How to have Self Empathy

In my last post I wrote about how important Self Empathy was for me.   Now I want to explain my process. 

Empathy is the relationship between a tree's roots and leaves.

Why take on adopting a practice of self empathy?   You would need a motivating reason; otherwise this will be another one of those nice techniques we have all tried and forget to use.  Well, here are some of the reasons I have integrated self empathy into my life.

First is finding my own power.   I, like many, had a view of the world that power was mostly external. I identified power with the trapping of a good home, a nice car, a well paying job, a large bank account and good friends - or whatever external resources I had access to. What I noticed when I started teaching at the prison is that all the inmates had their external resources stripped away. I started exploring internal power with them. They discovered that the correctional officers could not take away their internal power. Many of the inmates, when they realized this, got very curious about how to develop internal power.

The second motivating factor was to change my belief about self responsibility.   I want to be fully responsible for my thoughts, feeling and actions. When I started living this, two shifts occurred. First, have you ever noticed yourself or someone else say “You are making me mad”? I realized that saying “You are making me mad” is one way to give away my power.  When I stopped doing this I stopped projecting blame on others, taking back the power of my own feelings.  Second, all the thoughts that I had that I did not enjoy, whether they were about me or others, were something for which I could take responsibility by identifying what was important behind the thought (see tips below). When I did this, I stopped taking these thoughts as personally.

If you are still interested, then how do you make this into a practice? It requires a conscious effort to use the skill when opportunities arise. Once you have adopted this practice and have used it for a period of time, it will become organic.  In other words, you will enjoy using self empathy because you will enjoy the results. You may notice yourself becoming more happy, satisfied and peaceful.  I have been practicing it since 2009 and it is now natural for me to do, leading me to have more passion, power, clarity of purpose and self-mattering in my life.

Here are the four steps of self empathy:

Observations – notice what has happened. This could be an action or something said by yourself or others.  Try to strip down your story of what happened. It is natural for us to judge everything. Just separate your judgment from the facts.

Feelings – notice how you are feeling about it now. You may have many feelings.  Noticing them will help give you access to what is important to you in this moment.

Needs – identify the underlying meaning for this event. What is truly important to you? See it as a need vs. a strategy. Strategies are just paths to getting our needs met.  Stay open to the possibility that many strategies and resources are available to fulfill your needs.

Requests – notice if there is a request you could make of yourself or others that would satisfy your needs.  This step in where the power is generated.  For self empathy to be effective there needs to be action.  If you do not see a request it is okay.  It just means you need more empathy.  Repeat the first three steps until a request emerges.

In closing, think of this as going shopping for a new coat. You walk in the store. You see one on the rack. You try it on, see if it fits. Does it have the features you like? Do you look good in it? Basically you are judging you experience of that coat. Go experience self empathy.

Source: I want to give credit to “Non-violent Communication” created by Marshall B. Rosenberg, PhD for the basic self empathy process.