When OCD and Self-Compassion Meet in the Middle

a post by Nancy Larsen for the World of Psychology blog



OCD is a disorder that affects millions of people and causes a lot of mental, physical and spiritual distress. Because OCD can be debilitating it is important to note that the problem is not the disorder itself, rather, it is the anxiety that comes from the symptoms of the disorder. So when you are compulsively demanding your mind to stop obsessing, this just fuels your OCD symptoms and increases your relationship with the distress

A big part of learning to live with OCD is to incorporate self-compassion. Instead of avoiding your anxiety, self-compassion invites you to look at it with understanding and gentle curiosity. This approach allows you to see your pain exactly how it is without self-judgement or self-criticism.

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The Life-Changing Benefits of Two-Minute Meditations

a post by Michelle Kennedy for the Tiny Buddha blog



“Smile, breathe, and go slowly.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

I felt everything, from my lower back pain flaring up to tightness in my jaw where I clinch and carry my stress. With my eyes still closed, I rolled my shoulders and repositioned the pillow under my butt. Five minutes had passed, and I had no idea how I would ever make it to forty.

I opened my left eye to see if anyone around me was fidgeting as well and saw rows of people sitting in perfect, cross-legged lotus position with straight necks and relaxed jaws next to me.

Our teacher, mindfulness author David Richo, sat in front, a relaxed calm floating around him like morning mist. I sighed, shut my eye again, and tried to concentrate on not concentrating so I could make it through the rest of the group meditation.

Once I remembered that I’d forgotten to pick up my dry cleaning and that I still hadn’t called my best friend back, I relaxed a little more and tried to just “be.” I heard a rooster crowing in the wilderness above the Spirit Rock property, noticed it, and let it go. I re-recognized the back pain and let that go as well.

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Don’t Waste Your Limited Time and Energy Regretting Your Past

a post by Adsam Bergen for the Tiny Buddha blog


“It is better to look ahead and prepare than to look back and regret.” ~Jackie Joyner-Kersee

We as humans have an incredible ability to help each other in times of need. When things get rough and life gets hard, we tend to come together, step up to the challenge, and provide assistance. Our selflessness shows, and it’s amazing to see everyone work in harmony.

Need proof? Just look at any natural or man-made disaster in this world, and you’ll see it. We are a species that shows calculated compassion, unlike any other living creature on Earth.

But as much as we come to help one another, we rarely extend that same compassion toward ourselves. This is especially true when crisis hits us internally; we find it nearly impossible to show ourselves compassion.

Why is that? Why do we have such a hard time with it? It’s a hard question to answer, but I believe it stems from one simple thing: We have really high expectations for ourselves, and it’s almost impossible to live up to them.

When someone looks at us from the outside, they can only judge us on our actions. But from our own internal perspective, we judge ourselves based on our thoughts.

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6 Ways to Show Yourself the Love You Deserve

a post by Pernilla Lillarose for YourTango.com [via World of Psychology blog]



When people think about being kind to themselves and practicing self-love, it’s often considered in a noncommittal, “Yes, I really should be doing that more,” sort of way. Then they go about their merry way, continuing the same old behaviors and being anything but kind to themselves.

Fortunately, a number of people do decide they are finally ready to start loving themselves. But what made them ready, and why have they waited so long to start?

What about you — are you ready to start treating yourself with kindness and learn how to love yourself fully, the way you deserve?

Where do you find yourself on the “self-love/being kind to yourself” scale currently? Are you at the bottom, clueless as to what loving yourself even means, or slowly crawling up the scale, wondering why it took you so long to treat yourself with love and kindness?

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Be Kind, Retrain Your Mind: 3 Tips to Overcome Negative Self-Talk

a post by Nadia Colburn for the Tiny Buddha blog


“You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”  ~Buddha

In 1990, in an early encounter between the Dalai Lama, the foremost Tibetan teacher of Buddhism, and Western students, the Dalia Lama was asked a question about how to deal with self-hatred. He was confused and didn’t understand the question. The translator translated the question again and still the Dalai Lama was confused.

