Activate Self-Compassion

Welcome to Day one of meditation for self-compassion.

Find a comfortable position. Sitting with your spine straight and hands relaxed on your lap is a proven effective posture to meditate. Use it if it works for you.

Breathe deeply.

Relax your senses. Pay attention to your muscles and relax them. Breathe deeply. Feel a gentle wave of water wash your entire body. Relax your face, your feet, your hands and your entire self.

Pay attention to the flow of air coming in and out of your nostrils. Arrive here and now.
Compassion is a natural response. Not something difficult to achieve but rather a response that arrives without effort when you are aware and conscious. A natural human response to suffering. We are all experiencing some level of primordial suffering at each particular point in time. On an essential level, whenever you wish the present moment to be different than what it is in its reality, there is suffering.

Self-Compassion starts at a cognitive level, with the awareness of what is the reality in each moment, without judging or controlling. Striping the present moment of labels and seeing the truth of what is. Then the recognition of how you experience suffering in that moment. How your self wants things to be different than reality. What follows this recognition is the feeling of concern for and connection to the one who is suffering. To you. Then the level of intention. The deep desire to relieve the suffering you are experiencing. And finally, the action level, where you choose your outer action based on a conscious inner experience of self-compassion.

Let’s take a few minutes to breathe intentionally, in a pattern that helps the brain relax and calms the nervous system. This will prepare us to open our minds and hearts to the silent meditation. Breathe in counting to four, imagine there is a beam of light in the base of your spine, going up all the way to the crown of your head. Hold the breath for 4 counts. Imagine the light intensifying and expanding your awareness. Breath out counting to four, imagine the light slowly moving back through your spine. Hold your lungs empty for four counts. Continue this breathing pattern. Breath in. Hold. Out. Hold.

Now let your breathing get back to normal. Perceive how you feel.

We will now meditate silent for a short while. I will take care of the time and at the end you will hear a bell. At any point during this process if you feel lost, uncomfortable, agitated, just continue to breathe. Go back to paying attention to the flow of air coming in and out of your nostrils. It will bring you back to focus.

[meditation in silence]

Slowly get back to your senses, feel your body. Let it speak to you. Observe how you feel. Throughout the next 24 hours remember the central perception of this day: Self-Compassion is a natural response to your suffering. It arises without effort when you are aware of what is the true reality of this moment and make a conscious choice of action.

When you are trying to get a decision or you are trying to achieve something and you feel stuck. You know your vision you know where you want to get or you know what you need to do to get out of that situation but you just can’t figure out how, it possible that there is something inside of you that is blocking that flow. It’s possible that you are the one that is really holding yourself down.

Maybe there is release that needs to occur. You need to forgive yourself for something so you can free that energy or maybe there’s acknowledgment that needs to occur, you need to consciously acknowledge that you are in a certain situation, that you have been suffering in a certain way.

If you are stuck, then movement needs to come in. And for movement you need energy and to free the energy there is probably some sort or some level of self-compassion that is waiting to happen.

If you are thinking about your answer while the other person is talking, you are living in the future. At least part of your conscience. If you are in the future, you are not dwelling in a compassionate state. Compassion can only happen in the present.

That’s the only place in which real connection can be made and meaningful creative action can be taken. We do this all the time, but usually in small installments. If you wish to lead from a place of compassion, your commitment is to first listening from a place of presence. Attune to what’s important and recognize what’s needed. Be conscious of what is the reality of the moment.

A compassionate response is inseparable from consciousness.

In our day-to-day life, it can be difficult to envision the practicality of self-compassion. One of the ways in which it can help us navigate life with less stress, less anxiety and more peace is in situations of conflicting positions. In business decisions, family matters, politics an infinite realm of normal life situations, often times we find ourselves in a crossroads. There are two or more paths, points of views or ways of thinking and they are opposites or conflicting,

One of the principles of compassion is that it holds opposites. A compassionate heart can see from different angles and perspectives. It understands the common humanity that connects all of us an thus, is capable of holding ideas that initially seem diverse but that in reality are only expressions of another human being’s views. Often that capacity enables the person to find ways to integrate diverse concepts or at least hold in the same space different perspectives.

We are going to engage in an exercise to awaken this capacity in us.

Choose a situation in which you struggle or in any way have difficulty with opposing ideas. It could be a family matter in which you can’t understand the other side’s position. It could be a business decision that seems impossible to make because the courses of actions will infuriate different groups, or a simple life example in which you feel two different things at the same time toward a person or situation.

Hold one in your right hand. Hand closed. Hold another in your left hand, hand closed. Open hand 1 bring to heart, open hand 2 bring to heart.

Think of something that is currently being a source of stress for you. Resist the inclination to overthink, analyze or explain. Your mind is not the totality of your intelligence. Trust the rest. Feel what is the thing, situation or emotion that is most dragging your energy and giving you a sense of anxiety. Be honest. There is no one else here. Just you. You can look deeper and be honest about what that is.

Now hold that in your awareness for a second. In whatever form it wants to present itself. Appreciate that this density is somewhere in your energy field, in you. Bring it to your sight, imagine it in front of you. Take a deep breath and gently, but firmly, let it know that it’s time to go. I will not let you use my energy anymore. I will not nourish you anymore. It’s time for you to move on.

You can’t manufacture compassion. All you can do is create the conditions for it to arise. Not abandoning my direct experience of discomfort and suffer. I value myself enough to extend myself past this limitation.

Everything I need to know next in inside the discomfort of now.

Sit on a comfortable position. Spine straight if possible. Massage slightly your legs to wake up the body. Put your hands on your face and massage a little bit to wake up your face. Your hair, the back of your neck. Tell your body that we’re going to be doing this right now. We’re going to be right here right now. Take a big, deep breath. Settle in and find a quiet position. Do not move. From now on, try not to move until the end of the meditation.

Breathe in and out. My hands are placed on top of my knees, but you can place them anywhere that you feel comfortable. As long as it feels to you it’s an open position, it’s a position of being open, receiving and giving.

Let’s breathe with consciousness, breath in counting to four. Hold your breath to four. Exhale in four and hold your empty lung for four. Let’s do it for a few minutes.

Bring your attention to the center of your body, to your heart. Breathe from that point.
Imagine that when you breathe that point inside of you lights up a beautiful bright light.
You can imagine a color, an intensity to that light, and then I want you to imagine it every time you breathe the light gets more intense and bigger emanating from the point in the middle of your body and your heart, Breath in.
Expand that light. Trust your power to create your reality. Breathe in.
The field of energy you’re creating is going to become bigger than your body. Breathe and allow it to grow, to expand. It becomes more powerful the more you breathe in. Expands further. Just feel your body.

If you start thinking about something else, just let that go. Its normal. And come back to your attention to your heart center and your light. Breathe. Spine, always straight. Breathe.
This is the space where compassion lives. Pay attention to the way your body feels. How you feel.

From here it easier to access compassionate response to anything that happens in your life. And if you are a leader, if you are, uh, someone that has influence over other people, many people, in one way or another. Your body is learning right now. The state in which compassionate leader responses come from. Trust the power of your body to learn that. It’s just like exercising. At some point it becomes second nature. Your body is learning. Breathe. Tell yourself: I want to act from a compassionate place. In my life. And I am going to so, from now on. This is my decision.

Compassion towards myself is the first step. Open your heart. I accept my compassion with myself. Open your heart. And let it be.

Turn your gaze to the third eye without open your eyes. Every time that you lose attention you can do that and gently bring back your attention. I am worth. Of my compassion.
Accepting self-compassion is the first step. I don’t not need to carry guilt. Fear. Regrets. Anger. Drama. I do not need to carry any of those things. I accept that. Being free from suffering is not a privilege. It’s my natural state. It is the state from which I will be able and I am able right now to connect with the field of all possibilities. And reach what I want. From this place I can be who I really am and impact the lives of everyone around me. Everyone that I can touch and influence. With compassion. Self-compassion is the first step, and I accept it. In my heart. Now.

Breath in.

Find that light in the middle of your heart, breathe from there. Keep yourself open and trust your body is learning.

You’re going to be in silence for a few minutes.
Breath, Breathe, Breathe.
Gratitude for what I’m feeling now. For being able to be here. Feel gratitude wash over your entire body.

Our freedom is determined by our capacity to take a breath when we are triggered and find our self-compassion before we respond. In that breath we choose the answer that is true to our deeper consciousness. We create our reality. That is true freedom.
We are learning how to meet ourselves in that place where we pause before slipping into automatic reaction. Pause before turning away from suffering, from discomfort, from challenge. We pause and we look into the unknown. Stay there. That is when we find space.

Because when our primitive nervous system takes over, we abandon ourselves and we get lost in the narrative. That’s when self-compassion is most important. If we are able to bring compassion to ourselves in that moment when we get lost, then we are not under the control of suffering anymore. It doesn’t mean we stop feeling things. It means we are not those things. Identification with them is severed.

Even if you still feel anger, guilt, impatience, remorse, confusion or any other manifestation of primordial suffering, there is something else in charge of your actions. You are in charge. Decisions have to be made, but they can now be taken from a place of intelligence and compassion, instead of anger and fear.

There is a question that can help us when we become conscious of our state.
Ask yourself: inside of me, right now, is there a yes or a no? How am I living the exact moment that I’m in now? What is the condition of my consciousness? If it’s a no, then I’m neglecting the moment, wanting it to be different. And I’m missing the point of it all: me and the moment are one. I’m neglecting myself.

Saying yes to what is now does not mean being passive. It does not mean you condone what’s is happening. It means you stop fighting. You stop thinking. And you start seeing that no matter what you think, the moment is just as it is.

Reality does not care about what you think. But if you align yourself with the truth of what is now, then you remember. You remember that you are the now.

You are indivisible from what is and the power of that feeling frees you from bondage to the past. To the things your mind creates. And in that instant, compassion to yourself means knowing yourself. All is possible in that moment. And peace is real in you.

It does not matter how long you can hold that peace. All it matters is that you keep asking yourself the question, indefinitely, until resistance is no longer your natural response to the moment.

Then when you feel pain, when you suffer because you want something to be different, you are able to feel it and let it run its course, without defining you. Without becoming part of you. And your baggage starts to get lighter. Energy is released, and life shows to you your own face.

This course is a seed. A seed of self-compassion. We have planted it together. Cultivate the right conditions. This seed will grow. And the fruits of self-compassion will bring about a new way of leading, a new way of influencing all people around you, a new way of living.
When you live from that space, the field of possibilities is unlimited and abundant. Compassion is not a concept anymore, it is alive.