0:00

The more you're able to see yourself

0:02

not as just you, but as part of this

0:05

larger humanity, the less self focused

0:07

you are welcome

0:16

to the one you feed Throughout

0:18

time, great thinkers have recognized the

0:20

importance of the thoughts we have. Quotes

0:22

like garbage in, garbage out,

0:25

or you are what you think ring

0:27

true, and yet for many of

0:29

us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower

0:31

us. We tend toward negativity, self

0:34

pity, jealousy, or fear.

0:37

We see what we don't have instead of what we

0:39

do. We think things that hold us

0:41

back and dampen our spirit. But

0:43

it's not just about thinking. Our

0:45

actions matter. It takes conscious,

0:47

consistent, and creative effort to make

0:50

a life worth living. This podcast

0:52

is about how other people keep themselves moving

0:54

in the right direction, how they feed

0:57

their good wolf m

1:12

Thanks for joining us. Our guest on this

1:14

episode is Kristin Neff, who has been

1:16

on the show before. She is the associate

1:19

professor at the University of Texas

1:21

at Austin's Department of Educational

1:23

Psychology. With her partner Chris

1:25

Gerner, she's developed an empirically supported

1:28

training program called Mindful Self

1:30

Compassion, which is taught by thousands

1:32

of teachers worldwide. She also

1:34

co authored the Mindful Self Compassion

1:37

Workbook, as well as teaching

1:39

the Mindful Self Compassion Program,

1:41

a guide for professionals. Hi

1:43

Kristen, Welcome to the show. Hi er right, how

1:46

are you? I am good. I am very

1:48

happy to have you on again. We talked.

1:50

I don't know how long it's been, maybe three

1:52

four years, who knows. At time just flies by.

1:55

But since we've talked, I think

1:57

your ideas have become much

2:00

more popular. And I will say

2:02

in the coaching work that I've done, I've realized,

2:04

over and over, working with so many more people

2:06

since when you and I last talked, how

2:08

critical these ideas of self compassion

2:11

really are, both in living

2:13

a better life but also in actually

2:15

being able to make changes in our life. How important

2:17

self compassion is. So we're going to get into all

2:19

that here in a few moments.

2:21

But let's start like we always do, with the parable.

2:24

There is a grandmother who's talking with her grandson.

2:27

She says, in life, there are two wolves inside

2:29

of us that are always at battle. What is a

2:31

good wolf, which represents things like kindness

2:33

and bravery and love, and the other

2:36

is a bad wolf, which represents things

2:38

like greed and hatred and fear. And

2:41

the grandson stops and he thinks about it for a second,

2:44

and he looks up at his grandmother. He says, well, grandmother, which

2:46

one wins? And the grandmother says

2:48

that the one you feed. So I'd like

2:50

to start off by asking you what that parable

2:53

means to you in your life

2:55

and in the work that you do, right, I

2:57

mean, so that that actually is one of the parallels

3:00

that's kind of ubiquitous in in the

3:02

mindfulness and compassion world, are really

3:04

any contemplative practice, because

3:07

what it highlights is that

3:10

what we practice grow stronger, you

3:12

know, and the whole revolution in terms

3:14

of understanding neural plasticity

3:17

that we know if we what we practice actually

3:19

can lay down new neural pathways in

3:21

the brain. So it's very much

3:24

the case that if you practice mindfulness

3:26

and compassion and self compassion,

3:29

you build those neural pathways. If

3:31

you just you know, kind of go down the habitual

3:34

path of fear and hatred

3:36

and reactivity, then

3:38

you actually just strengthen those neural

3:40

pathways. So, I

3:42

mean, that's what's so remarkable about what

3:45

we know the science of contemplative practice

3:47

is you really can change

3:50

your neural pathways with practice

3:52

based on what you feed. Yeah, I

3:54

agree. I think the ability to change

3:56

our neural pathways and neural

3:58

plasticity is something. Know, I feel like I can't

4:00

pick up a book these days without reading about

4:02

it. But it is so true. It's

4:05

just doesn't happen as quick as we would usually

4:07

like, you know, that's

4:08

a good news,

4:11

as it can change. Bad news is it

4:13

takes longer than we think, which I think it's

4:16

just good to know that because I think what happens with

4:18

a lot of people as we hear like whoa, this can

4:20

change, and so we try a time or two and

4:22

it doesn't really do a lot, and so

4:24

then we give up and and contemplate if practice

4:27

as well as self compassion practice, my experience

4:29

is the more you do it, the better you get at it

4:32

right exactly, you know. But the nice thing about

4:34

self compassion is every time you fail

4:36

to have self compassion, you can give yourself compassion.

4:40

You know. It's kind of recursive that way.

4:42

Yeah, So let's jump into

4:45

self compassion and you

4:47

know, kind of talk about what it is to start,

4:50

you know, for people who aren't familiar with the term.

