The Healing Power of Self Compassion
“I think modern medicine has become like a prophet offering a life free of pain. It is nonsense. The only thing I know that truly heals people is unconditional love.” Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
One of the blocks that may hold you back from releasing painful patterns in your life is your relationship with yourself.
The teeny weeny habit of finding constant fault with yourself — often disguised as a never ending quest for self improvement — gets in the way of your true healing.
The most healing frequency of all is the vibration of unconditional love, a love that requires nothing of anybody, including yourself.
You don’t have to be or do anything to experience the benefit of this frequency, you just have to be in the neighborhood.
Just as sunshine penetrates the darkness, so it is with unconditional love softly caressing the inevitable wounds of life,
One of the easiest ways to begin to practice unconditional love is through compassion.
What is compassion?
In my mind, compassion is a quality of your heart.
You may have empathy for others when they lose a spouse, end up in a hospital, fall down and hurt their knee, get fired from their job, end up with the sniffles.
It is sometimes easier to see how what happens to others isn’t even really personal, just part of the human experience. Everybody aches sometimes.
Compassion happens when you expand the energy of your heart.
This may happen most often in a non-verbal manner, without you saying or even doing anything.
You can feel when you amplify your heart frequency and others can also.
It’s as if your heart radiates a steady frequency of energy that warms everyone around you.
What if you could offer the same compassion for yourself?
Although we can receive compassion from our family, our friends, our doctors, our energy healers and all other members of the helping profession, perhaps the most important person to have this quality of heart for you is you.
That’s because you can’t really let all the love in that exists everywhere all the time until you allow yourself to be in a compassionate, loving relationship with your true self.
Here are a few ways you can expand this heart quality to you:
- Catch yourself in the habit of self judgment. When you notice yourself finding fault with who you are, what you look like, how much money you do or do not make, how far you think you have or have not come in your life and all the myriad ways you can measure yourself to some imaginary standard, just stop for a moment. Where did these ideals come from anyway? Mother, father, church, mass media, your friends? Or you simply decided you need to be that way? What if you could simply allow yourself to be you with no labels. Have mercy on yourself and give yourself permission to throw away your old measuring sticks.
- Soften your expectations. Even if you truly believe you should be some other way in this moment, what if you could just allow yourself to be who you are, where you are in this very moment? By letting go of your preconceived ideas you allow your true self to emerge from under all your masks. You practice tenderheartedness with yourself. You allow your process rather than forcing it or constricting it. You just let yourself be you.
- Notice how you can love yourself just the way you are now. You may not in fact be living in your ideal situation with the comfort and ease you would prefer, but being hard on yourself won’t make anything better. Can you allow yourself simply to be? Can you even welcome the way you are now, seeing your beauty, your strength, your tenacity, your perseverance in spite of all that has happened? By letting go of the habit of pushing or shoving or cramming yourself in any direction, you allow your highest good to show up by grace in perfect timing.
What is healing? Healing happens when you hold yourself tenderheartedly in mind, compassionately allowing your humanity and trusting God to guide you to all that is good, blessed and wonderful.
Like this article? Please visit my websites at www.catherinecarrigan.com,www.unlimitedenergynow.com, and www.whatissocialmediatoday.com. For a FREE 15-minute consult, please email catherine@catherinecarrigan.com or call 678–612–8816.
