Being kind to myself doesn’t come naturally. My internal voice invariably slips into the hardwired negativity loop playing over and over in my head. My cognitive jumble becomes a stick with which to beat myself and intrusive thoughts like not feeling good enough, have always held me back.
Being kind to ourselves seems like it should be relatively easy to do. But failure for many of us is deeply tied in with our self-worth as society values high achievers and specific models of success over self-compassion and fulfilment. I used to think being kind to myself was a sign of weakness and that if I told myself I was bad at things it would serve as a motivator. I believed that my inner critic constantly telling myself that I was a failure would force me to do better. I am a teacher. Telling students, they are stupid isn’t going to inspire them so why would it encourage me? Society places emphasis on the daily grind and if we don’t subscribe to this ‘try harder’ pace of life, we are just lazy.
Some of the things I would tell myself, and still catch myself saying, I would never dream of saying to a friend. When you stop to listen to the harsh words we say to ourselves, it’s pretty horrifying. Pushing ourselves to do things we are afraid of is important but telling ourselves we are rubbish if something doesn’t click straight away isn’t part of it.
There are some days when I really do feel useless. I have no energy. I’ve let someone down. I haven’t achieved what I wanted to achieve. But I’ve learned to just accept that MS is unpredictable and there will be days I am too tired to do things.
Kindness is not the same as feigning positivity. Allowing ourselves to feel all of our emotions and accepting our imperfections is essential. Society often provides unrealistic expectations of how we should be living our lives, which simply masks the reality of life’s ups and downs. This idea that being self-compassionate is just simply about having a pity party is the very essence of toxic positivity. Particularly in Ireland, where the notion of being kind to oneself is deeply associated with self-indulgence. We have all heard the timeworn ‘Don’t be pitying yourself now, sure there are so many worse off than you.’ Shedding this skin isn’t easy.
It can be hard to practice self-compassion, especially when we associate certain things with failure. I had an incredibly negative experience with a PE teacher in secondary school, which put me off sports that I used to enjoy. It wasn't until I moved to Belgium and joined the GAA and saw how much fun team sports could be, that I realised how deeply ingrained these neural pathways are. I still struggle to get up and go for a run and expertly avoid going to the gym but it’s a process and I know it benefits me in the long run.
In a strange way, since my diagnosis in 2019, I have become much better at grasping opportunities and learning to give myself a break if I don’t somehow end up as a Nobel Prize winner or running an ultramarathon. I now know that self-kindness is about learning not to judge myself so harshly if I make mistakes. Instead of engaging in this endless cycle of self-flagellation, I try to sit back and assess how I could have done things differently or how I can improve the way I go about things. Recognising and playing to my strengths has improved my health. I am never going to be excel-perfect, but I am working on ways of being more organised without beating myself up about it. Research shows that being kind to ourselves leads us to having more emotional resilience and improves our psychological well-being. It’s challenging because our brains are naturally wired to self-criticism but chipping away at our biases can make a big difference to how we live our lives.
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