A Compassionate New Year’s Practice
I shared this Self-Compassion practice at a Solstice Women’s Circle, and wanted to share it with anyone that would like a guided practice, grounded in compassion, to reflect on the past year and call in some goodness to 2022. At the beginning, I share a little backstory on my journey to discover Self-Compassion Practice, so if that part doesn’t interest you, feel free to jump down to the guided prompts at the end.
I have been coming to a women’s circle on the winter solstice for many years, to reflect on the year past, and choose a word to guide me in the year to come. The words are written in the back cover of a treasured notebook, reminding me of the journey I have been on oever the past decade.
I can remember the feeling of each circle — the bone-tiredness I arrive with on the darkest night of the year, exhausted from the pull to turn inward coupled with the very chaotic feeling of the season that makes slowing down and resting feel impossible.
It’s always a relief to enter into a quiet, sacred space, surrounded by other souls who want to honour the powerful magic of the night, all of them sharing the intention of reflection on the year, releasing what no longer serves and calling in something nourishing for the year ahead. It has become an important turning point for me each year.
The words for each year seem disconnected on the page, but in the story of my life make so much sense. The first solstice gatherings I attended were led by my friend, Kael Klassen — a teacher, and all around wonderful human, who led us through guided journaling, yoga nidra and drumming to find a word to lead us through the year ahead. Then I began gathering with another dear friend, Shannon Harte, who also led us through guided journaling and meditation to find a word for the coming year.
I am Quiet
I am Brave
I am Presence
I am Softening
I am Healing
I am Embodied
I am Reclaiming
Each year the word has shown up in a different way, and as I reflected this year, I could see clearly that each year was leading me to greater connection and compassion for myself. At first this happened through practicing yoga nidra (what a gift that was for a very tired mother of young children), then an intellectual and experiential exploration of mindfulness, including taking an MBSR course and attending the Educator’s Institute at the Greater Good Science Centre.
Finally, over the past 5 years, as I navigated the deteriorating health of my complicated mother, her eventual death and the complex grief that followed, I realized that self-compassion was the most powerful aspect of all I had learned. Self-compassion practice helped me to set boundaries with my dying mother to protect my mental health. The practice helped me validate my complicated grief, and seek the help I needed. It helped me to feel my feelings — to soften, soothe and allow them to flow through me. It helped me to take care of myself when it felt really hard, because I learned, through the container of the practice, how to mother myself with the tenderness, curiosity and care that I had always yearned for.
Self-compassion practice helped me realize that shame — the feeling of “not good enough” — permeated so many areas of my life and was holding me back from the fullness of being here in all my messy, human imperfection.
It was a slow antidote to the poison of shame. For me, other practices hadn’t addressed the shame I felt — sometimes even adding to it when I felt I wasn’t doing meditation “right”. Through trauma-informed therapy, I learned about polyvagal theory and learned to become more anchored in the ventral state of my nervous system. Through somatic work, I was able to increase my capacity to feel safe and embodied so I could listen to the wisdom in my body. Through continued self-compassion practice, I have been increasingly able to find the kind voice within me, and treat myself with the tender, loving care I so freely give to others.
The practice I would like to share with you is one of my favourite self-compassion practices from Dr. Kristen Neff. Writing myself compassionate letters from a voice of love has been a transformational practice for me, in reparenting myself, healing, and slowly discovering that this voice of love is always present within me, that this voice of love is me.
Definitions (because I’m a librarian and giant nerd)
Compassion literally means “to suffer together.” Among emotion researchers, it is defined as the feeling that arises when you are confronted with another’s suffering and feel motivated to relieve that suffering. (Greater Good Science Centre, UC Berkeley)
As I’ve defined it, self-compassion entails three core components. First, it requires self-kindness, that we be gentle and understanding with ourselves rather than harshly critical and judgmental. Second, it requires recognition of our common humanity, feeling connected with others in the experience of life rather than feeling isolated and alienated by our suffering. Third, it requires mindfulness — that we hold our experience in balanced awareness, rather than ignoring our pain or exaggerating it. We must achieve and combine these three essential elements in order to be truly self-compassionate…..Taken together, this research suggests that self-compassion provides an island of calm, a refuge from the stormy seas of endless positive and negative self-judgment, so that we can finally stop asking, “Am I as good as they are? Am I good enough?” By tapping into our inner wellsprings of kindness, acknowledging the shared nature of our imperfect human condition, we can start to feel more secure, accepted, and alive.
