We’ve all made it through May! Let’s take a moment to honor all that we’ve gotten through. For me, this month has held uncertainty, challenges, and a lot of time at home. In moments I was inspired and hopeful, and in others I was overwhelmed and fed-up (and some of these feelings lingered longer than I’d hoped). As I sat with and made room for all of these parts, I was reminded of the importance of self-compassion.
You may already be familiar with the phrase or you may be wondering ‘what the heck is that?’ Self-compassion is the practice of extending grace that you grant others, to yourself in moments where you’re feeling inadequate, ashamed, and self-critical. In order to practice self-compassion, we must be attuned to our internal processes; we must consider the way we talk to ourselves, how we approach challenges, and the way our self-talk makes us feel about ourselves.
In the spirit of connecting with ourselves and using our journals to cope with this pandemic, I offer these prompts for all of us to think about: When I hear the word ‘self-compassion,’ what comes up for me? Am I paying attention to my internal world? How does the way I talk to myself affect how I feel about myself? What would practicing self-compassion look like in my life?
Through answering these questions, my hope is that some of your automatic thoughts and feelings become apparent. This could help you acknowledge what you’re already doing well, and also allow you to start to make small changes that allow for you to extend kindness, patience, and love to yourself. Each day that we practice self-compassion, we are allowing ourselves to sit with and embrace all of our feelings- both positive and negative; we are deepening our understanding and honoring ourselves holistically.
If you find that going through this prompt has brought up things that you need help processing, Latinx Talk Therapy is here!