Tag: self-compassion

My 200th post!

NOW can I call myself a writer?

What passion of yours do you discredit because you haven’t done it long enough, well enough, fast enough, professionally enough, famously enough?

The thing that bubbles up from deep inside your soul is YOU, whether a thousand people know it or just you.

If you ever, ever, ever find yourself biting your tongue when the words “I’m a [thing-er]” or “I love [thing-ing]” want to come out . . . I challenge you to stick up for the enthusiastic, joyful, adventurous child deep inside you, and finish that sentence with pride.

“I’m a runner.”

“I’m a writer.”

“I love cooking.”

And remember that when your little child says “Mommy, I love drawing,” you would never say “Yes, but you’re not very good at it darling.”

Who you are and what you love and what you want still count as much as they did when you were 3 feet tall.

So say your “I’m-a” sentence, and then let it sit as truth. No “But-I’m-not,” “But-I-only” . . . Don’t discredit it. It is you.

Honor the passion inside you. Don’t extinguish your own flame. There are no minimum qualifications for being in love with life.

Thanks for honoring the Writer in me.

What are YOU?

~

Follow and support my journey as a writer by throwing your email down here:

I look forward to connecting as together we navigate this weird adventure called life. :)

Honoring the adventurous human in you today.

~

You ARE you

A while ago I wrote a short and simple blog post called “It’s okay to be you.”

I wonder if adding another way of thinking about it could help:

You just ARE you.

Period.

Whether it’s okay or not (and it is), you are you.

If you are an anxious you, a distracted you, a busy you, a depressed you, a frustrated you, an over-achieving you, a socially awkward you, a tired you, or a can’t-gym-these-days you . . . that is just . . . you.

You are it.

It is you.

Trying to not be you won’t work.

So . . . may as well be okay with who you are.

It’s an adventure.

Dance with it.

I hope that you will be gentle with yourself

Imagine you’re holding the hand of a little child, seeing tears brim in their eyes. Frustrated. Embarrassed. Not good enough.

How delicately will you hold that child’s heart in your hands? What will you say? How gentle will you be with their sensitive little heart?

This child needs love and support. You would be gentle and kind with them, wouldn’t you?

With them.

With yourself, on the other hand? . . .

You do a good job hiding your secret. You’re big now. Strong, seasoned, tough, even a touch jaded. You choke the tears back these days. Nobody can know. You can’t be needy.

But you are that child. You’re just a little taller than you used to be. Still, the sensitive heart is there as it always has been.

So my wish for you today is that you’ll be gentle with yourself.

Today, when your mind floods with reasons to feel small, ashamed, not good enough . . . see in yourself the sensitive little child–trying your best, just needing love–and reach out to yourself. Hold yourself in love and respect and appreciation and compassion.

It’s easy to forget that we are every bit as human and precious as “other” people–it’s easier to love those other people, looking vulnerable, with the tears in their eyes. It’s harder to be kind to ourselves. To accept our own vulnerability and need for love. To know our inner child. To say, “I am good enough. I am loved. Everything is going to be okay.”

How do those words feel when you say them to yourself? What if you stopped blaming and shaming yourself, and spoke to yourself as you would to the little child?

Do you ever comfort yourself? Can you try?

I hope that you will be gentle with yourself.

<3

A challenge: Can we be our same “good” selves even in the “bad” contexts?

IMG_9800

I am a person with a lot of good inside of me. And, um, there is some bad inside of me.

Sometimes I do these big wonderful things to help people. And sometimes I choose things that I know could harm me or the world.

I have this deep passion for kindness, gentleness, being compassionate, and not being an asshole. And then sometimes I hear myself saying something heartless about someone and I think “wow, I am being an asshole.”

So I have both. Good in me. Bad in me.

“Good” and “bad” are tricky concepts. We each have different words for them, and some of the words come with a lot of baggage. Maybe your words are “good” and “evil.” Maybe your words are “right” and “wrong.” Maybe your words are “beautiful” and “ugly.” But somewhere–somewhere deep down, no matter our big picture, we have a sense of “yes, that is how life is meant to be,” and “no, that is sick sick sick.”

And we each have some of both in us.

And the bit of bad doesn’t mean we’re worthless!

When your 3-year-old can’t draw to save her life, that is perfect. You love her awful, beautiful picture she made with her little trying hands. She’s 3. And you love her.