It does take work to break the self-criticizing habits of a lifetime, but at the end of the day, you are only being asked to relax, allow life to be as it is, and open your heart to yourself. It’s easier than you might think, and it could change your life. (Kristen Neff, Self-Compassion)
How I define and experience Self-Compassion Practice
For many when they first encounter the term, self-compassion might get confused with self-pity or self-centredness. I recently had to explain the concept to my 10 year old niece and I described it as having an “Inner BFF.” Not even sure if that is how kids talk these days….probably not… but the explanation made sense to her.
The practice of self-compassion helps you discover a voice that you may not have heard before — one that arrives most often to counter our harsh inner critic. This voice is like that of a kind and honest friend — one who can offer a shoulder to cry on, and also an encouraging nudge towards something challenging she knows would be good for you. This inner friend gets you, she knows all you have been through. She also loves you fiercely and wants the best for you. In every moment, she is rooting for you to flourish.
Inner coach is the explanation I most often give to adults. If you have ever had a Ted Lasso level mentor or coach, you may have had a taste of how it feels to have someone see all your gifts and celebrate you, while also encouraging you to take good care of yourself, and challenge yourself. An inner coach reminds you that you deserve tender, loving care just as much as anyone else. They also give you small steps to start with — they don’t use shame to motivate you and don’t expect you to be a perfect person. With their support and unconditional love, you begin to feel safe enough to take risks and grow.
Finding this inner voice and having her begin to speak louder than the inner mean girl is a practice. For me, the time between reading Brene Brown’s words “Speak to yourself the way you would a good friend” and my ability to begin to actually do that more than just once in a while, was about a decade. Learning to be kind to ourselves in a society that tells us we are not good enough at every turn, takes a great deal of practice. This one is one of many self-compassion practices I have found helpful in my journey.
This practice helps us to begin to recognize that this safe, healing presence is always within ourselves. Not to negate our need for humans who help us feel safe, soothed and seen — we need people, we cannot do it all on our own. But in the absence of the presence of a real-life compassionate friend, we can use this practice to increase our capacity to validate our own suffering in challenging moments, to be curious about what is happening in our minds and bodies, and to always ask ourselves the most important self-compassion question — “What do I need right now?”. Answering that question can lead us to many new places — setting new boundaries, allowing ourselves to rest more, asking for help when we need it. This practice is a space where we can truly care deeply for ourselves.
Preparation — remembering the year past with somatic self-compassion
Let’s prepare for our letter writing practice by remembering the year past in a compassionate way, using a somatic (body) approach. This was adapted from a practice by Annie Bray, a wonderful somatic teacher and human I learned a lot from this past summer in her HELD program.
Take a few minutes and breathe deeply. Notice the stability of your body and the support of the ground. Close your eyes if it feels safe and relaxing, or choose to make your gaze soft. As you breathe in, notice the expansion of your ribs, as you breathe out, notice the contraction. Take a moment to consider how much your body has lived through this past year, or even from the beginning of the pandemic. As you acknowledge and validate what your body has been through — notice any images, feelings, thoughts and sensations that show up. Notice them arising and flowing by like a stream, or like a movie. If the images feel too close, too strong, see if you can take a bit of space from the stream of images. It might be helpful to imagine you are in a movie theatre, and if you need to move to the back row to take some space from any emotionally challenging parts, please do. Even with that intentional space, you may notice that your body experiences waves of grief, sadness, numbness, or anger. You may also notice memories or sensations of love, connection, pleasure.
Breathe here for a moment and honour how complex our inner lives can feel.
As you watch the movie of your year — remember you can always come back to notice your connection to the ground if you need to.
Validate — How has this year felt for you? In a self-compassion practice connect to mind and body, using mindfulness, to notice and validate what is there. What sensations are present when you watch the scenes of the year? Pleasant, unpleasant and neutral… allow yourself to feel what is there in each scene in the movie of your year. Perhaps there is grief, sadness, disconnection. Perhaps you remember moments of joy, pleasure, connection. Can you allow them all to be there at the same time? Can you connect to the common humanity of this experience? Can you connect to the idea that all humans have felt this complexity over the course of the year and know that you are not alone?
Get Curious — What stories are present in your mind as you feel into these sensations? What thoughts and stories start spinning when you feel into your body? Can you name how you are feeling? How are you tempted to retell these stories, even inside your own self, to make them sound better? Can you notice if you are trying to wash over the hard parts or speed through to a happy ending? As you feel into the bodily sensations as you reflect on your year, is your mind crafting stories to make sense of it all? How do these stories make you feel? Can you notice if you are getting entangled in any of them?
What do I need right now? — Feeling all of this can be a lot. Give yourself what you need before we move on to our letter writing practice. A cup of tea, a few deep breaths, some kind words about how proud you are of yourself for taking the time to reflect on your year and honour all that has happened in a space of non-judgement. All of these will give your body a cue of safety. You might also try giving yourself a little hug. Place your right hand under your left armpit and wrap your left arm across your chest to hold your right shoulder. You could also try placing one or both hands on your heart for a few breaths. Feel into the sensation of being held with love in this moment.
