Bill Merrington looks at how to be more compassionate

IN the Christian faith, Jesus reduced the ten commandments down to just two. To love God and secondly, to love your neighbour as yourself. In this second commandment, many of us have a problem, we struggle to love ourselves, let alone our neighbour. We can get trapped with a self image of ourselves that is negative and rigid. When I see individuals for therapy, they often arrive with an inflexible view of themselves.

They struggle to see the options before them and can’t imagine how to move away from the unwanted inner stuff of life. They get caught in the pain of the past or the fear of the future and seem unable to get in contact with their five senses of the present. This then affects their relations with others around them.

Simply, they forget to smell the roses right in front of them. Instead we tell ourselves a story about our lives that incorporates a negative, restrictive viewpoint. This naturally pulls us down and inhibits our future perspective.

To love ourselves requires a large dose of self-compassion. Practising compassion and kindness to oneself needs to become a habit. However, when we have anger, hate, hostility and ill-will towards oneself and towards others, it can be a painful place to be. If we can practice loving kindness we will find that it protects us from developing and holding on to judgements and hostile feelings.

Some people find themselves having a ‘gravitational pull’ down into negativity and depression. We can blame the world and those around us for our troubles, but there is a point when we have to look at what’s going on inside us. Our body and mind wants to re-regulate the system after a disturbance that upsets us. But there are times when our mind and body fails to normalise, leaving us with an anxious state of being.

Our compassion has to begin with the acknowledgement that humans are not well equipped for life in the fast lane. Historically, humans would fight or run away or freeze from stressful situations. As children and adults, running and fighting is just not possible, we struggle to stabilise ourselves and can end up hyper-active, running on overdrive, or we become hypo-active, becoming flat and low in mood. Our levels of tolerance can be small as we find ourselves easily triggered by an emotional overload. It doesn’t take much for a situation to hook us into a negative reaction. We become antagonistic or avoidant, narrowing our choices in situations.

As therapists, we hear a person’s story and bear witness to their pain and vulnerability. However, it is not enough for the therapist to be kind and caring. The client themselves has to learn a new way of caring for themselves. Stories can help. Just reflect upon a cat with her many kittens. Each one is nursed, licked clean and fed. What happens when one meanders out of the box? Usually a mother will go and find her and carry her back to the other mewing kittens to feel the warmth and love of the family. The kitten is soothed and at peace with itself. Now humans are no different. Your lives might be more complicated, so we have to find a way of self-soothing ourselves. We might have several ‘kittens’ within us that represent parts of us that we don’t like about ourselves. It might be a memory, a feeling or a judgement about ourselves. This ‘kitten’ needs to be soothed and cared for with a dose of patience and kindness.

Think about how you would care for some with your historical story. We all have fragile narratives that require compassion to comfort our pain.

A simplest form of self-compassion is to simply hug yourselves or tap gently our shoulders with our fingers. It’s surprising how powerfully emotional self care can be.

To practise this compassion further, we can say a prayer to oneself. This is actively expressing good will towards oneself.

If you find it too difficult to begin with oneself, think of someone who you would like to send loving kindness towards. Begin by sitting comfortably and looking around at your surroundings. Just notice your room. Then focus on your breathing as you rhythmically breath in and out. Notice the movement of your chest as it naturally rises and falls. Then open up your palm of your hands and gently bring the person to mind. Picture them and recognise their voice. Radiate loving kindness by reciting warm wishes to them with words such as, ‘may you be at peace, may you know love and wellbeing'. Focus your mind on each word. Repeat the sentences with your outward breath. If your mind wanders, that’s fine, but notice this and bring yourself back to the sentences. Now, transfer the words to oneself saying, ‘may I be at peace, may I be healthy and well.’ Practice this twice a day for a month to generate a healthy habit. And as you focus on being kind to yourself, you just might find that you are more compassionate to others. Next week we will look at the role and benefit of tears.

Dr Bill Merrington is a private therapist and chartered psychologist working in the York district. If you would like to join a compassionate/mindful class contact info@bmerri.com)