What is nice?

Hi friends! Wanna know something I learned this week?

It’s about how to be nice to ourselves, especially when it’s new and we don’t want it thank you very much.

Dear Jay, Andy’s mother has told me that her son has been made very unhappy this year. Name-calling and ostracism have left him sad and lonely. I feel concerned about the situation. Your experience as a leader in your class makes you a likely person for me to turn to for advice. I value your ability to sympathize with those who suffer. Please write me your suggestions about how we can help Andy.

Sincerely, Your teacher.

This was a letter from a teacher (and child psychologist) to an 8 year old bully in her class. Jay was the one bullying Andy into feeling sad and lonely.

Someone asked me this week what self compassion looks like. "For those of us who aren't used to exercising it, how do we know what being nice to ourselves looks like?"

First of all, this an awesome question and I'm going to be reflecting on it a lot. (Maybe you might let me know if the topic appeals to you as something worth exploring together?)

Secondly, that is what self compassion looks like. It looks like treating a bully with empathy and grace. It looks like separating the person from the behavior (Jay is not a bully, he's a child who's behavior has recently been causing someone some pain). It looks like recognizing our good nature and trusting that we have the interest and ability to change and improve. It looks like fostering positive action, with love and support. It looks like coming with belief and understanding instead of judgement and blame.

We've all got an Andy and a Jay inside us. Self compassion looks like taking the time and space to look after our Andy and to recognize that Andy deserves help, to feel happy and safe. On top of that self compassion looks like being just as kind and caring as we would be with Andy, with our Jay.

We often lack compassion for ourselves when there's something we want to change about ourselves but feel incapable, or like we're not moving fast enough. It can be easy to feel frustrated and impatient. It can be easy to call ourselves lazy or stupid or incapable or a fraud.

When we feel like a fraud, there's a voice in our head accusing us of being one, after all.

It can be easy to bully ourselves without even realizing. And even when we recognize we might not be doing such a great job at supporting and encouraging ourselves, it can be easy to start bullying the bully and getting frustrated with ourselves for not being kinder to ourselves!

The brain is complicated ¯\(ツ)/¯

One way I like to try and make it simple is to ask myself this:

Would I say that to an 8 year old?

Would I say "You're lazy" to Andy? Would I say “You’re stupid” to Jay? Chances are I'm being a bit of a bully, and I'm deserving of more compassion and patience than I'm giving myself. Hug time.

I could talk for days about self compassion and how I'm learning to exercise it, but I'll leave you with that, save for this one last thing:

It's easy to think of compassion as a switch, which we should be able to set and forget. But like most things in life, it's a practice. And practice takes practice. So be kind to yourself :)

Thanks for stopping by 🌝

I’ll be back next monday with more mash for your marbles.

In the meantime, here is…