The Power of Compassion
A word that is thrown around a lot in therapy, yoga and other mindful practices is Compassion. It’s one of those words, or concepts, that sounds warm and lovely as an idea but for many of us seems distant and out of reach. The truth is, deep Compassion has a massive amount of power: a few moments spent in authentic Compassion can profoundly shift our entire physiology, our thoughts, and our relationships.
Dr. James R. Doty, clinical professor in the Department of Neurosurgery at Stanford University, writes that compassion is actually our more natural and inherent state, and it has a healing effect on our bodies. “When someone acts with compassionate intention…it takes them out of the threat mode and puts them into rest and digest mode.” In other words, your stress responses lower and your body’s functioning can return to a healthy normal. Studies show that regular compassion reduces negative neuroendocrine, inflammatory and behavioral response so stress.
So why is compassion so difficult for many of us?
There are many and complex reasons, but the one I hear most frequently is that people are afraid to have compassion for themselves because they don’t believe it will help. Somehow compassion has been linked to complacency. “If I am kind to myself then I will just sit here and nothing will happen.” We believe that judging ourselves is motivational and beating ourselves up for our mistakes will help us move beyond them, but what we find is that we often just end up adding to our own misery. As the Dalai Lama says, we add to our own suffering and make our pain worse by being angry at it. It’s like pouring lemon juice on a cut. Not helpful. Not healing. Many of us live in this cycle of anxiety and judgment and have not yet built trust with an experience of compassion.
Compassion is such a curiously powerful thing. It feels like a soft blanket but is really the workhorse of emotional health. Think back for a moment to a time when you were hurt and someone had compassion for you – do you remember how your body felt? Maybe you relaxed, maybe relieving tears fell, and somehow a bit of the pain shifted into a feeling of comfort and softness.
I felt those physiological just last week I received some disappointing news and was feeling sad. My 5 year old daughter asked what was happening and when I told her I was sad she looked at me empathically, put her hand on my knee, and said simply “I am so sorry that happened.” That little sentence of compassion made my shoulders relax, my heart open, and I felt my whole being soften in resonance as I took in her kindness. She didn’t jump into logic, into problem solving, into trying to talk away or somehow move away from my feelings. They just were. And that actually helped! Increasing my experience of compassion didn’t solve the practical problem, but I felt more ease and comfort inside myself, which made a huge difference in how I was able to re-approach the situation. It worked like magic.
There is tremendous research available about what happens inside of our bodies when we experience compassion, but in simplicity: we feel more safe, we relax, and we are better able to think clearly and make decisions. We are also more able to connect with the people around us.
A primary reason we come to therapy is for deep compassion. Research shows that therapy is the most successful (across modalities) when the client feels genuine compassion from the therapist. We want someone to be able to look beyond our behavior to our intentions, to what we are longing for, to what we are needing. Compassion itself is the healer.
Exercise in Compassion 1: Take 10 minutes and do a guided meditation of self-compassion: I love these mediations created by the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center.
LISTEN to a guided Compassion Meditation
Exercise in Compassion 2: Take a moment to write a letter to (or have an internal conversation with) a part of your self that is suffering or unsure right now. Be the kind, understanding friend you are to others – towards your self. Notice the experience in you body as you reach out to yourself with love and how this shifts the parts of you that are in pain.
Rachel Lund started Self Space out of the deep belief in the power of therapy to change people’s lives from the inside out. Her hope is to help people find more safety, care and love in their lives. Rachel is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor and Clinical Supervisor in Washington state, and focuses on treating clients through a neuropsychotherapy approach to therapy that connects mind+body.