The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion

by Christopher K Germer

  There still aren’t many meditation teachers in the West, so it can be difficult to find a personal teacher in your geographic area. Most Western practitioners travel long distances to go on retreat and learn from a variety of teachers. Don’t fret too much if you haven’t found a personal teacher, though. A teacher is only as good as the student, and ultimately only you can transform yourself.

  Go on Retreat

  Retreats are an excellent place to learn the practice, to troubleshoot areas of difficulty, or to receive advanced training. They usually last from a few days to a few months. Most retreats occur in silence, except for daily meditation instructions, talks by teachers, and personal interviews. Silence alone has the effect of drawing out underlying emotional issues that we wouldn’t recognize in daily life, which we learn to engage using the skills of meditation.

  Two years ago, during meditation, I received a tap on the shoulder from the retreat manager, who told me with great tenderness that my father had just died. I left the retreat to see about funeral arrangements and to connect with my family, and when there was nothing further to take care of, I returned to the retreat. Sitting in the midst of my grief, occasionally weeping, smiling, regretting, and loving my father, I was reminded how healing it can be to have the company of compassionate people, even when they don’t say a word.

  FURTHER PRACTICE CONSIDERATIONS

  Many questions will emerge as you progress on the mindful path to self-compassion. Questions are an important part of practice. A curious, welcoming attitude and a carefully framed question will create space in your mind for an answer to appear all on its own. You can learn to trust that. However, the following issues may have already arisen for you:

  “My practice has done so much for me that I want to share the wealth. How can I get my family involved?”

  It’s generally best to keep your practice to yourself. Try not to become an annoyance to your loved ones by converting them to your practice. They’ll be curious when they notice your good will toward them. Our nearest and dearest are definitely transformed by the practice … when we change. They’ll probably be living in a happier environment.

  It’s interesting, however, how naturally kids take to self-compassion practice. I received the following e-mail from the mother of a 2-year-old:

  We were driving back from southern Vermont, so Mia had been in the car seat for about an hour and a half already (pretty good for a 2-year-old) when we got stuck in traffic. At that point she’d had it with being in the car and car seat and she started to have a mini-meltdown. I started to say the loving-kindness phrases out loud, as a way of dealing with the terrible pain of watching my child in distress and not really being able to do anything about it. To my surprise (and extreme relief for both of us) the minute I started saying the phrases, she started responding to each phrase affirmatively and calmed right down. We got into a nice little cadence …

  May we have peace in our hearts.

  Mia: Yeah.

  May we have joy in our hearts. Mia: Yes.

  May we be free from suffering.

  Mia: Okay.

  May we live with ease.

  Mia: Yes.

  This went on for a couple of minutes, and then she was fine. I was especially surprised because I had already tried to soothe her by singing songs and by reaching into the back seat and playing with her.

  Here’s another thing I’ve noticed: sometimes when she is having trouble settling down for her nap I will say the phrases to myself, and it is as if the energy in the room changes, and she senses it and she settles right down.

  Self-compassion may come easily to young children because they have not yet been tainted by social conditioning—they still live close to our inborn wish to be happy and free from suffering. One mother told me that using “we” is especially effective with young children (“May we be happy”) because kids have a fluid sense of “I” and “mine.” When helping older children become more self-compassionate, a useful question to ask is “What would your best friend say to you right now?” Once you’ve grounded yourself in the practice, use your creativity to explore the many ways to engage your children.

  “Should I always think of my own needs first?”

  We need to listen to one another to be happy in relationship. That means that we have to occasionally put our own needs aside and validate the experience of the other person. But as you read in the vignette about Suzanne and Michael in Chapter 1, we can’t put our own needs aside to have a happy relationship unless the pain buried in our hearts is seen and heard, at least by ourselves.

  Troy and Carlos had been living together for eight years and had a 4-year-old adopted son. Carlos came from a large, close-knit family that had loud, cantankerous arguments over the dinner table, whereas Troy’s family of origin was quiet, often even sullen due to simmering resentments. Troy had a low tolerance for emotional outbursts because they had quickly become violent when he was a child. He was an introvert, and he calmed down in private. When Troy and Carlos had a disagreement over how to raise their son, Carlos demanded that Troy talk with him as Troy retreated into the bedroom to lie down. Carlos was an extravert, preferring to solve problems in the presence of others. As Troy pulled away, Carlos became agitated and spoke loudly; the pain of disconnection was too great for Carlos to bear, unfamiliar as it was from his family of origin. Carlos was left feeling wounded, and Troy felt threatened, leaving them no room to actually hear the hopes and dreams they each had for their child and how to incorporate them into how they raised him.

  After 3 months of couple therapy, I asked this couple what they’d learned from treatment, if anything: “If there were only one thing to remember when you have an argument, what would that be?” Troy said, “Not to judge myself.” (Troy felt like a “horrible person” when Carlos yelled at him.) Carlos said, “Open to unhappiness.” Carlos had entered the relationship expecting that Troy’s companionship would always feel good. He hadn’t anticipated that Troy would pull away in an argument, making him feel lonely and abandoned. Troy and Carlos put their insights into practice. Carlos found that validating the unhappiness he felt as Troy retreated helped him “lay aside how it is for me, not even reluctantly, and then listen with openness and patience to figure out where Troy is coming from.” That brought Troy out of his corner, and he reminded Carlos what a valuable companion he was.

