6 Simple Ways You Can Practice Self-Compassion and Why it’s Important to be Self-Compassionate

The relationship you have with yourself is the most important relationship you’ll ever have. It becomes the blueprint for the way you interact with and show up in all your other relationships — whether it’s romantic, platonic and professional (in the workplace). Practicing self-compassion involves treating yourself with kindness, understanding, and acceptance, especially during difficult times. Here are 6 practical ways you can become more self-compassionate towards yourself:

1) Treat yourself like you would treat a friend

If your friend called you today and told them an embarrassing mistake they’d made — how would you respond? Would you reassure them? Would you help encourage them? Would you do all of the above?

If you wouldn't talk to a friend in a negative or critical way, don't talk to yourself that way either. Treat yourself with the kindness, encouragement and reassurance that you would extend to your close friends. Being kind and understanding towards yourself is a practice and habit that anyone can develop.

If you like going on coffee dates with a friend to catch up, schedule in a coffee date with yourself to check in to see how you’re going. You can become more self-compassionate by treating yourself the way you would treat someone you love.

2) Acknowledge your emotions

Feelings are an incredible gift! I used to feel so embarrassed and ashamed for feeling things so deeply, because it was a lot for me to handle — and I felt like it was a lot for the people around me. I’d feel anger, sadness, regret and shame as deeply as I’d feel joy, gratitude, peace and accomplishment.

But in hindsight today, I realise that this is an incredible strength of mine: allowing myself to feel, recognise and validate my emotions. By embracing your emotions as they are — it can be healing. As you acknowledge even if they're difficult to deal with. It's okay to feel sad, angry, or frustrated. Allow yourself to feel your emotions without judgment.

3) Practice mindfulness

Practice being present in the moment, without judgment or criticism. So often, I find myself worrying about things I can’t control in the future, and regretting a lot of the things I’d said and done in the past. These thoughts totally steal me away from the current moment and fill me with anxiety, dread and guilt.

“Be where your feet are” — this quote sounds cliche and simple, like something you’d read out of a book like “Eat, Pray, Love”. But sometimes it’s the simple things that are a little complex to action — but incredibly life-changing.

Committing to be present by getting in tune with your senses regularly (e.g. identifying and naming 5 things you can see, 4 things you can touch, 3 things you can smell, 2 things you can taste, etc).

Actively bringing yourself back into the moment can be healing, grounding and incredibly self-compassionate. Practicing mindfulness can help you become more aware of your thoughts and emotions, and learn to accept them without judgment.

4) Cultivate gratitude

Oh, gratitude.

“Being grateful” — is another very simple concept in theory. And when times are good, it’s easy to be grateful. Or “easier” (for some of us). Choosing to be grateful is an act that we can practice. The moments gratitude make a more profound difference in our lives is oftentimes the moments we least want to practice it.

Hence why I feel like gratitude is a practice. Something that we need to consistently choose. Especially on the days we don’t feel like it. When you practice counting your blessings - even if there are only 3 things you actually want to be thankful for — you’re choosing to focus on the opportunities.

When you focus on the positive things in your life, even during difficult times — it can help shift your focus away from negative thoughts and emotions, and create a safer space in your mind.

5) Take care of your physical and emotional needs

This too sounds simple, but with the busyness and demands of life — whether it be parenting, working, running a business, care-taking, or all of the above — it can be easy to forget about our innate tangible needs as humans, and put “me-time” on the back-burner.

I’ve found that the busier things get, the more important it is to take care of my physical and emotional health. It sounds counterintuitive, I mean. When things are busy, you can’t get great sleep or eat well, let alone hit the gym!

Self-care can be simple. Small. Consistent. Even if it means you wake up 5 minutes earlier to meditate or walk around the block (literally 5 minutes). When you prioritise your physical and emotional needs by shifting your schedule to get enough sleep, eat well, exercise (whatever that looks like), and do the things that bring you joy — you are showing yourself love, kindness and compassion.

6) Practice self-forgiveness

Forgiveness is a funny one.. Because we very, very rarely feel like forgiving anyone. Let alone ourselves. If you’re anything like me, you’re your own worst critic. We hold ourselves to a stupidly high standard sometimes, and feel horrible when we don’t meet them. Does that ring a bell for you?

Forgiveness is freeing. It’s not just a feeling, it’s an action. Like many other concepts we’ve talked about on this blog post. It can take some time to even recognise, realise or comprehend that we’re being harsh to ourselves. But after taking some time to reflect — and understand your emotions, especially the more difficult ones like guilt and shame… And take sometime to be kind, understanding, and forgiving for your mistakes or failures.

You can step into a layer of freedom that allows you to embrace yourself for who you are. Learn from your mistakes without dwelling on them. Treat yourself with the same compassion and understanding that you would offer to someone else.

The relationship you have with yourself is the most important relationship you’ll ever have. I’m a broken record on this one — and still learning the ropes everyday. My self-dialogue is far from perfect, but I’m working on it.

Self-compassion isn’t about being self-indulgent or avoiding responsibility. It's about treating yourself with the same kindness and understanding that you would offer to a friend, and learning to accept and love yourself, flaws and all. And this will set you up to have incredibly strong, rich relationships with the people around you.

You are amazing.