April: Happiness and Unhappiness
We seem to be living in an age where we’re bombarded with messages to be happy, yet denial of our unhappiness perpetuates the problem. After all, unhappiness has a function – it tells us when something is going wrong. If we don’t allow ourselves the fundamental honesty of our sadness then we miss an important cue to adapt.
There is an important difference between wallowing in misery and doing everything we can to alleviate our unhappiness. If happiness is a skill, so is unhappiness. Unhappiness is instructive; it teaches compassion.
Do you think of happiness as a skill? How so?
What are the skills for navigating times of unhappiness?
When you are feeling down, do you isolate, insulate? How does this help or not help?
Is being gentle with yourself hard for you? What beliefs undermine self-compassion?
What practices can support you when you - or someone you love - are unhappy?
Suffering = Pain x Resistance
Self-Compassion is a mothering practice. In The Way of the Mysterial Woman, author Suzanne Anderson describes how unhealthy patterns of mothering create shadow behaviors of neglect and depletion or the opposite, smothering and over-indulgence. Self-compassion is an important tool in healing shadows of the mother wound.
A prayer for SELF COMPASSION
This is hard right now.
We all struggle in our lives ~ I am not alone.
May I hold myself with tenderness in this moment.
May I be kind to myself in this moment.
May I be compassionate with my suffering in this moment.
May I remember I am not alone.
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Take a deep breath of self-compassion.