How to Stop Beating Yourself Up

Most of us are far too hard on ourselves. We doubt our own worthiness. We talk to ourselves unkindly and often sacrifice our own well-being in order to “get things done.” Often we fear that if we stop criticizing ourselves we’ll cease to perform well.

Paradoxically, though, it’s people who lack self compassion who are more prone to stress and burnout, while self-compassionate individuals are more emotionally resilient, better able to face challenges, and overall more effective.

Self-compassion can be learned. It arises from developing four skills:

• Mindful awareness, which helps us to recognize our mental habits, including that of giving ourselves a hard time
• Acceptance, which allows us be with our suffering without reacting to it or seeing it as a sign of failure
• Self-kindness, which helps us, in the face of difficulties, to give support, encouragement, and compassion to ourselves
• Realistic perspective on life, which help us to see our problems in a balanced and mature way

Each of those skills—which are woven into the four guided meditations on this CD—can be learned through practice.

The tracks are:

1. Kindfulness of Breathing (12:08)
2. Empathizing With Ourselves and Others (25:39)TY
3. Being with DIfficult Experiences (19:56)
4. Four Steps to Self-Compassion (12:35)

Self-compassion helps us to relearn our own intrinsic worth as human beings, and is an essential step toward having true compassion for others. Running Time: 70 min.