4:53

Let's talk about what is self compassion, and

4:55

then let's talk about why it's important. The easy

4:57

way to think about what self compassion

4:59

is is is just treating yourself

5:02

with the same kindness, support,

5:04

care um that you would show to

5:07

a friend you cared about when they were struggling

5:09

in some way. So it's just really

5:11

doing a U turn and giving

5:13

the compassion you would normally show to others

5:16

to yourself. And so that's kind of

5:18

the simple version my model of

5:21

self compassion. It's a little more

5:23

complex, and I do think it's important

5:25

because you might say that the components and

5:27

self compassion are also a recipe

5:29

for how to give yourself compassion

5:32

um. So it really starts with mindfulness. And

5:34

we've heard a lot about mindfulness these days,

5:37

but we really can't have self compassion

5:39

without mindfulness. We need to be able

5:41

to notice when we're struggling, when we're suffering,

5:44

instead of avoiding it or resisting

5:46

it. Are also instead of just being lost

5:49

in its swallowed up by it, we need

5:51

a little perspective to say, hey, you know,

5:53

I'm having a hard time. So that's a mindfulness

5:56

and then we do respond with this kindness,

5:58

you know, again, like we would treat a friend, as

6:00

I said. But there's a third element

6:02

that's actually really crucial, and

6:04

that's framing our experience in light

6:06

of the shared human experience. The third

6:09

component is common humanity,

6:11

right. And actually the word compassion

6:14

in the Latin come means with passion,

6:16

means suffer, suffer with There's

6:19

an inherent connectedness

6:21

in compassion, which makes

6:23

it very different from pity. Right. So,

6:26

for instance, self pity is not healthy,

6:28

self compassion is healthy.

6:30

What's the difference, Um, well, other

6:32

people, right, the self pity as

6:34

well as me. It's kind of a very egocentric,

6:37

self focused attitude. Self

6:40

compassion means, Okay,

6:42

everyone's imperfect, everyone

6:44

leads an imperfect life. And

6:46

that's really important because when we do that,

6:48

we have perspective. We actually

6:50

feel connected to others and our struggles

6:53

as opposed to separated from them. And

6:55

it also gives us some perspective which really

6:57

helps. I've been working on a video

7:00

for people, and I've been talking

7:02

about taking different perspectives, and

7:05

one of them that's been so helpful

7:08

is the idea that everyone

7:12

suffers and has a hard time and

7:15

you know, really touching base with that

7:17

common humanity, Like I'm not alone

7:19

in this, the fact that I'm struggling,

7:21

that I'm suffering, that I didn't do well. It's not

7:23

all like a personal failing. That's the human

7:26

condition, that's right, you know. And

7:28

so it's not like we want to belittle our own

7:30

suffering by saying, oh, well, everyone suffers,

7:32

you know, gosh, they're children nine in El Salvador

7:35

or something like that. That's not the point.

7:37

What the point is really to remember that it's

7:39

not abnormal. Often what

7:41

happens when we fail or

7:43

something is really difficult, we feel as if

7:46

something has gone wrong, you know, this isn't

7:48

supposed to be happening. And when

7:50

we fall into that trap, we kind of believe

7:52

what's supposed to be happening is perfection,

7:55

and that's somehow everyone else there in the

7:57

world is not having problems or

7:59

is leaving a perfect life, and it's just

8:01

me who's struggling, or just me who feels

8:03

inadequate, And that really adds insult

8:06

to injury. It makes it seem much worse than it

8:08

actually is. When we think, not only are

8:10

we struggling, we feel all alone and isolated

8:12

in that struggle. So it's really just basically

8:15

correcting that illusion we fall into

8:18

of being alone. But you know, we also

8:20

have to acknowledge it doesn't mean that all people

8:22

struggle in the same way, or that

8:24

the amount of struggle is the same. It's

8:27

not. You know, each person's experience is totally

8:29

unique and different, and yet the

8:32

fact that we do suffer is what unites us

8:34

as human beings.

8:35

Right, So you say that

8:37

the quintessential self compassion

8:40

question is what do I need? So

8:42

sometimes what we actually need is to make

8:44

a change. Right when we notice we're

8:46

engaging in the behavior that's unhealthy,

8:50

or maybe weren't a job or a relationship

8:52

that's unhealthy. Sometimes acceptance

8:55

actually isn't what we need. What we need is

8:57

to take action in some way. Maybe

8:59

we need to leave the relationship, or

9:02

maybe we need to you know, to do something

9:04

differently or um, you know,

9:06

meet our needs in a different way than what we're

9:08

currently doing. And so that's really

9:10

where wisdom comes in. You know, what

9:13

do I need is the question we need to ask

9:15

ourselves, and typically wisdom

9:18

can give us the answer or at least point

9:20

is in the right direction. We can't

9:22

alwe us assume it's gonna look one way, it's gonna

9:24

it's gonna vary day by day, Yeah, exactly.

