accept our shortcomings or problems without inducing feelings of shame. Meditation, especially, can be a helpful practice. Meditation involves observing our thoughts without judgment, that is a key element of self-compassion.
Self-compassion is really a way to care for ourselves, have a tendency to our emotions and combat problematic self-talk.
There's a popular proverb: Treat others how you want to be treated. So, in practicing self-compassion, we also have to remember to treat ourselves the way we want others to treat us.