18/12/2025
Self-compassion is often misunderstood as just being kinder to ourselves. While that’s part of it, it’s nowhere near the whole of it.
In my experience, it’s something much deeper. It feels less like an attitude and more like a capacity shift—a reorganization of the inner system. When that system shifts from threat to care, from self-judgment or criticism to support, everything changes.
Over time, these practices cultivate a particular stance—a way of relating to whatever is happening, internally or externally. It’s an inner orientation that makes room for friendliness, goodwill, care, kindness, and allowing (vs resisting).
In this sense, self-compassion is almost the opposite of resistance.
Often when we’re resisting, we’re not befriending ourselves—or our experience. We push away sensations (think fear sensations), emotions or thoughts we don’t like, or situations we wish were different.
Self-compassion doesn’t ask us to sugarcoat what’s difficult. Instead, it invites us to make space for what’s here—to see our experience within a larger field of complex conditions, rather than collapsing into it or taking it personally. Thereby giving us the very capacity to stay with what’s difficult.
As Kristin Neff has pointed out, it’s hard to remain present with a challenging emotion unless there’s some kindness available to meet it.
When we take this stance toward what’s arising—in the body, in the mind, in our emotional life, and in our relationships—something shifts. It’s within this orientation that change becomes not only possible, but often transformative. Without it, we remain closed, defended, and often unknowingly at odds with ourselves and with others.
The Mindful Self-Compassion program works, week by week, through practices and themes that help make this shift more possible—through practice, lived experience, and inquiry. Over time, these skills can deepen into reliable qualities of mind and heart—capacities we can draw on throughout our lives.
As the saying goes, the distance between the head and the heart is only a foot—but it’s the journey of a lifetime.
In my experience, these capacities are essential not only for personal well-being. They shape how we show up in the world—and how we meet one another.
The Winter Mindful Self-Compassion Program starts on January 7, 2026. You can visit omwellness.ca or https://lnkd.in/eaRWyssE for more details.