9:27

So let's talk about some myths

9:30

of self compassion that

9:33

I think make a lot of people sort of turn away

9:35

from it prematurely or not

9:37

investigate it. So I thought like

9:39

we could walk through a few of these before

9:42

we go deeper and how to practice it. So

9:44

the first is this thing that

9:47

people often say, which is, you know, doesn't

9:49

self compassion just mean throwing a pity

9:51

party for poor me? How would

9:53

you answer that? There's basically five

9:55

main myths of self compassion, that that's

9:58

one of them, that it's self pity, And

10:00

I think that's when people will understand the

10:02

common humanity aspect of self

10:04

compassion. Right. So, ironically,

10:08

self compassion reduces self

10:10

focused even though it's got the S word

10:12

in it, it doesn't highlight

10:15

the sense of self. It actually reduces it.

10:17

So what is self focused is when we're

10:19

saying, oh, I'm so horrible, I'm you know, judging

10:22

myself and I'm blaming myself. It's

10:24

a very self focused state. When you say

10:26

that, hey, this is part of the human condition.

10:29

You know, everyone fails when

10:31

you kind of relate to your own experience. From

10:33

this larger perspective, you actually

10:35

have less self focused. So, for

10:37

instance, we know people with more self compassion,

10:40

they're less likely to ruminate, they're

10:42

less likely to get like stuck in and thoughts

10:44

about themselves, are more able to take a broader

10:47

perspective. You know, it's an understandable

10:50

fallacy that people have, but it's actually

10:52

unjust the opposite. When you have self

10:54

compassion, you take yourself less personally

10:57

ironically, which is why it leads to less

10:59

self be not more important

11:34

to note that all this work you've done has

11:36

a lot of research behind it, So these aren't

11:38

just ideas. These things have been studied, and we know these

11:40

things to be true. And and I think that

11:43

idea of self compassion is throwing

11:45

a pity party for me. I think that the easiest

11:47

way to sort of know this is true for ourselves

11:49

is just to think about when we are

11:52

in a lot of pain, are we

11:54

more focused on others? We more focused on

11:56

ourselves When we're more focused on ourselves. When

11:58

our pain is relieved, we're actually more

12:00

inclined to look outwards towards other people.

12:03

So self compassion being a strategy

12:05

that relieves some of my own suffering just

12:07

by its very nature, is going to make me

12:09

more other oriented because I'm in less

12:12

pain exactly. So, for instance,

12:14

self compassion is a powerful antidote

12:17

to shame, and shame is a very

12:19

incredibly self focused emotion, right

12:22

it was shame kind of locks you in this dark

12:24

coal where you can't even relate to other people.

12:27

So absolutely, the more you're able to see

12:29

yourself not as just you,

12:32

but as part of this larger humanity, um,

12:34

the less self focused you are. One

12:37

of the other myths is self compassion

12:39

is for whimps. I have to be tough and

12:41

strong to get through my life. Yeah,

12:43

so that's another common one. We really

12:46

think that somehow that using this harsh

12:48

internal voice, if we can stand up to that

12:50

voice, that that makes us strong again,

12:54

you know, with the research actually shows that it's

12:56

just the opposite. At this point,

12:58

I'm very comfortable saying that self compassion

13:01

has been shown to be one of the most powerful

13:03

sources of strength, coping,

13:05

and resilience we have available to us. So,

13:08

you know, when the going gets tough, the tough gets

13:10

self compassionate because having

13:12

compassion, having your own back, being

13:14

supportive to yourself actually

13:17

strengthens you when times are difficult,

13:19

cutting yourself down, shaming yourself,

13:22

you know, calling yourself names, actually

13:24

weak as you and so just you

13:26

know, to take an example, there's been

13:28

a lot of research with combat veterans,

13:31

you know, people who may be seen action and Afghanistan

13:34

or Iraq, and they find that combat

13:37

veterans who are more self compassionate

13:39

about what they've experienced, they're

13:41

less likely to develop PTSD UM,

13:44

they function better in daily life, they're less

13:46

likely, you know, to turn to drugs or alcohol

13:49

um, and they're less likely to attempt suicide

13:51

to deal with their pain. And and so

13:53

we know that with combat veterans, similar

13:56

findings people going through divorce, raising

13:58

special needs kids, coping with cancer,

14:00

to chronic pain. I mean basically,

14:02

when things are tough, what

14:04

are you or are you an inner ally? Do

14:06

you have your own back? Or are you an

14:09

inner enemy? Are you cutting yourself down?

14:11

And clearly you're going to be stronger going

14:13

into battle being an ally

14:15

as opposed to an enemy. That's a great

14:17

way to put it. And that's one of those things when I

14:19

referenced in the in our brief introduction.

14:22

You know, all the work I've done, you know, coaching,

14:24

I do, behavior coaching with people, which is basically

14:26

how do you make changes in your life? And it's

14:29

stunning how much

14:32

that harsh, critical inner voice

14:34

actually demotivates us and

14:37

does not make us stronger, actually wears

14:39

this out and weakensis b. J.

14:41

Falg in his latest book has a line that I loved.

14:43

He said, people change better by feeling good

14:45

than feeling bad. My experience has shown

14:48

that over and over. Not only is it just

14:50

more pleasant to be inside a brain

14:52

that is not so hard on ourselves, it's

14:55

also so much more effective,

14:57

and you know it actually helps us to

15:00

be tougher and stronger.

15:02

That's right. So shame is not exactly

15:04

a get up and go mind state, is it right? Or

15:07

so? Or when we're flattened by insecurity,

15:10

or when we're our heartbeat is going

15:12

crazy because we're beating ourselves

15:14

up and we're stressed and our cortisols

15:16

going, we can't make the best decisions of

15:19

performance. Anxiety, for instance, undermines

15:21

our ability to achieve our goals. So

15:24

definitely, Now, some people confuse

15:26

her self criticism with constructive

15:28

criticism, and they think that self

15:31

compassion means just saying, oh, that's

15:33

fine, right. Sometimes

15:35

compassion is like Mama there, it's

15:38

like, no, you gotta make a change, and

15:40

here's what you need to do. But

15:42

it's coming from a place of love and support,

15:45

not from a place of you know, you're not good enough.

15:48

I will hate you, I won't love you unless you succeed.

15:51

Right, but some of that criticism may be quite

15:53

focused, quite clear, but

15:56

it's coming from a place of wanting the

15:58

best for you, as opposed to again

16:00

shaming yourself because you aren't good enough. And

16:03

we know, um just the same as

16:05

motivating our children, it's actually more effective

16:07

in the long run to motivate them with constructive

16:10

criticism than with shame and destructive

16:12

criticism. It's the exact same thing with ourselves.

16:15

Right. I love the idea. I think

16:18

I got it from reading something of yours,

16:20

which is that we tend to think well

16:22

self. Compassion is just you know, giving yourself

16:25

whatever you want, and you make the point of like a compassionate

16:27

parent doesn't let the child eat all

16:29

of the ice cream that's in the freezer. Right.

16:33

It's not about like you just give yourself

16:35

everything and anything you want. It's about

16:38

wisdom, But it's about kindness

16:40

and I and I and I love that idea because I think

16:42

one of the hardest things that people wrestle

16:44

with balancing and I know I have and

16:46

figure out, is like, where do you draw the

16:49

line between sort of giving yourself

16:51

a break and also holding yourself accountable?

16:54

And what I found is that holding myself

16:56

accountable is fine and is

16:59

actually really important and I need

17:01

to do it, but it's the tone in which I do

17:03

it. I can do that very same activity

17:05

of sort of you know, holding myself

17:07

accountable and sort of having a standard

17:10

for my actions and how I'm doing and the

17:12

behavior and choices I make. I

17:14

can do that with either a really harsh,

17:16

critical, mean tone towards myself

17:19

or I love the example. If I could do it like

17:21

I would to a friend or to a coaching

17:24

client or to my son, There's a there's

17:26

a way that I can do it. It's

17:28

not so much content a lot of times,

17:30

although content is important, a lot of it

17:32

for me is tone. Yeah, so it's

17:34

not only tone but also the intention.

17:36

Of course, tone often conveys the intention,

17:39

but you can really feel it if the

17:41

intention is the supportive, constructive

17:44

one, or if the intention is to

17:46

shame or you know, harm

17:48

you in some way. And sometimes,

17:51

for instance, with a friend or a child, you might

17:53

use a really like sharp telling stop

17:55

it, you know. But you know, if

17:57

it's stopped it, it's like because I'm worried about you

18:00

and I care about you, and I don't want to kill

18:02

yourself. I don't want to harm yourself, versus

18:04

like stop it because you're like

18:07

you disgust me, or that's horrible something

18:09

like that. So very small variations

18:12

in tone can um convey

18:15

that intention. And so,

18:17

like I said, I do like to use the mama their example,

18:20

or you know, the the tiger mom for instance.

18:23

Sometimes we have to be a tiger mom with ourselves

18:26

if it's coming from a place of care, not

18:29

from a place of I won't love you unless you get

18:31

it right. We kind of touched on this myth

18:33

a little bit, but I'll just I'll

18:35

bring it out just so we can be explicit about

18:37

it, which is self compassion will make me lazy.

18:39

I'll probably just skip work whenever I feel

18:41

like it and stay in bed eating chocolate

18:44

chip cookies all day, right, kind of the idea

18:46

that will make you self indulgent. Um.