  Mindfulness and self-compassion can transform most of our personal relationships for the better—but only if we’re willing to feel the inevitable pain that relationships entail. When we turn away from our distress, we abandon our loved ones as well as ourselves. But when we incline toward whatever is arising within us, we can be truly present and alive for one another.

  “Will I ever overcome the urge to resist and avoid emotional pain?”

  No. The instinct to push away pain is hardwired. A patient of mine once said, “The desire to not get upset is like hope—it springs eternal!”

  We will always have the potential for self-made suffering from trying to avoid emotional pain. Mindfulness and self-compassion practice can simply make those periods shorter and shorter.

  Geoff was an exceptionally bright guy, a computer wizard, who felt anxious about many things: his kids, job, money, marriage, and physical health. Almost anything he paid attention to became a source of worry. In therapy, Geoff quickly understood the concept of “what you resist persists.” He was the perfect client, diligently practicing formal meditation twice daily for 20 minutes and informally whenever he felt anxious during the day. After a month, when I asked if his efforts were paying off, Geoff said he wasn’t sure. He still felt anxious despite all his hard work.

  Geoff was in the “disillusionment” phase of treatment. He was practicing in order to be less anxious, to “comfort [anxiety] away,” which is yet another form of resistance. Geoff was a workhorse and an intellectual—he understood how to work toward a goal, and it was taking him a little longer to get the feeling for self-compassion. With this insigh
t, Geoff gradually shifted his emphasis from working toward self-compassion to just giving himself kindness when he felt bad. (“This hurts. May I live with ease.”) He stopped seeing self-compassion as a “project” and started living in the present moment as an anxious guy who needs some loving.

  Intellectual people initially believe that the concept of self-compassion is the thing itself, but conceptual understanding is only the first step. Resistance to discomfort is a subcortical process occurring at the gut level, and self-compassion becomes most effective when it operates at that level. But even when compassion is deep, resistance springs eternal. Practice is necessary as long as we reside in a human body.

  “Does self-compassion ever become automatic?”

  Yes, somewhat. Changes will occur in your life when you least expect them, such as when you lock your keys in your car or when you show up at an important meeting 1 hour late. You may be surprised to discover how understanding you’ve become (“I guess I’ve been overcommitted lately”), rather than self-critical (“You fool!”).

  I had client, Aiko, who had not heard of self-compassion before she began practicing it. Six months later, as Aiko was describing her daily schedule of crippling work deadlines, I wondered aloud whether she ever remembered to be compassionate with herself. Aiko replied that simply saying the word “compassion” made a tear trickle down her face and softened her body. Another client told me that the word “kindness” was all he needed to evoke the feeling. With sufficient practice, words like “kindness” or “compassion” can trigger a host of beneficial nonverbal responses—softening the body, allowing unpleasant feelings to pass through, and loving ourselves. At later stages, only a flash of awareness (“Ouch!”) is enough to trigger a self-compassionate outcome.

  “My problem is my own behavior! How do I change?”

  All of us suffer from less-than-exemplary behaviors. Those actions often arise from our schemas—old habits of responding to threatening situations. Cesar, a middle-aged jazz musician, was a man with “mistrust” and “failure” schemas.

  Cesar worked a daytime job in an office supply store and complained bitterly about the fact that his talents were not properly recognized and compensated for at this stage in his life. Whenever his boss at the store questioned something he did, such as how he talked to customers, Cesar responded sharply and angrily. Behavior like this had led to a succession of unsatisfactory jobs.

  I had known Cesar for about 2 years when complaints about his supervisors started sounding repetitive. Cesar noticed the pattern as well. He confided in me that he had an anger problem, lamenting that “anger is like drinking poison and expecting someone else to die.” Cesar saw how correcting the problem would have to be an inside job. I asked Cesar what criticism from his boss signified to him. “I won’t be able to provide for my family,” he said. “I’m all alone at work. I will never be able to make enough money to play music.” Cesar broke it down even further: “I’m a failure.”

  We discussed kindness toward oneself as a way to transform anger at its roots. Cesar, an unusually creative person, decided to visualize a “wisdom figure with his arm around me” whenever he felt like a failure. In just a few weeks, Cesar found himself feeling less vulnerable at work, knowing he had a way of comforting himself when he felt attacked, and his angry retorts subsided.

  Finding the soft feelings behind our hard feelings—in this case, the sense of failure behind angry words—gives us flexibility in how we behave in response to perceived threats. We’re no longer condemned to act in habitual ways. We’re not trying to directly change hard feelings—to drive them out—but rather to cultivate a soft relationship to hard feelings that gives them a chance to change on their own.

  “Can’t being soft open the door to getting taken advantage of? Is that really the best way to be?”

