Today's practice will help you develop self-compassion when you're struggling or facing a difficult situation.
The worst part of suffering is always an emotion,
And emotions are harmless when you allow yourself to feel them.
Without self-compassion,
We are constantly stopped by our emotions because we aren't able to bring enough attention and understanding to those emotions to be able to process them all the way through.
When we're unwilling to feel an emotion,
We push the emotion unconscious,
Making it much more likely that we are reacting to it.
That makes it hard to follow through on what we expect of ourselves because we aren't able to take action in spite of negative emotion.
Here's the thing.
The only way to learn to meet our expectations is to not meet them at least some of the time.
That's how we get good at meeting them.
Many have a low tolerance for failure because we are unable to be compassionate towards ourselves.
We disengage in our relationships,
In our careers,
And from our goals because we know how hard we will be on ourselves the moment we experience even the slightest bit of failure.
Not being able to be compassionate with yourself is costing you intimacy in your relationships,
Including the one with yourself,
And it's costing you your dreams.
How much you are able to create and how much you are able to take action on is directly proportionate to your capacity to be compassionate with yourself.
This practice is inspired by Kristin Neff and is called a self-compassion break.
Begin by finding a posture that balances both effort and ease.
So you can find an alert position without holding any unnecessary tension.
And then just begin to close down your eyes and take your attention inward.
To begin this practice,
We actually need to bring into focus a little suffering.
Maybe you're feeling stressed or worried,
Or maybe you're experiencing some tension or difficulty in a relationship,
Bringing to mind a difficulty with some stress around it,
But not so much stress that it doesn't feel workable,
Especially if you're new to this practice.
Finding a situation and getting in touch with it.
What's going on?
What's making you feel triggered?
What happened or what might happen?
Who said what?
Really bring the situation to life like you're watching it like a movie,
Playing it out in your mind.
Begin by recognizing that this is a moment of suffering.
You might freeze the frame as you watch the movie at the point where you noticed yourself get triggered.
Understanding what feels true to you with a phrase that resonates for you.
Maybe something like,
This is really hard right now,
Or I'm really struggling.
We're actually facing the situation by acknowledging it and naming what's going on for us.
Then I want you to offer to yourself that of course you're suffering and it's okay.
See if you can just let that be for right now.
What makes suffering so unbearable is when we suffer that we suffer.
There's a real humaneness and humanness to bringing a quality of acceptance to what's really going on with us in a moment of suffering.
Not making it mean that something has gone wrong or that something is wrong with us.
Sensing into the naturalness of suffering.
How it lets you know that you are human and that you're alive.
That it is human to suffer.
Asking yourself,
Can I be with this?
Can I be with this?
Sometimes the answer is no and the compassionate thing is to back off a little.
But with practice,
You are enlarging your capacity to say yes.
To include the suffering in your experience of life.
Because it is including it that you learn to transcend it and give yourself over to a fuller experience of life.
An experience of life that includes both pleasure and pain.
You enlarge your capacity and willingness to experience any emotion.
And if there's no emotion that you're unwilling to feel,
Then there's nothing you can bring yourself to do to create any outcome you desire in this situation or any other.
It's profoundly liberating to look at the situation like the one you're facing and say yes.
Not back away or seek to escape,
But to turn toward it long enough to understand what's really going on.
What's so triggering.
So you're acknowledging the suffering and creating some calming down by normalizing it.
And now I want you to scan through your body from your head down to your feet.
Paying special attention to the chest,
The belly,
The throat.
And locate the place where you experience the suffering the most.
Where do you feel most vulnerable in your body when you're experiencing the suffering in the situation that you've brought to mind?
Maybe there's a strong feeling or sensation there.
Or maybe it just kind of feels dull and numb.
To support you in getting present to it,
It can be helpful to place a hand on it as a gesture of care.
Like you're reaching out to let a good friend know that you're there.
One some other place that feels soothing and comforting.
Using your own sincerity.
Letting yourself know that you really care.
And using any language that supports that care and friendliness.
Maybe language that you would use with a friend going through a similar situation.
You might ask that vulnerable place,
How do you want me to be with you?
Sometimes the answer that comes in so much a fully formed answer but just a need to bring presence to it.
To hold what's going on with silence and listening.
And as you deepen your attention,
You might just say,
I care.
Or I'm here.
Or it's okay.
Or you might use a diminutive like,
Darling,
I'm so sorry.
Or you might experiment with using your name.
Whatever feels natural for you to express care towards yourself from the wisest and most loving part of you.
That part of you that wants to alleviate all of your suffering.
Staying in contact with the vulnerability.
Listening,
Feeling.
What does this place most need?
Sometimes that you can offer what's needed just by getting present to it in your body.
Letting compassion start flowing into the place of vulnerability.
Feeling that.
Getting into that.
And then letting go of your practice.
Noticing how your body feels right now.
Letting everything be just as it is.
Letting yourself be just as you are in this moment.
Feeling that.
Breathing that.
Feeling that.