18:49

And so again, you know the research, so the

18:51

research just proves all of it. It says we're more

18:53

motivated, we're more lucky to take

18:55

personal responsibility for things, we're

18:57

less self focused. And another thing

19:00

is that, um, we are less

19:02

self indulgent. So for instance, we go

19:04

to the doctor more often, we

19:06

eat healthier, we exercise

19:08

more, we practice safe sex. And

19:11

that's basically because when we care about

19:13

ourselves, right, we're gonna do

19:15

what we need to be healthy. What

19:18

is self indulgence or laziness? That's

19:20

kind of we're having short term pleasure

19:22

at the expense of long term harm.

19:24

You know, what makes it lazy as opposed

19:26

to taking a needed rest. Well,

19:29

the difference is if it's lazy

19:31

that I mean somehow that's interfering with what you need

19:33

to get done, or is taking a needed

19:36

rest? Beans So this is appropriate, right,

19:38

and so is it healthy or is it not healthy?

19:41

You know when is when is having that bowl

19:43

of ice cream a useful thing? It's

19:45

just kind of a treat. And when does it start

19:47

becoming self indulgent problematic because

19:50

I don't know, it's you know, raising your blood sugar or

19:52

whatever. And so the difference is

19:54

is it healthier is it not? And when you

19:56

care about yourself and you don't want to

19:58

suffer, You're gonna choose healthy

20:00

behaviors, and that's what the research shows. So

20:30

now we sort of have talked about

20:32

why people would want self

20:34

compassion and some of the myths around us. So

20:37

let's talk about practicing self compassion.

20:40

So if we had to give people a

20:42

very short couple of minutes on here's

20:44

where to get started with self compassion,

20:47

what would you say? There's a couple of ways

20:49

to approach self compassion.

20:51

Um. Probably the easiest thing to

20:53

do is to draw off what

20:56

we already know, which is how to

20:58

be compassionate to those week here about

21:00

right, And actually usually the best

21:02

context to think of in terms of

21:04

how to be compassionate is our

21:07

close friends, um, you know, because

21:09

let's face it, sometimes our partners

21:11

or kids they're almost like two close

21:14

we aren't at our best with them, and

21:17

people we don't know very well sometimes we

21:19

also aren't are most compassionate with them

21:21

as well. But usually we have some good

21:23

friends, people we really care about, um,

21:26

But who's you know, when they fail or they

21:29

make a mistake, it doesn't personally threaten

21:31

us, which means we're kind of able to access

21:33

the more carrying way of helping.

21:36

And so if you think, well, if I had a good

21:39

friend, have the exact

21:41

same situation happened to them, like they

21:43

said the same thing, or they failed in the same

21:45

way, or they're going through the same health issue.

21:47

You know, what would I say to that friend? You

21:50

know, what tone would I use? What would my body

21:52

language be like? And that's a very good

21:54

template for how to treat

21:57

yourself. Right, So again you just

21:59

kind of think of how you would treat another

22:01

and then you do a U turn and

22:04

you and you do that with yourself. And

22:06

it's funny for for many people. At first, it feels

22:08

uncomfortable, like, what do you mean talking

22:10

to myself like I'm here for you,

22:12

you know what you need or you know, I

22:14

believe in you or I support you, And

22:17

it seems so it seems so strange to talk

22:19

to you to yourself in this kind of

22:22

second person way. And we do it all

22:24

the time when we criticize ourselves, Oh

22:26

you're such a fool, you're such an idiot, right,

22:29

we don't even think about that one because

22:31

we're so used to it. Right, So

22:33

we're actually used to speaking to ourselves

22:36

all the time in this in this kind

22:38

of second person way. So what we're

22:40

just doing is changing the tone and

22:42

the content of it. And it does

22:44

feel awkward at first, but you

22:46

start getting used to it, you know, after

22:49

a while, it starts to feel more habitual

22:51

and we start to really listen to ourselves.

22:54

You know. You can also do it in the first person,

22:56

like you know, maybe happy

22:58

or maybe say for you know,

23:00

kind of phrases like that with the eye, if

23:02

that feels more comfortable, um,

23:04

but usually it feels it's a little more powerful

23:07

to do it in the second person because when

23:09

you do that, actually, one of the things that

23:11

gives you is it gives you perspective.

23:13

So instead of being lost in the pain, lost

23:16

in the shame, it's like, oh, wow,

23:18

you're really hurting, how can I help you?

23:21

And that little bit of perspective taking to yourself

23:24

also gives you a little bit of distance, so you aren't

23:26

so identified with the pain. That's

23:28

one way to do it. Another really

23:30

kind of useful and easy way to

23:32

tap into self compassion is to do

23:34

it uh physiologically right.

23:37

So what we know is when we're criticizing

23:40

ourselves, when we're um, you know, really

23:42

upset, we're in a fight or flight mode.

