BYOH: Build Your Own Happiness or How to hack your own happiness buttons.
Today: Be more compassionate and kind to yourself.
As a parent, I have tried to instill, in my kids, a sense (and a practice) of compassion for others. When they see someone whom is different from them or even someone with whom they disagree, I have always tried to nudge them towards being less judgmental and more understanding of the world around them.
When I am around other adults who make smug comments about others, I try to inject the same lessons. I have a hard time listening to people judging others without them even trying to understand who the other person may or may not be.
For the most part, I feel like most of the people, with whom I associate, tend towards compassion for others. But, a lot of time, I notice that these same people tend to be very hard on themselves, myself, included.
We fat-shame ourselves or food-shame ourselves. We apologize for having bad-hair days or for not wearing make-up. When people show up, unannounced, we apologize for having a messy home. Even when we do our very best on a project, we, preemptively, apologize, in case others don’t like our work.
One of the most important tips in hacking your own happiness buttons, is getting into your head, that you deserved compassion, especially from yourself.
Just like the friend who is having a bad hair day, or the neighbor who has to, regularly, visit the food pantry, deserve your compassion, so do you. Stop being so hard on yourself; the world is hard enough on you.
If you have done your best, today, and you know it, even if circumstances, beyond your control, bollixed all of your hard work, appreciate that you tried, and get up and do your best, again, tomorrow.
Be kinder to yourself. Treat yourself the way that you would treat your child or your partner or other family member. Be more understanding of yourself, be nicer to yourself. Don’t be so hard on yourself.
It sounds so simple, but, if you have spent years buying into the negative things that people, close to you, may have said or even what the world, at large, seems to want you to believe about yourself, it’s difficult to embrace the idea that you deserve to be treated with love and respect, even if the only person delivering that to you…is YOU.
In short, be more compassionate and kind, and start with the person you see in the mirror: Yourself.
Feel free, to visit my Facebook page and tell me what kind of things that you do to push your own happiness buttons or drop a line in the comments section. I would really love to hear from you.
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