Self-Compassion ~ Embracing Your Past Selves With Love

How deep can self-compassion go? In this guided visualization, we gently connect with our past selves, like the year-rings of a tree, and embrace every version of who we have been. Like lotus petals folding inward, this practice invites profound self-acceptance, healing, and inner peace.

Take your time, listen with headphones for a deeper experience, and allow yourself to be held in the gentle embrace of your own presence.

Image: Zdeněk Macháček
Sound: Nature Healing Society

Transcript

A very warm welcome to this deeply,

Deeply self-compassionate visualization we're going to do.

I want to invite you to get as comfortable as possible.

This is a visualization that goes perfectly well if you want to lay down and especially for some of us that have a kind of have-to mentality,

It can be a beautiful experiment to allow yourself to also meditate sometimes laying down,

Especially if you want to do more compassionate work.

And if you're sitting,

Then sit in such a way that is so comfortable that it becomes a joy to sit.

And if that's a little bit out of reach,

Then go for as comfortable as possible.

So to prop up yourself in a way that you can have as little pain as possible.

So generally you want to have no tension in your groins and hips.

So you want your knees to be a bit lower than your hips.

If that's not available,

It can also be pleasant to put some cushions or blocks under your knees to soften the groin a little bit.

And take a moment,

Maybe you want to do a few stretches or,

You know,

Stretch out your face,

Open your mouth wide,

Do a few twists,

Shake it out a little bit.

Just do whatever you feel your body would enjoy right now.

We're going to do a beautiful practice and just before we get in,

It's helpful to just really ask the body a few questions.

What would you like now?

What would be pleasant?

And just give it that for a moment.

And then when you've found your posture,

It's also fine to move.

This is not a very strict meditation,

Although it's helpful to have some stillness so that the concentration will aid the visualization.

And if it's difficult for you to visualize,

Some of us have some more ease,

Some of us a bit more difficulty in actually seeing things.

It's more about the feeling,

The energy than about actually creating a video in your head.

So if it's easy for you,

Then it helps,

But then also let the image that you create touch you.

It's really about being touched by the visualization.

And if your imagination is less visual,

Then don't worry,

It's really about feeling the visualization.

So maybe you're already noticing your breathing is a bit deeper and I invite you in any case to take a longer inhalation and a longer exhalation.

Do that a few times and as you exhale,

Let go of your shoulders,

Let your face relax.

If you're wearing glasses,

I would recommend to take them off.

More relaxation in the face is also more relaxation in the body.

So just contacting the breath here for a few cycles,

Finding more relaxation.

And I hope it goes without saying,

But do what works for you.

All my guidance is a suggestion and if somehow you are taken by a different current that seems more compassionate or more fitting,

Go with your intuition,

Trust that.

And before we go into the visualization,

I would really love this work to be deep and transformative so it can help to set an intention.

So I want to give you a moment to set any intention.

It could be something about,

You know,

I'm going to help myself,

I'm really going to focus or I really want to be non-judgmental,

I'm going to really give it a go or anything.

Maybe you want to do your favorite mantra or anything of that nature.

Please take a minute right now for that and otherwise just keep breathing.

And then let's go into the practice here.

I want you to visualize yourself way back in the day when you were just an embryo in the womb of your mother.

So your world was completely made of liquid and dampened noises,

Gently rocking day in and day out,

Slowly becoming aware of light,

Sensations.

So connect with yourself before you maybe had a name,

Maybe even before your parents knew that you were coming.

Find yourself there in your own past.

And one way to visualize it is to go as if you're going down the year rings of a tree,

To go to the very first ring,

So it's not in your head,

It's actually in your very center of your body,

There's this echo still of you as a tiny,

Vulnerable,

Beginning human.

And then in whatever way works for you,

Imagine very gently holding that embryo in your hands.

And I just want to invite you to hold this in your hands,

That beautiful little embryo you,

And very gently bring it to your heart.

You're not going to hurt it,

It's very safe in your hands.

And just hold the embryo with your hands against your heart,

Hugging it in this way.

It might come natural for you to rock a little bit while you're holding it.

And then allow any words to come,

Any message you would like to give to this embryo you.

What would you love for this being to know?

From your heart to its heart,

Which is the same heart.

So just take a moment with this embryo in your heart,

In your hands,

Against your heart.

And allow any words to come,

And if nothing comes that is beautiful too,

Because you're already sending a message of love,

It may be enough.

And just take a moment to receive and pass on any message.

And then I invite you to slowly find an end with this first visualization.

And the way I invite you to do that is to,

In your imagination,

Place this first iteration of yourself deep in your center.

Whatever that might be for you,

Could be your belly,

Could be your heart,

The first year ring of the tree.

Place it gently back,

Let it go into your very center.

And when it's there just breathe,

Feel what you just experienced,

Just allow for some transitional transition.

And then I would like to invite you to imagine the next year ring of yourself.

I would love you to see and find in yourself,

Your newborn self.

Maybe you're one day old.

And you can imagine gently rocking this newborn that is all wrapped up in a warm cloth.