23:44

Are are sympathetic nervous system is

23:46

activated. We're releasing cortisol, adrenaline.

23:49

Um, we feel frightened because there's, you

23:51

know, some fear that I'm not lovable or

23:54

I'm gonna, you know, make some huge mistake in my

23:56

Life's gonna be over right. Your

23:58

sympathetic nervous system is at debated naturally

24:01

that way, and when we give ourselves

24:03

compassion, it actually activates the

24:05

para sympathetic nervous system. That's

24:08

kind of you know, when we feel connected to

24:10

others, When we feel cared for, we

24:12

release oxytocin other opiates.

24:14

Our cortisol goes down or heart

24:16

rate becomes more variable as we've become

24:19

more flexible. One of the ways we

24:21

can actually activate this sense of safety

24:23

and the parasympathetic system

24:26

is to touch. As human beings

24:28

were exquisitely designed

24:31

to respond to touch, because the

24:33

first two years of life right,

24:36

the primary way the infant and parents

24:38

convey safety, care

24:41

back and forth is through touched before

24:43

language sets in. Right, and

24:45

so the human body is designed

24:47

to respond to caring touch by

24:50

feelings, you know, safe, relaxing, calming

24:52

down again, releasing these oxytocin

24:55

opiates, etcetera. So what you can

24:57

do is, you know, put your hands

24:59

on your heart or a cradle,

25:01

your face in your hands, or hold

25:03

your own hand, or give yourself a hug.

25:05

I mean, people are different in terms of what works,

25:08

and you've got to kind of check it out. But

25:10

you can actually start with your physiology.

25:13

And what that does is, first of all, like if you just

25:15

put your hand on your heart, it reminds

25:18

you of your own presence, and

25:20

then it kind of your body says, okay,

25:22

I'm being held literally by

25:24

myself, and then you calm down,

25:27

and then that's often a really good place to start

25:30

to be self compassionate. So, um,

25:32

you know, sometimes you don't even need words. But

25:35

if you were to put your hands on your heart and say

25:37

something like this is

25:39

really hard, I'm so sorry, it will be okay,

25:41

something like that something you would just quite naturally

25:44

say to a friend or a child. Um,

25:46

your body really responds excellent.

25:49

Would this be a good time for us to do uh

25:51

self compassion break? Sure? Yeah?

25:54

Okay? So the self compassion break

25:56

is one of the most popular practices

25:58

from the Mindful Self Compassion program

26:00

that I developed with my colleague Chris Germer

26:03

and it actually uses both. That uses

26:05

language of the type of thing you might say

26:07

to a friend, and it also uses

26:09

a touch. So I'd be happy to lead

26:12

you through that. So, um, you

26:14

may want to close your eyes if that feels comfortable.

26:17

You don't have to, but it often helps if

26:19

we close our eyes to go inward a little

26:21

bit more. Maybe before

26:23

we do the practice, just taking a few

26:25

deep breaths, because you've just been talking

26:27

a lot. Just kind of imagine

26:29

releasing some of the tension

26:33

of thinking. Okay,

26:36

So what I'd invite you to do is

26:38

to comp to mind

26:41

some real situation in your

26:43

life right now that

26:46

is a little bit distressing. Okay.

26:49

So this could be a relationship

26:51

issue, it could be

26:53

something happening in your life that's

26:56

troubling, could be

26:58

some health issue you go going through,

27:01

right It might be something you're feeling badly about

27:04

or embarrassed about. So

27:07

some issue that's causing distress.

27:10

And please don't choose something that's really

27:13

difficult or stressful, because if

27:15

so, you'll be overwhelmed and you actually won't

27:17

be able to learn the practice. So

27:19

most most of us have two or three things

27:21

we could think of at any one moment, choose

27:23

something that's moderately difficult, but

27:26

not very difficult. Okay,

27:30

So you know, calling the situation

27:33

to mind, reminding yourself of what's

27:35

happening, what the situation

27:38

is, making

27:41

it real. So

27:46

what we're gonna be doing is we're going to bring

27:48

in the three components of self

27:51

compassion um as

27:53

we're you know, relating to this very

27:55

difficult experience. So

27:58

the first thing we need remind

28:00

ourselves is what's

28:03

happening right now, this difficult situation.

28:05

This is a moment of suffering, right,

28:09

So we're just bringing mindfulness to

28:12

this fact. We're validating, validating

28:14

the fact that this is hard, okay,

28:20

And I invite you to use any language

28:22

that makes sense for you to really acknowledge

28:26

the difficulty of what's happening. Might

28:29

be I'm so sorry this is

28:32

happening, or ouch,

28:36

something that just really acknowledges

28:39

and validates with mindfulness the

28:42

pain that's here. Okay.

