Meditation For Self-Compassion

This self-compassion meditation will ease the body, and calm the mind. By working with our thoughts, we can begin to change the way we view the world, our relationships, and our intimate relationship with ourselves.

Transcript

For this meditation,

I suggest you find a comfortable seat.

Or perhaps you might lie down if it's the end of your day.

And as you start to settle,

Let your in breath lengthen the spine.

You might anchor down from your hips and lift the crown of your head.

Like your inhale could fill the spaces between the vertebrae of your spine with beautiful breath.

And then find some ease and some comfort in the exhale.

Organizing the body,

Seeking out a little bit more ease.

Intentionally letting the arms and the legs drop.

Find a little ease,

Maybe a little space in between the top and bottom teeth.

And there's a little bit more slack with the jaw.

And a softness of the eyes.

And perhaps you close your eyelids.

Shifting into this still space where you can start to notice the beating of your heart and the rhythm of your breath.

In this meditation,

We will be cultivating more of the idea of self-compassion.

Self-love.

It is to me a paradox that we spend our whole lives in this body.

And still we find it so challenging to love ourselves fully.

Or to the extent that we love others.

And so we'll be creating space now to give ourselves some rest and some extra love.

And if it helps to anchor your breath in this meditation,

You may start to inhale and exhale with a balanced rhythm.

Inhaling for a count of three,

Four,

Maybe five.

And exhaling for the same amount of time.

It might help to imagine the tides of the ocean coming in and out of the sand.

On your inhale,

The waves come in.

And then on the exhale,

They retreat back.

Using this as an anchor can help you stay present,

Help you stay right here with me.

And this idea of self-love can get so complicated as we spin out into the world each day wrapped up in all of the layers of responsibility and labels that we have adorned from the beginning of our life.

We are daughters and sons.

We are sisters and brothers.

We wear mom and dads,

And cousins,

Friends,

Lovers,

Colleagues,

Employer or employee.

These labels keep us separate.

When underneath,

We all own the label of being human,

All worthy of love and respect and dignity.

But the focus on all the other labels that we have becomes so loud that we often forget that ourself,

Our very own right to love,

Gets drowned out by the noise of everything else.

So in meditation and in these moments of stillness,

We can start to wipe away these other labels that are very important throughout our daily life to walk us through our journey.

But at other times,

We can hang them on the side and leave space for our humanness,

For our flaws and our strengths,

Our worries and our triumphs,

Allowing everything to feel heard.

When was the last time you gave yourself a little space?

When was the last time you held yourself as purely as you do your loved ones?

Sometimes this act is seen as selfish or being egotistical.

But it is true that you need to show up for yourself just as much as showing up for others,

For we cannot pour from an empty cup.

Opening your heart now,

Your beating heart just left of the center of your chest and cultivating a warm color around your heart.

This glowing organ alive and beating.

And I want you to bring to mind someone that you dearly love,

Maybe a pet,

Maybe a close loved one.

Notice how your body responds to their name in your head.

There might be a little lift of the corners of your mouth.

You could feel that twinkle in your eye as you imagine them.

How would it be like if you could feel that way about yourself?

Lending yourself the same amount of tenderness and space that you give this person each and every time you think of them.

I invite you to put your hand on your heart.

Breathing into this hand,

Feeling the beat of your heart.

Feeling this tenderness.

And oftentimes we allow our thoughts to overtake.

We see our thoughts as truth or as fact and real and sometimes they can lead us astray.

Our thoughts were the first thing in this world that allowed us to navigate our external environment.

But sometimes in environments we learn how to think in ways that are not supportive as we grow into adulthood.

Ways that we use to survive are no longer helpful as we yearn for more independence and autonomy and selfhood.

And knowing that if you have these intrusive and sometimes repetitive thoughts or if you often ruminate on the past or if you worry about the future,

Just know that sometimes this is your brain,

Your thought processes working at an automatic pace.

They are just trying to keep you safe but perhaps this is based on an old model of thinking.

And these grooves in the mind create suffering because we see them as real.

Maybe bring to mind a thought lately that you've had that is not helpful.

One that does not cause too much pain but something that you can hold just there in your heart as you breathe.

You might say it out loud or you might repeat it to yourself several times in your mind.

How does it make you feel?

Do you feel it in your body?

And then now I implore you to think or say the opposite.

If the thought implies a lack of something,

Give it abundance.

If the thought is an all or nothing black or white statement,

Give it tones of gray.

If it's a worry,

Make it an assertive statement.

And if it's a remorse or something that happened in the past,

Give it space to feel sad and acknowledge your love for it.

And then return back to your beating heart,

Perhaps the hand that is holding onto your chest rising up and down in this beautiful body of yours still here and still present.

And this is where it starts,

The shift,

The recognition of thoughts and patterns of thinking that are here in our lives as exactly that,

Patterns.

Patterns that are automatic and sometimes unnoticed.

But if we can start to notice them,

Then we can start to change them.

And taking a moment now to take a deeper breath in all the way down to the belly,

Expanding through the rib cage and then exhale out your mouth.

Doing this as many times as you need as you start to lean into the rhythm of your heart,

Creating more space and stillness in the mind.

Leaning in,

Being curious about this meditation,

The signals in the body and the quietness of your heart.

Observing the in-breath,

Observing the out-breath.

Staying here as long as you need.

Be well.