Holding it in your arms,

Maybe rocking back and forth as you hold it.

Maybe you have a beautiful gaze going on between you and your newborn self,

In silence for a few moments.

And then feel the unconditional love and trust that this infant radiates out to you.

It trusts you,

It trusts its future self very much.

It loves you so much.

And maybe a message will come from the newborn to you.

And maybe a message will come from your present self to the newborn.

So let any interaction come and speak it in a way that works for you or receive it in a way.

You can do this right now.

And then I slowly invite you to find an end to this encounter.

And with each letting go you don't actually have to let go of the feelings,

But just of the visualization.

And so having placed the embryo self in your center,

Let this newborn self be placed around the embryo self in an embrace of sorts.

The embryo is still there and at the same time it has grown into a newborn,

Transformed and still there,

Depending on our attunement.

So when you've placed your newborn self,

Just breathe in simple presence.

And maybe with some layers a lot is happening,

Maybe with some layers nothing is happening necessarily.

That's totally perfect.

We're just encountering,

Interacting,

Being open.

And so next I would love you to find in yourself your five-year-old self.

Already walking,

Already babbling away,

Or not.

And invite your five-year-old self to come and give you an embrace and let it say yes or no to you.

And if it doesn't want to give an embrace you can just love it from a little distance.

So even with your inner parts you want to ask,

Hey is it okay that I hug you?

And so now connect with your five-year-old self and if possible embrace and see if any message comes in any direction.

I'll give some silence for this now.

And then without breaking the connection gently let go of this embrace and place your five-year-old self in another embrace of your newborn self which is still embracing the embryo self.

And when you've gently placed your five-year-old self there you can slowly let go of that visualization and come back to a moment of present breathing.

And then I invite you to find in yourself your ten-year-old self.

The first year of being an official teenager.

And then invite your ten-year-old self for a very loving warm hug and embrace.

And again any kind of,

I'm suggesting embraces,

But any kind of being with that works for you that somehow seems natural in the moment.

That's what you want to go for.

I'm going for embraces as an example.

And then being with your ten-year-old self.

Notice here any message that want to be passed on,

Up or down,

In or out,

I'll give you a moment for that.

And then gently let your ten-year-old self take the place among the earrings of your layering of embraces.

And when you've placed your ten-year-old self there just return gently to some present breathing.

Feel in your body now,

How was that?

What echoes are reverberating now from that contact in your body?

And just breathe with that.

And then remember and find in yourself your fifteen-year-old self,

Travelling towards adulthood in your life.

What was it like to be fifteen?

Would your fifteen-year-old self enjoy an embrace from your present self?

I would love for you to give that a go right now and see whatever communication spontaneously occurs from stillness and togetherness.

And then gently,

Without breaking the connection,

Allow your fifteen-year-old self to take its place in the sequence of embraces,

The petals of a flower folding into each other,

Into itself.

And come back to presence,

To breathing.

And then I want to invite you to connect with a version of yourself of an age of your own choosing.

As I do not know your age,

You might be seventeen listening to this,

Or sixty-nine,

Or one hundred and four.

So I would like you to choose an age,

A yearing,

That is meaningful to you right now.

And repeat the same practice.

So go ahead and take a moment to find what age you would love to give this kind of attention with and then just go through the same visualization.

And then gently I invite you to find an end,

Or a pause maybe,

To this visualization and let this iteration of yourself come into its place among the petals of the flowers.

Just come back to present breathing for a moment.

And as a sort of completion of this practice,

I'd like you to visualize not just the embryo self,

The newborn,

The five-year-old,

The ten-year-old,

The fifteen-year-old,

And the age of your choice.

But imagine all your years,

All your yearings,

And see them as a full flower of petals folding into each other with this same embrace.

And every layer listening to the other layer,

Communicating important messages,

Or communicating silence.

So take a moment to visualize your complete self with all the years,

All the layers as this flower of folded petals.

And not just see this,

But feel this layering in yourself,

In your body.

And when you breathe,

Can you feel that you can inhale through all the layers right down to your embryo self?

And when you exhale,

That there's this openness,

You can exhale through all the layers out.

So as the final visualization here,

Breathing in through all the layers to your embryo self,

And exhaling with ease out through all the layers,

The petals out.

And then letting go of that visualization and just become present and breathe normally.

And as we go slowly towards the end of this practice,

Maybe you want to keep your eyes closed,

Or maybe you want to gently open them,

But take your time.

Feel what's right for you.

So I'll end the meditation here,

And I really invite you to slowly get out of it,

Slowly go out of it,

And maybe you want to stay for a while.

So this will be the official end,

And I hope it was deep compassion for you and self-connection.

Thank you.

Reviews

That was a beautiful and very profound meditation! I will revisit this and do more of the tree ring work you just taught me about. What an incredible way to direct self compassion to the many layers of who we are. Thank you for sharing your beautiful gifts with us here on inside timer! Namaste & amen🪷🙏🕉️🙏🪷

I found this to be a relaxing and soothing experience, with just the right level of guidance while leaving space to explore your own experience. Thank you Hans 🙏