Self

Self Compassion: Letting Go of the Need For Perfection

Kristin Neff, Ph.D. is widely known for her work in self-compassion. She describes the core components of self-compassion as:

·      Being  Kind to Ourselves

·      Recognition of the common human experience (the interconnected nature of our lives)

·      Mindfulness

When we develop self-compassion, we can love ourselves and remain calm and not react impulsively or defensively when we make a mistake, when we are challenged, or when we do not feel love from others. Being kind to yourself is treating yourself like you would a good friend or loved one. We win some battles and lose others, and to expect perfection is a setup for disappointment. Acceptance of our flaws and imperfections helps us understand that failure is part of life and is how we learn. When you make a mistake, there is no need to make excuses, feel bad, or beat yourself up internally. Happiness and motivation are reduced by harsh criticism toward self or others. Of course, we strive to be our best person, and self-compassion is not a mental trick to let ourselves off the hook or excuse ourselves when we don’t do the work. Mistakes are usually because we are not thinking, we forget get distracted, or get caught up in a pattern of rumination. We need to not condemn ourselves (or others) with labels such as stupid, lazy, or not motivated. Most mistakes are due to flaws, not lack of effort. It is okay to just say we are human and allow ourselves to ruminate, make mistakes, and understand that not all of our one hundred or so billion brain cells (neurons) did their job perfectly today, a few million of them will get out of line occasionally but this is a small part of who we are. Just be okay with imperfection in yourself and the world. This is not to condone meritocracy or to encourage or excuse negative behaviors. Experience teaches that acceptance of humanity and compassion for self and others is much more helpful than the negative contributions of critical self-talk. Recognition of our common humanity allows us to be more accepting and tolerant of mistakes. It also helps us to be a better parent, teacher, or partner and to be real.

Prompt: When you make a mistake, be cool with your humanity, try not to beat yourself up, say “I made a mistake, I will try harder.”

Being warm and supportive towards ourselves and actively soothing ourselves—does help when we fall short of our intentions or goals. It leads to less anxiety, less depression, and greater peace of mind—and, importantly, it makes us feel more motivated to make the improvements we need to.

Self-Compassion and Change: Dr. Neff

“If your resolution feels like a chore, YOU PROBABLY WON’T DO IT IN THE LONG RUN. If it is something you feel like you “should” do but that you don’t actually want to do...eventually, you likely won’t do it at all.

Take care of yourself in a fun way that will replenish you, and make you feel happier and healthier for the rest of your life.

If we want our habits to stick, we need to start small. It is hard for anyone to make big changes all at once. Creating a new habit or routine can take a great deal of energy and focus, and we have only so much self-control in a given day to work with. It's much better to succeed at just one small thing at a time than it is to fail at bigger things or many things at once. Almost all of us can pull off a brilliant couple of days or even weeks, but remember, life is a marathon.

An anchor or a prompt for change can be a time of day, a different habitual behavior that comes right before your habit (those make good triggers)—or even an emotion. For example, when you feel anxious, you may habitually pick at your nails. Or if you feel happy, you may habitually reach for your phone to take a picture. Emotions or thoughts often trigger behaviors.

If you have a habit that you don't want to eliminate, choose a trigger that occurs only when you want to do the habit. For example, "Do a thirty-minute yoga video twice a week" isn't a habit. It's a to-do item for your task list because there's no clear trigger and, therefore, no clear automaticity. But if you work only three days a week, you can use work as your trigger: “Do a thirty-minute yoga video every weekday as soon as you walk in the door from dropping the kids off at school."

Relish the positive emotions that your new habit elicits. Be intentional about them, or “take in the good” of them, as Rick Hanson would say. For example, I tend to feel happiest on my walks when I consciously look up at the trees (rather than down at the trail, as I am inclined). When I look up at the trees, I tend to feel a warm, relaxing sense of awe spread over me.

Structure your environment to support your decision. Put your work shoes deep in your backpack and your walking shoes by the door.

Make a specific plan for what you will do when challenges arise because they will. If you wake up to find that it's raining, pre-decide that you'll wear your blue rain jacket and take that huge golf umbrella your dad left in the closet.

Establishing a rule of no screen time after 9:00 p.m. opened up time for me to read more in the evening, spend more time with my husband and children, and talk to my daughter, who is away at school and likes to talk at night. All these things contribute to feelings of ease and happiness.

My computer is set to automatically go off at 9:00 p.m. My iPhone automatically goes into silent mode. My colleagues at work and my friends and family know that not only will I probably not read and respond to emails at night, but they are encouraged to make fun of me if they notice that I'm breaking my own rules. So it's not that I don't ever check my email or send a text after 9:15 p.m. (Lord knows I sometimes do.) It's just that I've set myself up to follow my rules more often than not, especially when I need to get up early in the morning.

Making a specific action plan dramatically increases the chance that you'll follow through.

The licensing effect occurs when we behave virtuously and then “cancel out” our good deeds by doing something naughty.

Our thoughts—about ourselves, other people, our circumstances—and the meaning we attribute to our world tend to trigger our emotions, and our emotions are often the motivation for our behavior. Our actions, when repeated, become habits.

Research has shown that taking breaks, even brief ones, dramatically improves our performance and productivity. When we don’t take breaks, our focus and the quality of our work usually suffer. But when we do rest throughout the day, we can work for much longer without the quality of our work or our focus suffering.

Start with something that is ridiculously easy. You could do it every day with barely a thought. Think about doing one push-up instead of 15, meditating for only one minute, and replacing one unhealthy snack with pre-packaged carrots and hummus. Remember, this is about initiating the neural pathway in a way that doesn’t create resistance— you’ll be able to expand your habit later. Write out your slightly better-than-nothing habit below.”