I recently finished The 5-Day Self-Compassion Challenge from Kristin Neff and Chris Germer, and I discovered two things:
Genuine self-compassion is really, really powerful.
I am not nearly as good at self-compassion as I thought I was.
I’ll write about being kind and gentle to yourself until my fingers cramp. Meanwhile, whenever my own life gets a little extra “lifey” (as it has these past few weeks), I have no qualms about kicking my own ass for struggling.
I’ll say things to myself that I’d never say to a friend, such as:
You should be over this already. Why are you still sad?
You’ve done so much self-work. How come you aren’t handling this better?
Other people have it way worse, and they’re still holding it together. Why can’t you?
I’m sure there are many highly scientific reasons why it’s so much easier to be compassionate to other people. I’m not here to explore that today. Instead, I want to take advantage of it and invite us all to share some compassion with each other.
My theory: the more compassion we spread, the more readily we can access it for ourselves and other people.
TL;DR I want to start a virtual hug chain.
Because I sure could use a hug today, and I bet you could, too.
Are you in? Restack this post and tag at least one other person with a virtual hug! 🫂
I know that tree and it hugs back!!
You always know, Robin. You always know.