Practicing Self-Compassion

I can’t recall what the ad was but I remember watching a commercial several years ago where two people were in a room together and one of the them talked to the other the same way they would talk to themselves. She was hurling insults at the other woman about not being good enough, being stupid and overweight. She was clearly shaken about how mean and hurtful these words were when directed towards others.

But more often than not, we have very little insight on how these powerful words- this inner monologue damages us to the core. Some people call this negative self-talk, but I prefer to refer to it as emotional self-abuse or emotional self-harm because that is really what it is. "Negative self-talk" doesn’t emphasize enough the damage we are inflicting upon ourselves. We are engaging in self-harm when we talk to ourselves like this- belittling ourselves, tearing ourselves down. Most of us would never think to speak these words to another human, but we do every single day- to ourselves. A lot of us love to shower our friends or partners with compliments, affirmations, support and validation.

I want to challenge you today to turn this inward. Think of your biggest cheerleader in your life (or maybe imagine Mister Rogers) and talk to yourself today the way these special people talk to you. We can do this, together.

Feel free to share this post and let’s spread the self-compassion!