How Self-Compassion Can Help Treat Mental Health Disorders and Addiction

“If your compassion doesn’t include yourself, it’s incomplete”- Jack Kornfield

How do you feel when you make a mistake? Do you go too hard on yourself? Do you feel worthless, even if the mistake is a small one? If the answer is affirmative, self-compassion can help you ease your mind. Mental health disorders and dealing with addictive behaviour can often make one feel worthless and lower their self-esteem. A great way to aid this process is to remind yourself about the positive and indulge in ways that increase your self-esteem.

What Is Self-Compassion?

A few definitions of self-compassion include:

• Self-compassion has been defined as a self-attitude that involves treating oneself with warmth and understanding in difficult times and recognizing that making mistakes is part of being human (Neff, 2003). (Breines & Chen, 2012).

• Self-compassion involves being kind to oneself when confronting personal or situational difficulties. It includes framing the imperfection of life into common humanity and being mindful of negative emotions so that one neither suppresses nor ruminates on them. (Neff & Beretvas, 2012).

• Self-compassion is an emotionally positive self-attitude that should protect against the negative consequences of self-judgment, isolation, and rumination (such as depression) (Neff 2003).

How Self-Compassion Can Help Treat Mental Health Disorders and Addiction

Self-compassion is essential to humans. It can ease the treatment process of mental health disorders and any addictive behaviours you might have. Research has shown that practising self-compassion can help one make continuous progress and long-lasting changes in depression symptoms (Mongrain et al., 2010). Another study has shown that higher self-compassion is linked to better well-being and also increases levels of happiness, life satisfaction, and body appreciation (Neff, 2017).

Self-compassion instils a positive and non-judgmental attitude towards oneself which can help you regulate your emotions, reduce anxiety, and increase resilience; giving you a sense of self-worth. With each act of self-compassion, you will realise that you deserve care. This can help you identify and overcome negative thought patterns and behaviours. It can also help you engage in acts that feel good to process your experiences, leading to greater self-awareness and insight.

Ways to practise self-compassion

Here are a few ways you can practise self-compassion:

• Notice when you start talking negatively to yourself. What you say is how you will feel. Whenever such thoughts arise, take a pause and try to replace that thought. 

• Encourage yourself in small ways. Whenever you’re in a difficult situation, think of what you would tell a friend or family member in a similar position. What advice would you give them? This can help you go easy on yourself and also be more aware of your wins and successes. It could be small ones but it is important to acknowledge them. 

• Make sure you’re eating well and keeping yourself physically active. How you treat your body is how you will feel about yourself. This can also ease your treatment to overcome addictive behaviours.

• Practise mindfulness and meditation. Even if it's for a few minutes, it can keep you focussed on the present moment, gain a different perspective, and help you be more patient and resilient. 

• Try the technique- “What would you tell a friend if they were in a similar situation?” This can help you change your perspective and realise that you are being too hard on yourself.

It can be difficult to consistently practise self-compassion and extend the same care and love we have for others to ourselves. However, with small steps every day, we can ease our moods, cope with stressors, and build healthy habits to deal with mental health disorders and addiction.