  Many situations in life demand mental toughness. Some personalities, like the “floater” or people suffering from “weariness,” may need to summon up inner strength to meet life’s challenges. Their default option is to acquiesce, which can cause more suffering when they’re caught in a bad situation. It’s important to set limits on the behavior of others when they’re hurting us.

  Paula was a physical therapist, married for 4 years to a gentle, well-educated, handsome man, Kyle. His family of origin had a long history of alcoholism, and after a year of marriage, Kyle fell into the same trap. Paula felt sorry for him, and enjoyed his company when he was sober, but over time she found herself the family’s sole financial provider and her partner less and less emotionally present. When she started flirting with a colleague over lunch, Paula decided that she needed to take steps to address her marital problem.

  Kyle refused to acknowledge that he suffered from alcoholism, so Paula turned to Al-Anon for support. Over the following 3 years Paula felt alternately sorry for Kyle and enraged at his emotional and financial abandonment of her and their two kids and his unwillingness to stop drinking. Paula’s struggle was validated at Al-Anon meetings, which gave her the courage to seek legal advice about divorce. Upon getting this news, Kyle still refused to admit he had a problem, blaming Paula and his unhappy marriage for his drinking. Paula always considered divorce to be a last resort, and she felt terrible about it, as if God would be disappointed with her. She was caught up in shame and blame. Paula gradually opened up to the anguish of returning every evening from work to her husband watching TV with a martini. “I deserve to be happy,” Paula heard herself saying. “I too need moments of leisure. I don’t deserve to be lonely, angry, and miserable all the time.” Paula left her husband.

  When we pay attention to our inner experience and accept how we truly feel—unhappy, lacking direction, empty, ashamed, despairing—we’re likely to discover a huge reservoir of strength and determination. Like a mother defending her young, internal softness often leads to external toughness. The foundation for setting limits on others is knowing our own limits.

  “If it’s my current attitude toward pain and suffering that’s so crucial for emotional healing, does that mean I should just leave my past behind?”

  This question echoes many discussions I’ve had with psychotherapists who were trained to explore their patients’ early childhood experiences. It’s indeed important to understand how our past has shaped us. Our core emotional habits are meaningful objects for mindful self-compassion (see self-schemas in Chapter 4) and knowing the details of our lives help us to accept them more fully.

  Remember Michelle, the young woman described in Chapter 1 who couldn’t control her blushing? Michelle had always been a highly sensitive person, more so than her three brothers. Her father was quite stern and didn’t mince words when he was upset with the kids. Michelle was also a beautiful child who received a lot of attention for her appearance, but schoolwork didn’t come easily to her. She dreaded each September when school began, especially after a carefree summer. Michelle applied herself with diligence to her schoolwork and eventually succeeded in graduating from a good university.

  Deep inside, however, Michelle always felt like an imposter. She had vastly exceeded the achievements of her parents, which she believed was due to hard work rather than her intelligence or competence, and she had internalized the critical messages of her father. When Michelle went on job interviews, she was sure her inadequacies would be exposed, especially if the interviewer was a male.

  Michelle had a brief infatuation with therapy after she discovered that acceptance-based strategies stopped her blushing. But infatuation quickly led to disillusionment, which lingered for many months. It just wasn’t enough to “accept” that she blushed— something deeper had to be addressed. Ironically, Michelle had a breakthrough when she became depressed during the fall season. She couldn’t understand why she was feeling that way until she connected it with school resuming and how terrible she always felt at that time of year. “My father always told me that I was not as smart as my brothers. I could never prove him otherwise. It felt awful.”


  With that insight, Michelle started feeling the pain left deep in her heart. To accept blushing meant being a total failure—unlovable. Michelle started to grieve those many years of academic struggle and self-doubt, allowing herself just to feel sad about it. Somehow she started to feel more human and in her body. Michelle became more patient with the therapy process as well, knowing how deeply her feelings ran. She gave herself 3 years to learn to be more self-accepting in response to blushing. To assist the process, Michelle visualized Jesus tapping her on the shoulder whenever she felt bad. When she started to blush, she added, “May I love myself just as I am.” I recently called Michelle, 1 year after we last met, to get permission to write her story. She told me she hardly ever thinks of blushing anymore.

  Self-compassion has the “gleam of the particulars,” as poet Naomi Shahib Nye might say. The details of our lives are necessary to contact the deeper meaning of our daily experience. In the case of Michelle, she couldn’t fully connect with her emotional pain— get a visceral sense of it—until she understood its origin and the long trajectory it took in her life. Then she had a deep and authentic experience to address with self-compassion. Self-compassion is not a strategy for bypassing our personal issues—it helps us to have a full life within them.

  “Self-compassion has done a lot for me, but is it an emotional cure-all?”

  There’s always an element of self-compassion—caring for ourselves and allowing ourselves to be happy—when life is flowing smoothly. We should be cautious, however, about pushing self-compassion on ourselves in all situations. Sometimes we need to turn away from our pain to make it manageable, sometimes we should take medication, and other times we should do nothing at all. Self-compassion is not a universal panacea.