Self-Compassionate Letter to Release the Year
Now that you have brought some of the memories of the past year to the surface, you are going to write a letter to yourself from an unconditionally loving, accepting, kind and compassionate friend or being. This practice is adapted from Dr. Kristen Neff’s Self-Compassion book.
I like to imagine the voice of Love writing to me, but you may find something else resonates more with you. Make the practice your own.
This being sees all your strengths and weaknesses. They understand your unique life history and how any of your perceived inadequacies are connected to the many things that you did not necessarily choose: your genes, your family history, life circumstances — things that were out of your control. This person loves you exactly as you are, right now, with all of your very human imperfections.
As you write, imagine how this person or being has watched you all year, and seen all your highs and lows. The movie of your life has been on their screen, and they have watched you with kind eyes. They have rooted for you, they have cried for you, they have put their arms around you some days. As you write from the perspective of this unconditionally compassionate friend/being you will explore:
- How would they perceive any of your perceived inadequacies or flaws as you reflect on your year?
- How would they use words to convey how deeply they “suffer with” you— seeing and validating your pain and feeling motivated to alleviate it.
- How would they share how they root for you and share your joy in your brightest moments?
- What would they write to remind you that you are only human, that all people have strengths and weaknesses, and experience highs and lows.
- If you feel like this friend/being would suggest changes you could make, how would these ideas be shared with a sense of unconditional understanding and compassion?
May all of their words in their letter leave you with a feeling of being safe, soothed, seen, understood, supported and richly resourced by their presence.
Let’s try it.
Let’s write to ourselves from the perspective of Love:
Dear ________________,
Write about your year from their unconditionally compassionate perspective — In the first section, they will write about your joys and sorrows of the year. First, get all mushy gushy with how proud this person is of you. You are a bright light that sparkles just for them — they love you with the fierce love of a grandmother. They see allllll your goodness. They will tell anyone that will listen how wonderful you are — how much you’ve grown, how intelligent you are, how creative — how absolutely wonderful. This can feel uncomfortable. If it helps, imagine the feeling in your body when you gush about a favourite friend of yours. Feel into how it lights you up to brag about how wonderful they are. The person writing you this letter feels like this.
Next, write about the more challenging aspects of this year. This unconditionally loving person/being also deeply feels your pain, because of the depth of their love for you. As they notice and acknowledge the hard times along with the joyful ones, Let their words be the ones you have longed to hear from the real humans in your life.
Some sentence prompts:
- This year I have noticed that you have…
- I have noticed that you embraced…
- I noticed how you lit up when…
- I felt your joy when…
- I rejoiced when…
- I saw your interaction with…
- In your work I saw you….
- In relationships I noticed you…
- In your relationship with yourself, I saw you..
- I saw how hard it was for you when…
- I felt your pain when…
- I rooted for you when…
Write their wishes for you — This compassionate person or being doesn’t use shame to motivate you. They also won’t sit idly by while you live small in some way, or underestimate yourself. They want you to grow into your most alive, connected self. They understand deeply what is behind your limiting beliefs, and they want to love you into releasing them. They understand the challenges you have faced, and how they have shaped you, and they want to encourage you to take steps to spiral you closer to your truest self. They love you so much and want the best for you. They have wishes that they hope will come true for you. What are they? What do they think needs to happen to lead you to a place of greater well-being, connection to self, others and nature? Write these wishes as a gentle affirmations
I love to start my affirmations with “may you…”— something I picked up from reading a lot of John O’Donohue, an Irish poet I love. If this doesn’t feel right to you, try another start to these wishes (I wish for you to offer yourself….)
- May you offer yourself….
- May you experience…
- May you know…
- May you give yourself…
- May you find…
- May you create…
- May you be….
- May you feel…
- May you honour..
- May you make time to…
- May you embrace….
- May you listen closely to…
Set this letter down for a while, and come back and re-read it at a later time. Allow the compassion and love to sink in as you read. Notice if you feel a sense of safety, or being held in love. This may feel uncomfortable or inaccessible at first, but as you practice, you will be able to let more of this deep love in.
This practice is a beautiful way to reflect on your day in an evening journal. It helps to bring awareness to the many emotions that are present in our day, helps us to notice the stories we have spun with curiosity and care, and provides a gentle hand to help us untangle ourselves from the ones that don’t serve us. The practice always leads us to the important question “What do I need right now?” which I hope will guide you to all sorts of nourishing places this coming year.
May you open your heart to yourself, and feel the fierce and tender love that is your birthright.