28:46

And then we want to remind ourselves,

28:49

um of the humanness

28:51

of this, of common humanity, you

28:54

know, struggled paying

28:56

difficulty, this is part of life,

29:03

right, So again, just using any language

29:05

that that makes sense to you, maybe

29:07

something like I'm not alone I'm

29:12

not abnormal for having something

29:14

like this happen me

29:19

too. Excuse

29:21

why French ship happens, you

29:24

know. And

29:28

then we want to bring in the kindness,

29:30

the kind response to this difficulty.

29:34

And so one way to do that is through touch.

29:37

So that invite you to again put your hands

29:39

on your heart, maybe

29:41

cradle your face with your hands, or

29:44

you might hold the face of a child, or

29:47

you can hold your own hand, some

29:49

sort of touch that feels good to you,

29:51

that lets you know physically you

29:54

have your own support. Right,

29:58

So feeling your hands on your body, within

30:02

the warmth of your hands, and

30:07

then saying any

30:10

words of kindness and kind

30:12

of warm, supportive tone

30:15

that are just what you need to hear right

30:18

now, right.

30:23

It might be something like you know it's

30:26

okay to be imperfect, or

30:29

you're doing the best you can, or

30:35

you know I'm here for you. And

30:38

if you actually, if you aren't sure what to say, what

30:40

you can do is you could imagine, um

30:42

that you had a close friend, someone you cared

30:44

about, going through the exact same thing

30:47

you're going through. Um,

30:49

imagine what you would say to that friend,

30:53

and then see if you can try saying

30:56

something similar to yourself Okay,

31:02

then when you're ready, open

31:04

your eyes. And so when we do

31:06

practice like that, usually there's one

31:08

of three ways we feel. Sometimes

31:11

we do feel kind of soothed and comforted.

31:14

Um, we feel some compassion

31:16

arising and it helps us feel good.

31:19

Um. Sometimes we feel absolutely

31:21

nothing. It just like does nothing just gonna

31:24

nothing happened. And the

31:26

third thing that happens is we might actually feel

31:28

bad. Sometimes we open our heart and

31:31

we feel more agitated afterwards. Um.

31:33

And all three reactions are

31:36

actually completely normal, and none of

31:38

them are better than than

31:40

the other. Uh. You know, sometimes

31:42

if we spent a lot of time kind

31:44

of closing our heart down and just deal

31:46

with life, and we we let

31:49

the fresh air of the compassion in, It's

31:51

it's almost like a house on fire, you know, you open

31:53

the doors of the doors of the house and

31:55

the air rushes in and the flames rush out.

31:58

It's actually termed for that called backdrop. It

32:00

sometimes that happens. It's it's actually it

32:02

doesn't mean you're doing it wrong. It means you're doing

32:04

it right. Um.

32:06

But just to say, you know, whatever your reaction

32:09

is, it doesn't really matter. What we're doing here

32:11

is we're setting our intention to

32:13

be kinder to ourselves. The practice

32:16

actually rest on our intention. We

32:18

do it, and we practice and eventually,

32:20

um, it starts to bear fruit. So whatever

32:23

you're feeling right now, good, bad, or nothing,

32:25

it doesn't really matter the important things. We just

32:27

practice this new way of being

32:30

to ourselves. Wonderful. Well, thank

32:32

you for leading us through that. And I

32:34

really like what you said there at the end about we

32:36

keep practicing regardless of

32:39

how this particular event went.

32:42

Um, I'd like to ask you about

32:44

doing self compassion in

32:47

the midst of a lot

32:49

of real self critical

32:52

thoughts. So an example

32:54

would be I work with a lot of people

32:56

who you know, they have a lot of self critical

32:58

thoughts. They tend to the sort of people

33:01

where I haven't been exercising for quite

33:03

some time, but they start and

33:05

they start by walking a mile

33:07

a day. But the thought that's going through

33:09

their brain the whole time, what they're saying themselves, it's like, well

33:11

mile a day is not enough. You should be doing way

33:13

more than that, Like how did you even get yourself

33:15

into this place where all you can

33:17

do is a mile a day? As an example,

33:20

how do people work with these

33:23

really strong negative judgments.

33:25

So one of the ways you can work with the inner

33:27

critic is actually quite helpful is

33:30

to realize that, even though

33:32

it doesn't necessarily work this

33:34

way, your inner critic is actually

33:37

trying to help you. It's

33:39

often not helpful. I mean, it's actually usually

33:42

really counterproductive. But what's

33:44

happening when we criticize ourselves is

33:46

that part of us feels threatened. Right,

33:49

So that voice saying, you know, I can't believe the only

33:51

Waca Moliday is not enough and how did you get

33:53

yourself into this? That's a part of us

33:56

that feels threatened. Either it's threatened

33:58

because we might be afraid

34:00

that we aren't going to be healthy. We might feel

34:02

threatened because we think we don't look the way

34:05

we should and other people will reject

34:07

us. We might feel threatened because of

34:09

something that happened in our past or early

34:11

childhood. Right, there's a lot of different

34:13

reasons why we feel threatened, but

34:15

almost always self criticism

34:18

arises from a feeling of threat. And

34:20

what we're doing is we're trying to use that

34:22

fight, flight or freeze response

34:24

to deal with the threat. Either we attack ourselves

34:26

that's the fight response, or we flee.

34:29

We like you know, we isolate ourselves in shame,

34:31

or we freeze, we get stuck in mumination.

34:34

And so when we realize that the

34:36

inner critic is trying to actually

34:38

help us be safe, then

34:41

what we can do is, instead of judging ourselves.

34:43

For judging ourselves, it's just makes

34:45

things worse, we can actually say, oh,

34:47

okay, I see thank thank

34:50

you for trying to keep me safe. I hear you.

34:52

Okay, you're worried, got it.

34:54

Okay, we'll see what we can do right. And

34:57

then once the inner critic kind of feels heard

34:59

and listen to, then it's actually

35:01

easier to bring in another voice, which

35:04

is kind of the more compassionate voice,

35:06

which also wants us to feel safe. And it's

35:08

kind of quite remarkable to realize that our

35:10

inner critic and our inner compassion itself,

35:13

they both want us to be safe. But

35:15

the critical voice suggest, you know, all it knows is

35:17

fear. That's that's the kind of the only voice

35:19

it has, whereas we also have this

35:22

wiser, um, kind of more mature

35:24

voice that can use the safety

35:26

of care, you know, encouragement. And

35:28

so once once we do that again, we don't want

35:31

to shut down the inner critic. We just want to

35:33

say, okay, thank you very much for trying to

35:35

keep me safe. I really appreciate it. And

35:37

then we can try to use you know, encouragement.

35:40

Okay, so maybe we can try to do a little more

35:42

tomorrow. So we want to keep high goals,

35:45

the long term goal high. We want to

35:47

take baby steps, right, Just

35:50

can I just do five percent more or five

35:52

percent more instead of like, you know more

35:55

and that kind of you know, slow incremental

35:58

improvement with encouragement, um

36:01

can can? It's it's easier

36:03

to get in to listen

36:05

to those voices once we realize

36:08

that our inner critic is actually trying to

36:10

help us. Shutting it down just

36:12

makes it worse, right, And so

36:15

one of the things that I think happens a lot

36:17

with this sort of thing, and I think you use the term backdraft

36:19

for it a little bit. But as we use some

36:22

of these phrases and some of these kindness is it's

36:24

almost like we don't really believe

36:27

them. So is it a matter

36:29

of you know, continuing to practice

36:31

so we come to believe. Is it a matter of continuing

36:34

to experiment till we find the phrases

36:36

and ideas that work for us? Both it's

36:38

really both. I mean, So you don't want to use

36:41

language that you're having an argument in your

36:43

head with, like, oh, that's just a bloatable

36:45

anarchy. That's not going to be helpful, right, So

36:47

it is important to find at least the language

36:50

that feels at least the most potentially

36:52

credible to you. And that's going to differ

36:55

by person. But it still may feel

36:57

a little uncomfortable, not quite right.

37:00

If you weren't saying like, oh, this is

37:02

false, and you think, well, I don't know about

37:04

this, but it doesn't completely wing false,

37:07

then you just keep um doing

37:09

the practice. And again, trying different

37:11

ways is to help. If you use a you know, an

37:13

image for instance, maybe I can't believe

37:16

it, But if I think about me as a child

37:18

and I say these words to me as my child

37:20

self, does that help? Right? So

37:22

you might try taking different perspectives

37:25

like that to see if you get a little

37:27

more attraction with it. There's actually

37:29

a saying. It's it's from the Jewish tradition,

37:32

and the saying is um. A young man goes

37:34

to his rabbi and he says, Rabbi,

37:36

you know, why does torret tell us to place

37:38

the holy words on our hearts? Why

37:41

doesn't it tell us to place the holy words

37:43

in our hearts? And the rabbi response,

37:46

well, because as it is, our hearts are

37:48

kind of closed, so we can't put them in

37:50

our hearts, so we place them on our

37:52

hearts and there they stay until one

37:54

day the heart breaks and the words

37:56

fall in right, And so

37:58

that's kind of what we're doing. And we're just kind of like continually

38:01

doing the practice again like the One You Feed

38:04

um, and eventually it starts to make

38:06

a change. Well, Kristen, thank

38:09

you so much for taking the time to come

38:11

on the show. I again, I think your work is

38:13

so important and so valuable. Of links

38:15

in the show notes to your website

38:17

where you have lots of meditations and different things,

38:20

and again, I just really appreciate you taking the

38:22

time to come on. Okay, thanks, it was lots

38:24

of fun. Okay, take care. Thanks bye.

38:43

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