The Gift of Self-Compassion

#046: The gift of compassion is a skill and ability that we need to learn to offer ourselves. Do you find yourself supporting others with compassion, kindness, and understanding? What do you offer yourself? 

Listen in for some helpful tips and ideas to bring this amazing compassion HOME to YOU. You are worthy!

Show Notes: 

Welcome to conscious parents, thriving kids, a place for all things parenting. I am your host Sue DeCaro. Oftentimes I have people reaching out to me all over the world asking me for guidance and support actually daily, and I take this as an opportunity to show compassion and kindness for that is really what I'm about. I'm a person who has a bleeding heart. I care for others in such a way that sometimes I actually have to protect myself and not over-give. As a parent, coach, and educator, I teach people how important self-care is in everyday life. We must always fill our own buckets and re-energize ourselves so that we are able to take care of the important people in our lives, our children, our families, our parents perhaps, and we cannot do that with an empty bucket. This leads me to the discussion of compassion. Many times as parents we find ourselves full of sympathy, understanding kindness and compassion towards others. I have many friends and family members that will share the things that might be challenging and painful and of course, I am supportive and kind feeling a little bit of their pain as I speak with them. We all possess the skill and offer this to so many others in our daily lives. When we are in pain, we also need to be able to show ourselves compassion.

This is not something that many of us have ever seen modeled in our own lives. How many of our parents actually have shown us how to be compassionate with ourselves? We're not taught the importance or the necessity of being most compassionate towards ourselves. For example, I had the flu a while back for two weeks. Many times when I had been sick in the past, I would try to push through it thinking that there was no time for illness. Who has time for that? But this particular time was different. I not only allowed myself to feel whatever was coming through my body but also acknowledged what message it was giving me each day. Moment to moment, I took clues from my body and responded compassionately. I showed myself the same love, kindness, and concern that I would show a friend. I accepted my current state and I recognized that I needed to lay on the couch, not push through the illness, but instead surrender to that moment with lots of self-compassion.

It is so important. Be kind to yourself. And here are some ideas on how to do this. First, acknowledge that whatever is happening is challenging or difficult. It's important to look at our lives and see the challenges and the difficulties that we are facing. Next, ask yourself, what do I need right now? And then how can I comfort and care for myself at this particular moment? These are the things we provide to others. So let's circle back and offer ourselves that exact same compassion. These questions and their answers are not opportunities for us to bring judgment to the situation. Just like we show others compassion and kindness, we need to show ourselves that same level of respect without a judgmental attitude. So when we look at the challenge or name the challenge and ask ourselves what we need right now, it's not about a negative focus. It's not about the fact that we are having a hard time. It is with complete neutrality that we need to come to this and wrap our arms around ourselves so that we can be compassionate for the most important person in front of us if we're looking in the mirror and that's ourselves.

Lastly, we need to honor and accept that we are human beings and as such, we are going to experience tough moments in our lives. Acknowledging the challenges in our lives and giving ourselves the time to care for those challenges is a small gift and a gift that keeps on giving because carving out that time to honor and accept that we are human is a gift in and of itself. Human beings need to go through life excepting with compassion. Don't ignore your pain. You will move forward in a more balanced way. When you comfort and acknowledge what is happening within you rather than brushing it under the rug and dismissing it self-compassion requires us to observe what we are feeling, our thoughts, our emotions, our struggles, while also willingly bringing kindness, acceptance, and compassion to ourselves. In those particular moments. It's important to be your own support system.

It's also important to have other support systems too, but of course, you are your best source of support in every moment because you're always with yourself. So I encourage you to offer yourself exactly what you would offer another each and every day. Come to your morning, afternoon, evening with the love and kindness you show others you deserve it. When was the last time you offered yourself a hug? When was the last time you were fully kind and compassionate with loving arms to whatever was facing you at that moment? I encourage you to do more of this and I'd love to hear how it goes. Thank you so much for joining me. Remember, every moment is a new moment for conscious connections.