If we wish to make a quantum leap to greater awareness,
there is no getting around the need for us to be willing to wake up, and to
care deeply about waking up. In the same vein, if we wish for greater wisdom
and kindness in the world, perhaps we could start by inhabiting our own body
with some degree of kindness and wisdom, even for one moment just accepting
ourselves as we are with kindness and compassion rather than forcing ourselves
to conform to some impossible ideal. The world would immediately be different.
- Jon Kabat-Zinn, Coming to Our Senses
In her work, Kristin Neff (2012) has shown that Mindful Self-Compassion
(MSC) “… is effective at increasing self-compassion, mindfulness, compassion
for others, and other aspects of wellbeing. Moreover, the benefits of MSC
appear to be enduring, lasting at least 1 year after completion of the
program.” (p. 40) This study measured participants’ perception of increases in
the following aspects of well-being: mindfulness, compassion for others, and
life satisfaction while also measuring participants’ perception of decreases in
depression, anxiety, stress, and emotional avoidance. Further, Neff found: “…the
more MSC participants practiced formal meditation, the more they increased
their self-compassion levels. Similarly, the degree that participants practiced
informal self-compassion techniques (e.g., putting a hand over one’s heart in
times of stress) in daily life also predicted gains in self-compassion. This implies
that self-compassion is teachable skill that is ‘dose dependent.’ The more you
practice it the more you learn it.”
It appears that healthy early childhood experiences and
relationships may lay the groundwork for development of self-compassion. “Research
supports the notion that self-compassion is related to the care-giving system
and early childhood interactions. People who lack self-compassion are more
likely to have critical mothers, for instance, come from families in which
there was a lot of conflict, and display insecure attachment patterns, while
the opposite is true for those with higher levels of self-compassion.” (Neff
& McGeehee, 2010) Even though early childhood experiences play a part in
developing healthy levels of self-compassion in an individual, self-compassion
skills can be taught, as Neff shows in her work with MSC. One limitation of her
work so far is that most of her study participants had prior mindfulness experience,
but Neff (in press, p. 18-19) addresses this, “… it might be that practices
taught in the program are only effective for those who already know how to
meditate. On the other hand, the fact that MSC participants increased in
wellbeing even though most had prior meditation experience suggests that MSC
offers tangible benefits over and above mindfulness meditation alone.”
This difference between the practice of mindfulness and
self-compassion bears further study. As we have seen, Kabat-Zinn feels that the
two practices are similar enough, and that mindfulness encompasses
self-compassion to such an extent, that one can ease suffering simply through
mindfulness itself. Neff, however, appears to be interested in trying to
separate the two practices out in an effort to further boil meditative serenity
down to its most basic ingredients. To this end, Neff continues to research MSC
practices in settings comparable to those that Kabat-Zinn has used to quantify
the effects of MSBR. Neff is showing that: “Overall, research findings so far
suggest that self-compassion may be a stronger predictor of depression, happiness,
life satisfaction and psychological wellbeing than mindfulness alone.” (in
press, p. 23) She describes situations where one can be mindful without being
accepting, and any meditator who has practiced for any length of time will be
familiar with this scenario:
Feelings of self-kindness and common humanity may often
accompany mindfulness of painful experiences, of course, so that
self-compassion may automatically co-arise with mindfulness itself. The two do
not always co-arise, however. It is
possible to be mindfully aware of painful thoughts and feelings without
actively soothing and comforting oneself, or remembering that these feelings
are part of the shared human experience. Sometimes it takes an extra
intentional effort to be compassionate toward our own suffering, especially
when our painful thoughts and emotions involve self-judgments and feelings of
inadequacy. (Neff, in press, p. 20)
In her ongoing research, Neff is continuing to look into differences
between mindfulness, self-compassion, and lovingkindness to see where the
greatest successful outcomes for practitioners can be found. Her work is
showing that it is these practices of loving support for the self, beyond any
other meditative practice, that hold the key to wellbeing, but she admits that
there is plenty of room for more quantifiable research in this area.
Although no studies have yet directly compared MSC with
MBSR or MBCT [Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy], studies examining the
outcomes of each program independently suggest that explicitly teaching
self-compassion does make a difference … Research that directly compares the
relative impact of MBSR, MBCT and MSC will be needed before understanding the
overlapping and unique benefits of each. While MSC appears to raise self-compassion
more than mindfulness-based interventions, it is likely that MSC raises
mindfulness levels to a lesser extent than MBSR or MBCT, given that teaching
mindfulness is only a secondary emphasis of the program … This suggests that
the MSC program is complementary to MBSR or MBCT, and that it may be an
effective supplement to these MBIs [Mind Body Interventions], especially for
those who are self-critical … Research might also fruitfully explore whether
wellbeing is maximized when both types of programs are taken, and, if so, in
what order. Intuitively, it would seem optimal to learn mindfulness before
self-compassion given that mindfulness is needed for compassion. However, for
people suffering from severe shame or self-criticism, they might need to first
cultivate self-compassion in order to have the sense of emotional safety needed
to fully turn toward their pain with mindfulness. (Neff, in press, p. 26-28)
While we wait for more research into these practices to be undertaken and
published, the work that Neff and Kabat-Zinn and others already have done on
self-compassion and mindfulness is solid enough to point us all towards
incorporating these practices into our daily lives immediately. Following the
lead of these researchers, we all can begin to practice true presence with
ourselves in each moment and true acceptance of ourselves as well. We can work
to recognize the ubiquity of suffering as a part of what makes us human, rather
than running away from suffering, denying suffering, or hiding our suffering
from ourselves and others. We can learn to lean into our own personal suffering
and soothe ourselves as we would do for a beloved friend or a child rather than
distracting ourselves or pushing our suffering down or away. We can practice
being gentle and kind with ourselves, replacing patterns of harsh self-talk
with mantras of self-compassion: “May I feel safe, may I feel peaceful, may I
be kind to myself, may I accept myself as I am.”
References
Forbes, B. (2014). Workshop entitled “Yoga
for Empaths”.
Germer, C. (2009). The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion: Freeing Yourself from Destructive
Thoughts and Emotions. New York, NY: The Guilford Press.
Kabat-Zinn, J. (2005). Coming to Our Senses: Healing Ourselves and
the World through Mindfulness. New York, NY: Hyperion.
Kabat-Zinn, J. (1990). Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of
Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness. New York, NY: Bantam
Dell.
Mitchell, D.W., & Jacoby, S.H.
(2014). Buddhism: Introducing the
Buddhist Experience, Third Edition. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Neff, K. D., & Dahm, K. A.
(in press). “Self-Compassion: What it is, what it does, and how it relates to
mindfulness”. To appear in in M. Robinson, B. Meier & B. Ostafin (Eds.) Mindfulness and Self-Regulation. New
York: Springer. Retrieved from www.self-compassion.org.
Neff, K. D., & Germer, C. K.
(2013). A Pilot Study and Randomized Controlled Trial of the Mindful
Self-Compassion Program. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 69(1),
28-44. doi:10.1002/jclp.21923
Neff, K. D. & McGeehee, P.
(2010). Self-compassion and psychological resilience among adolescents and
young adults. Self and Identity, 9, 225-240. Retrieved from
www.self-compassion.org.
Salzberg, S. (2004). Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness. Boston, MA:
Shambhala Publications, Inc.
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