And when I catch myself thinking or saying or doing something that isn’t fair or isn’t my business or is actually pretty shitty–it doesn’t mean I’m worthless. I’m trying at this “life” thing, and I’m getting some of it wrong, and sometimes I give up on trying for a minute. But…I’m 28. And I, too, am loved.

But even with all the love and acceptance, it is worthwhile to stop and say: “We each have some good in us and some bad in us.” Yin and yang. Life. Humanness.

Have you noticed that sometimes . . . a lot of times . . . it depends on the context?

With an inspiring group of fitness friends, we’re kind. On the phone with customer service, feeling annoyed and unimportant, we’re rude and aggressive. . . . On vacation, out in the great outdoors with other adventurers, we’re just the nicest and openest. Racing the clock in traffic, we cut people off and give people nasty looks. . . . Volunteering for a couple hours at a food shelf, we’re friendly and interested in our fellow volunteers. At the end of a stressful day at work, we have nothing but moody looks for people who try to connect. . . . On our Instagrams, we’re all inspiring and motivating and positive. Then we get sucked into a political debate and all bets are off. . . . Sometimes it even just depends on which people we’re around. Our group of kind and uplifting buddies? Or our group of sarcastic and negative buddies?

Have you noticed that some of us internalize big-picture assumptions about how “most people are generally well-meaning and kind,” while others of us internalize the idea that “most people are generally mean and selfish?” Maybe we’ve just been spending most of our time living and learning in one type of context.

For example, some people live in worlds where they get to see a lot of mindful, thoughtful, excited good, good, good–inspirational conferences, leading high energy workouts, working with precious children at a daycare . . .

On the other hand, some people live in worlds that seem to frequently center on or bring out the careless, mindless, thoughtless bad–customer service, politics, law enforcement, litigation, working with…precious children at a daycare . . .

It’s not that the world is made up of sunshine and rainbows. And it’s not that the world is full of awful people. It’s that the world is full of PEOPLE. People who show up a little differently depending on the context.

The SAME PERSON will find the GOOD pulled out of her in some contexts, and the BAD pulled out of her in other contexts.

Do you ever catch that in yourself? Like, “I’m usually pretty nice, but apparently not when I’m asking for a refund!” . . . Or like, “I thought I had grown up into a mature adult who gets along with other adults, but then I went to a family reunion!”

Do you ever notice someone doing the Jekyll/Hyde thing to you? Where you’re like, “wait–I thought this person was nice? Where did this come from???”

We all have some of both: Good and bad. Love and hate.

Potential for both.

Are we different per context? In some contexts, wonderful? In some contexts, a little less than wonderful?

All begs one big question:

How can we move more toward WONDERFUL?

How can we bring out the GOOD more often in ourselves? And in others?

Can we consciously tip the scale toward a more consistent, mindful life of LOVE? Even in the tougher contexts?

Can we pick up the entire spectrum and shift it a few smiles and thoughtful words to the KIND side?

Yes, we’ll still have both sides of the spectrum in us. It’s just . . . can we get a little more mindful, so that we can bring a little more GOOD to the “bad” contexts?

If it seems hopeless–if you think Little You can’t tip the world’s Kindness Scale–remember that Love can be profoundly contagious.

It starts with you and me.

namaste

Martin Luther King Jr - stick with love hate too great a burden

Accept your pendulum

When we humans grow, we tend to resemble pendulums.

If we were too this, we become, for a time, too that. And then we may become too this again, but a little less. And so the pendulum swings.

It just happens. We cannot stop abruptly in the center, perfectly balanced, on the first go-round. Growth is messy.

Your pendulum may have been wound way up from a lifetime of hurt, fear, judgment, or repression. When it swings hard in the other direction–and it will–accept yourself. You are growing.

If I focused too little on my own needs, growth may look for a while like focusing “too much” on myself.

If you were too gentle and repressed, growth make look for a while like expressing anger “too much.”

If I had too much reckless “fun” as a young adult, growth may look for a while like “too much” inhibition.

If you stuffed your emotions deep down inside when you were a kid, growth may look for a while like “too much” crying.

If I always controlled my appetite with negative self-talk and judgment, growth may look for a while like “too much” ALL THE cookies.

Growth is messy. Your pendulum will swing.

When your pendulum swings, remember that it is only a pendulum–it will swing back toward balance. It’s okay.

And remember to let yourself grow, to trust that process, to hold your new self with compassion.

Accept your pendulum.

Henry David Thoreau - not worth while to let our imperfections disturb us always