Are you someone who practices self-compassion, but wonders why it can be so effective? Or are you someone who has found, or is finding it, difficult to process strong emotions? This article discusses some of the benefits of self-compassion, touches on some of the findings from a neuroscience and psychological research perspective around self-compassion. It ends with an exercise to practice self-compassion.

About Self-Compassion

In a previous article I talked about the benefits of self-love, and touched very briefly on self-compassion. Because self-compassion can have such significant benefits, I decided to write an article completely focused on this. Coming at things from a pragmatic perspective, I was curious as to what are the psychological and even brain chemistry benefits of self-compassion. In working with people in therapy I had witnessed the benefits of it, particularly in areas such as grief and loss, and addiction.

For those dealing with grief and loss, self-compassion enables them to slowly learn how to self sooth and sit with the strong emotions associated with loss. This helps them to reduce distraction and avoidance behavior, which wasn’t unhealthy, but they could see wasn’t helping them process the loss, with the goal of eventually being able to move forward in their life.

For those dealing with addiction, being able to understand the origins of their addictive behavior, often from earlier in life, made sense of what they were doing now and enable them to see it is an ineffective coping strategy. This helped them to step off the cycle of shame that often perpetuates addictive behavior. Also self-compassion was used as an approach to start to sit with emotions they previously would have avoided through use of their addiction.

The research from a psychological perspective suggests that therapies focused on self-compassion can provide a number of benefits, which include the ability to process strong emotions. From a neuroscience perspective, like self-affirmation which was discussed in a previous article, self-compassion is protective against the effects of stress.

Practicing Self-Compassion – Compassionate Hand

The exercise today is my adaptation of one developed by Russ Harris, the creator of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), called the Compassionate Hand. My perspective of this therapy is that it is a very practical one. It allows people to accept that difficult things happen in life and uncomfortable emotions are part of life. It helps the individual to accept this and by connecting with the values that are important to them. By doing this they can build the capacity to not only cope with these difficult times, but also to grow.

One of the interventions developed by Russ is called the Compassionate Hand. The idea behind this is that your hand becomes a useful metaphor for a supportive person or idea that connects you to love and unconditional support when you need this. By transferring this ability to your own hand it provides you with the ability to offer these qualities to yourself.

Compassionate Hand Exercise

1) Find a quite space where you won’t be interrupted.

2) Spend a couple of minutes just quietly breathing and noticing your breath. If you find your mind wandering just come back to your breath. If it helps, put a hand on your stomach and notice how it moves with your breath.

3) Next step is to think of something in your life that causes you pain and scan your body to see where this pain is in your body. It might be your head, your chest, your stomach, your limbs etc.

4) Now focus on one of your hands being that source of support and love, and place it lightly and gently on that part of your body.

5) Feel the warmth traveling from your hand to your body and imagine it making your body feel softer, lighter and warmer based on this touch. Imagine loving and caring travelling through your hand into your body.

6) Stay with this for as long at you like, ie 10 seconds or 10 minutes.

7) Now put one of your hands on your chest and the other on your stomach. Again, imagining caring, warmth and kindness traveling from your hands into your body.

8) Stay with this for as long as you like.

9) When you are finished slowly reconnect with the space you are in. Notice the room. Briefly reflect on how that felt for you and what you noticed about it.

If at any point in this exercise you feel overwhelmed then please STOP. Consider using a different thought next time, or possibly connect with a therapist who can help support you with the thoughts and feelings that came up.

In Finishing

Self compassion for some people is something they intuitively practice and benefits their lives. As a therapist I have found clients adopting this practice and finding it invaluable. From a psychological perspective it starts to build a capacity to process strong emotions which can avoid other less useful strategies such as acting out, or even just incessant activity. From a neuroscience perspective evidence suggests that it offsets the impact of stress. I would encourage you to try the self-compassion exercise. Also at the bottom of this post is a link to an ACT web site which has many self-help resources.

Take care

Scott

Further resources on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy