Love and Compassion are My Superpower Tools

Then why do I often leave them on the shelf when I need them the most

As per the ad slogan from the National Enquire tabloid — Enquiring minds want to know!

My therapist and I were two of those minds. So we investigated and came up with the answer. Bear with me — I’ll share it with you soon. But first a little background information to provide a context to the answer.

The Perils of Self-Criticism

I’m pretty darn good at treating others with love and compassion. Kindness flows naturally from me. I cherish encouraging and supporting people — old friends and new ones, including my fellow Medium writers. Yes, I have my moments when I’m anything but kind, but they’re the exception and not the rule.

Unfortunately, when it comes to treating myself with the same level of kindness with which I treat others, I struggle big time.

Especially when I feel criticized — I’m so cruel to myself.

I give myself a hard time at the slightest sign of disapproval that most people wouldn’t even notice, or if they did, they’d easily blow off.

When the criticism is intense, my level of self-attack is off the charts.

It’s as if I’m a professional boxer, the fight is about to start, but I have no opponent staring me down— there’s nobody in the ring but me. The opening bell of self-critical thoughts rings, and in no time, I’m pounding myself in the face — the harsher my perception of the criticism, the more intense the self-inflicted blows.

The blows are so relentless, so powerful, so accurately delivered to the most sensitive parts of my psyche, that I end up stumbling out of the ring, face unrecognizable, feeling as defeated and low as one can get.

I came up with the above metaphor not because I’m this amazingly creative writer — it’s because the words flowed from recollecting my experience of just a week ago. Yes, that’s how bad it was.

All because somebody spouted venom at me. It didn’t matter that the words were totally unwarranted, that they came from nowhere. I chose to believe I deserved the harsh words.

I told myself … I don’t know what I did, but I must have effed up somehow, or why else would that person be so angry with me.

It’s now a week later. I’ve had time to process the event, and I’m doing a lot better. But at the time, it was that bad.

That was precisely when I needed to pull my love and compassion superpower tools off of the shelf.

Yet I didn’t. I couldn’t.

Why was that?

It’s because I was programmed to accept critical words as absolute truth, starting when I was a little kid. And I’ve yet to deprogram myself.

Fortunately, I’m learning to question my programming — to consider that the critical words may have nothing to do with me. Thank God for that. But I’ve got a ways to go.

My Programming

It began all the way back in my childhood. I’m 69 years old, so we’re talking six decades ago thereabouts.

As a little kid and well into my teenage years, I was relentlessly teased. Barely a week would go by when I wasn’t the subject of cruel taunting.

The teasing wouldn’t have been nearly as devastating if I had someone to console me, as in my mom or dad. After all, isn’t that what parents are for! Sadly, they weren’t up to the task. My parents weren’t mean people, but emotionally they had their heads up their rear ends.

I learned at an early age that if I approached them for consolation, I’d be sorely disappointed. My parents would not, or perhaps better said, “could not” give me either the physical or emotional hug I desperately needed that would have conveyed to me that everything would be alright, that I was alright.

Rejection from my friends — that’s one thing. But being rejected by my own mommy or daddy on top of that — that would have been too much for “little Arty” to bear. So as a matter of survival, I kept the pain to myself. Even worse than that — I turned it against myself.

Little Arty felt compelled to make sense of things, to figure out why my friends mercilessly teased me so often. The conclusion I arrived at was that there was something terribly wrong with me. After all, why else would my friends single me out as the object of their cruel taunts!

I carried this belief system throughout my entire adulthood, up until a few years ago. Perhaps better said — I religiously held on to that childhood conviction, which only served to further solidify it through the years.

So here I am, 69 years old, grateful that I survived it all without losing my marbles, without physically hurting myself. Yes, I have more work to do, but I’m proud I never gave up on myself and equally proud of how hard I work each and every day at becoming more self-compassionate in the face of criticism.

That’s Enough About Me — How About You?

Do you too struggle with personalizing criticism? Is your self-talk similar to mine, as in … I can’t imagine what I did wrong, but it must have been something.

If you relate, I’d bet my bottom dollar that you, too, have been programmed to buy into that bullshit.

Your programming may look very different than mine. It may not have begun until you were an adult. Perhaps your programmer was your first boyfriend or girlfriend, or your spouse — it doesn’t matter what the source.

Because regardless of how the programming came about, the lesson we took away from it was the same — that it’s acceptable to treat ourselves like total crap when we deserve to treat ourselves with a full dose of compassion.

Better Days Lie Ahead

I have a plan. I’m been implementing it for the past few weeks, and it’s going quite well. I’m encouraged, even though only a week ago, there I was, pummeling myself in the boxing ring.

Kicking long-entrenched habits is a two steps forward, one step back process. I will not allow myself to feel discouraged and give up. I’ve finally reached the point where I love myself too much for that. Therein lies my hope.

I want you to feel encouraged too. We may not know each other, but I like to think we’re all in this together. Let’s support each other. The time has come to grab our superpower tools off of the shelf and put them to good use when we most need them.

Here’s my plan to help get us going.

Step 1— Recognize that your propensity to give yourself a hard time in the face of criticism is not your fault.

Please don’t tell yourself anything like: What the hell is wrong with me that I still have this problem! I should be beyond this at this stage of my life.

Instead, tell yourself: I accept this is where I’m currently at. It’s ok — it is what it is. It’s not my fault. Everybody struggles with one thing or another. The difference is some people work on their issues, and some don’t, and I’m proud of myself I’m one of those who do.

Step 2 — Do some digging to uncover the roots of your personalizing criticism.

It’s another way of being kind to yourself — to recognize the problem didn’t come from nowhere. To do that, it’s helpful to find the somewhere it came from. This may bring on some tears as painful memories of mistreatment rise to the surface. That’s all part of the healing process.

Step 3: Commit yourself to do your best to no longer allow yourself to be the victim of other people’s opinion of you.

That being said, we’re only human. Even with our best effort, from time to time it’s inevitable we will fall back into old habits. But there is every reason to be confident the occasions will pop up far less frequently and will be far less intense.

That’s All For Now

I just checked the article length, and it's already up to a 6-minute read. Darn it, I didn’t quite make it to the nitty-gritty steps of the plan.

But if I included them, the article length would approach 10 minutes —in my opinion, too long for most readers to enjoy or maintain full focus. Certainly for me.

So I’ll end the article here. I hope you understand. Please stay tuned for the follow-up article where I promise to provide those final few steps.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read. I’m so grateful.

I have one favor to ask you before signing off — please consider commenting if something in the article resonated with you. Many readers look through all of the comments, and you never know when your words may make a difference in the lives of others — sometimes an extraordinary one.

God bless,

Art

A giant shoutout to my friend Donnette Anglin — a fantastic writer and a beautiful person. She always writes straight from her heart and cares deeply about encouraging her fellow writers. Here is an example.