Judging positively versus relating kindly

I cannot think of a more important time for us to relate to ourselves kindly. Between a rapidly evolving pandemic, devastating bushfires and floods earlier by a few short months, most of us have our feet firmly planted in mid-air. It has been terribly unsettling.

It can be expected that all of us are tapped into a fear cycle. All creatures live with the background hum of fear, it has its evolutionary place. It is a welcome and necessary current in life’s ocean. Current circumstances challenge our ability to not over-identify with fear. When we numb our fear, or distract ourselves with busy-ness, fear, like any unprocessed emotion, becomes toxic.

We develop unhealthy thinking loops around fear. We are constantly worrying and anticipating what is around the corner. We fixate on the problem and narrow our focus at the exclusion of our higher order problem-solving abilities. As my colleague, F exclaimed “where are the grownups – I need someone bigger than myself to give me an answer!” The three fear expressions: FOD, FOF and FOMO (Fear of Death, Fear of Failure, and Fear of Missing Out), hold us hostage by increasing our resistance against living with ambiguity (FOD), living with the fear of separation and rejection (FOF) and the fear of not feeling enough (FOMO).

There is a better way: the practice of self-compassion. It allows for productive behaviour, it limits self-judgment and creates the emotional safety to allow accurate self-assessment. In our current environment, I cannot imagine a more important time to include self-compassion. Kristin Neff described three components of this practice:

1. To practice self-kindness (instead of judgement)

2. To acknowledge our common humanity (versus isolation)

3. To act mindfully (versus ignoring or fleeing).

In real time, it might sound something like this:

• This is hard right now (self-kindness)

• It is human to feel this way or many of us feel this way (common humanity)

• May I be kind to myself in this moment (mindfulness)

Self-compassion moves our sense of safety away from our reptilian fight, flight, freeze responses to our mammalian caregiving network. Self-compassion practices release a cocktail of hormones that activate our parasympathetic nervous system and calm us down. Something as simple as placing a hand on your heart or on your belly may be useful: mammals respond to warm soothing touch and gentle pressure. In the words of Thich Nhat Hanh: Go back and take care of yourself. Your body needs you, your feelings need you, your perceptions need you. Your suffering needs you to acknowledge it. Go home and be there for all these things.

In kindness, Dunay