Finally, the Dalai Lama understood that the question was about how to manage negative feelings about the self. This was a new concept to him: he knew that people had negative feelings about others, but he had not encountered the challenge of self-hatred.

I wish I could say that I had never encountered the problem of self-hatred, but I’d be lying. Like so many people, even if I didn’t necessarily recognize my self-talk as such, I was inundated with internal negative self-talk.

My process of coming first to recognize what that voice was up to, then to listen to it with more compassion, and finally, once and for all, to ask it to grow up and step out of the room has been a journey of self acceptance, growth, and ultimately, freedom.

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The Practice of Self-Compassion and Reducing Stress

a post by Julie K Jones for the World of Psychology blog

There is more abundant and accessible stress reduction available to us if we direct our attention away from the “big ticket” relaxation events (the cruises, spas, and anniversary indulgences) and become curious about quieter, subtler forms of relaxation. Of course, we think of the big ticket items because we tend to aggregate all of the stresses in our lives and then look for a comparably sized stress reliever.

Self-compassion is a powerful tool for reducing stress before it becomes “cruise-sized” because it can be applied liberally and frequently, and even preemptively before built up stress takes on epic proportions. And similar to the way that eating small meals throughout the day is more effective for staying energized and full than eating two or three large meals, self-compassion is a more effective long-term way of achieving your stress management and wellness goals.

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How to Be Kind to Yourself

a post by Margarita Tartakovsky for the World of Psychology blog



We tend to think that we have to earn self-kindness. That is, in order to be kind to ourselves, we must meet certain conditions. We must not make mistakes. We must work out five times a week. No exceptions. We must keep a tidy, organized home. We must make “healthy” meals. We must check off everything on our to-do list. We must excel at work, and produce, produce, produce. We cannot fail. Under any circumstances.

And if we don’t meet these conditions, then we punish ourselves. We wake up earlier and earlier. We work longer hours. We don’t rest. We don’t take any time for ourselves. Because we’re convinced we don’t deserve it. We talk to ourselves in ways we’d never talk to others. Because we’re convinced we deserve it.

Being kind can be hard, especially when we’re angry with ourselves, especially when we feel disappointed due to something we did – or didn’t do.

Many of us have to teach ourselves how to be self-compassionate. It feels that foreign, that far away. And that’s OK. Because self-compassion is actually a skill we can sharpen – whether we’ve bashed ourselves for years or not. The more you practice, the more you act with kindness, the more natural it becomes.

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How To Tame Your Anxious Mind

a post by Michelle Maidenberg for the Thoughts of a Therapist blog [via World of Psychology]

Our humanness dictates our varied perceptions, evaluations, judgments, and expectations. These develop over time based on our physiology, history, and experiences. For some people, they perseverate or hyper-focus and complain that “they can’t get their mind off of ___.” Others overthink things and can’t stop “but-ing” themselves, while others chronically worry and/or have negative, dreaded, or pessimistic thoughts. Some others have racing thoughts, in which they experience their mind buzzing often. The quality of these thoughts may lead to restlessness, relentlessness, and intense feelings of concern, worry, fear, disappointment, and frustration.

Our mind’s level of chattiness varies from person to person. Because of the level of discomfort, there is often a struggle to avoid, get rid of, or “wish” that the thoughts and feelings ceased or never existed. This struggle perpetuates a mind loop where we end up challenged with having thoughts about our thoughts and feelings about our feelings. For some, this mind loop can be exhausting, painful and frustrating. It can be challenging to have self-compassion when all of that “noise” is surfacing causing us to question, defend against and desire to avoid ourselves.

You likely ask yourself or are asked by others to “stop” having the thoughts and feelings that you’re having. You’re expected to accomplish this by reciting “positive affirmations”, “thinking about something pleasant or positive”, or “thinking about something else.” You soon realize that there is no feasible method of “getting rid” of the thoughts and feelings, rather efforts can be made to decrease the intensity of distress so that life can be lived more meaningfully.

Our minds do what they do. It varies as to how chatty our minds are. It differs as to the degree to which we behave from our intellect (Pre-Frontal Cortex) vs our emotions (Amygdala). There is also variability as to how negative our thinking innately is.

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