These words have tremendous power in our lives, often without us realizing the power they have internally and externally. The impact of judging others and having compassion with others is enormous. The same is true with self-judgment and self-compassion.
Living with compassion does not mean people get “off the hook” but can empower us to make changes that can be remarkable over-time. “Over-time” is key. Patience and persistence count when it comes to making changes in our lives. Kindness can go a long way in supporting changes. Change can be difficult, but very often worth the effort.
Sometimes we misunderstand the power of judgment and compassion. We can take a different look and try something different as an experiment. Life is full of little experiments. Some work, some don’t. Consider how many times the lightbulb, which we now take for granted, did not work while it was still an experiment. Let’s experiment! Maybe we can experincemt with compassion and judgement, by starting with becomine aware how often we use each one of these in our dialy lives, both towards ourselves and towards others.
Sometimes we see “judgment” as the only way to go, the way to be fair, to create change. Yet, often judgment keeps us stuck and doesn’t allow us the power we need to make the necessary changes from the inside out. Judging others can ruin relationships and build walls without us realizing this is going on until it is so late, things may or may not change for the better. Although we might make temporary gains, they often are not long lasting when judgment is the foundation. Judging can keep us stuck, blind us, harden us, hurt us deeply emotionally and even physically.
Sometimes self-compassion gets misunderstood. We can begin to be compassionate with ourselves as we journey in this life and accept that we are not perfect, but we are doing the best we can. That alone can be a huge change for some. We can demand perfection, often unaware of how hard and judgmental we are of ourselves, until we stop and look.
Developing self-compassion can get tricky. Sometimes the best way to start is to consider how we would talk to others (especially a child or best friend) when we are talking with ourselves. In addition, we need to become aware of what we are saying to ourselves, which can also be tricky. But we can unpack it all, step by step. Becoming aware is step one.
When we keep kindness at the center, we can practice compassion more and jugement less. Kindess is an essential ingredient to making theise types of changes. Kindness towards ourselves first. Just like we need to learn to love ourselves, we also need to learn to be kind to ourself, which is a part of compassion.
How do we make these changes?
Let’s begin by just noticing our self-talk. What do we think, and say to ourselves about everyday stuff? Start noticing the chatter that goes on in our head each day. This can be exhausting to do because the chatter, the self-talk, and can be so subtle we may not even notice it. But the impact can be real and felt in our bodies, seen in our attitudes with others, and towards life.
Next, be aware of how often we judge ourselves and others. Just notice the judgmental talk, the judgmental thoughts we think, feel, and possibly project onto others as we go through life. We may be surprised.
Notice the compassion we feel for others and for ourselves. Do we care about ourselves as much as others? How do we feel when we show compassion to others? How about when we show compassion to ourselves?
Practice, practice, practice.
Practice noticing and becoming aware for a full week, maybe writing it your journal.
Once we recognize our habit of the judgment pattern, we can change it, if we are willing to do the work. We can also learn to love and show compassion to ourselves and watch our lives change inwardly and outwardly.
What difference do we want to make? We do make a difference, more than we realize at times. Our beliefs impact not only who we are, but also those around us as we interact with family and friends. When we are unaware of the judgments we hold and project, we don’t realize how we are impacting ourselves and others.
The same is true with compassion. As we become more aware, we live more consciously and fully. Our impacts are more aligned with our values and beliefs. We become healthier and happy.
Just like we may need a doctor to help us be physically healthy and strong, to correct things in our body that are not helping us, we also may need to see a therapist or counselor to help us learn to love and show compassion to ourselves, and to reduce judgment of others.
Enjoy the journey. Get a helping hand if needed so that you too can help others on their path, but mostly because
YOU ARE WORTH IT!
Compassion for ourselves goes a long way in the world we occupy. As we develop compassion for ourselves, we may naturally develop a different outlook in life and compassion for others. Compassion may change your life. This takes time. Be patient. Showing compassion to ourselves is a gift.
Please note:
All of our blogs are intended for educational purposes only. These are not intended as “advice” or any form of therapeutic intervention. Please contact your doctor, local mental health office for help with individual problems or concerns. You may also call 988 to speak with a person about self-harm thoughts.
You matter. Help and hope are there for you.
