The medicine of love.
This Valentines day let’s talk about self compassion:
The love we give ourselves.
Learning to love ourselves
Only when we unconditionally learn to love ourselves can we truly feel or experience the love of another, show our love towards another, and experience true happiness within and a love for life. Why, you might ask?
Loving ourselves in the truest, fullest sense gives us a greater capacity to connect more fully with ourselves and to another, in order to have a more authentic, open, deeper, relationship with others, or a significant other.
We need to make time to check in…
This isn’t always easy. The demands of life can mean very quickly we become low on our priority list. It is easy to get caught up in the fast-pace of life and our ‘to do’ lists. And not take time to check in with how we are and how we are doing. We need to make time for ourselves and learn how to spend that time ‘not doing’ and just ‘being’. Time for rest, reflection, dreaming and contemplation.
Loving ourselves means being honest and true to ourselves and our needs. In order to do this we need to take the time to get to know ourselves better by doing the inner-work; Observing our inner landscape (our thoughts, emotions, and inner-dialogue / inner-critic). And getting to know all of our parts. Even those we prefer not to know!
Our inner critic
It may reassure you to know that all of us have messy, angry, hurt, judgemental, jealous, selfish parts. This negative narrative (or inner critic) is part of our human nature. It doesn’t make us bad people. We are not defined by our parts. These parts are our coping mechanisms. They are our fiercest protectors. But they can actually hold us back in many ways, subconsciously affecting our emotions, perceptions and behaviours.
Did you ever experience a sense of disappointment at school if you didn’t receive a card on Valentine's day? And the feelings this may have triggered? A feeling perhaps of sadness, loneliness, jealousy, envy, of not being liked, unworthiness, or that something must be wrong with you?
Seeking validation, or to fit in and be liked, better still loved is instilled in our psyche at such an early age. Our early childhood experiences are formed over the years and buried in our psyche. They inform some of our limiting beliefs and feed our negative thought pattern (our inner-critic). They are based on the stories we tell ourselves.
Practising self awareness
When our inner-critic is at play we are acting from a place of fear, rather than a place of love. We are responding to the world through conditioned and often destructive patterns of behaviour, based on our emotions and perception of the world or the lens through which we see the world. This is based on our memories, judgments, imagination, fears, or what we think we need or desire. To fix the problem we look for happiness outside of ourselves. A quick fix. But this will only temporarily fix the problem.
Living our lives in this misguided way can be exhausting. It can cause unnecessary stress on our mental, emotional and physical wellbeing. By practising self awareness we can identify the stories we tell ourselves and the limiting beliefs that are holding us back, with compassion towards ourselves. We can then begin to put some space around them, or sometimes release them completely.
Shadow work
In order to live a fulfilled, happy, balanced life, we need to shine a light on our shadows, get to know our inner critics, and own them, so they don’t own us! And the more we can accept and have compassion for these parts of us, the more we can accept and be compassionate towards others.
By shining a light on our shadows they no longer have the same power over us. We can touch our wounds with tenderness and compassion, gently releasing anything toxic and helping our hearts to heal. This is the beginning of the healing journey.
Through self awareness, self-compassion and self-acceptance, we can repair what is frightened, or broken, and forgive and let go of the past and anything no longer serving us. With a gentle, loving kindness towards ourselves.
Be the love you seek…
It is worth noting that there are also shadow elements of yourself that are positive. It is often our creative side that is hidden away, perhaps because you were told as a child to focus on more academic subjects, or that you were wasting time pursuing these more creative aspects of yourself. Through self enquiry and the healing power of self-love, we can start to recognise our shortcomings and explore these more creative aspects of ourselves.
Layer by layer our hearts can begin to open again to our full, authentic self. Like the first petals beginning to open in spring time. Love is the fertiliser!
You have the power. You create the change. You have the key to open the door to your heart. To heal. To discover your true authentic self. You can be the love you seek.
NB: If you have experienced trauma of any kind, before exploring these practises, you may choose to seek guidance and professional support from a trauma-sensitive therapist.
A simple self-compassion practice to get started…
Seated or lying, make sure you are comfortable and relaxed in your body.
If seated ensure you are supported at your base, so the spine is awake but not rigid.
Relax all the muscles in the face and relax the jaw.
Begin to draw your awareness into your body.
Notice your breath. Turning your attention to where you sense the breath the most (nostrils, throat, chest, belly).
Now draw your awareness to your heart space.
Observe how this space feels. What do you notice? What emotions arise?
Now bring to mind a person, or pet, or place that you love and brings you a sense of joy.
Notice how this feels in your body.
Now breathe this feeling into your heart space.
Repeat this for x10 breath cycles.
Enjoy!
