# Self Compassion + Authenticity ##### Untangling Pain --- ![](https://youtu.be/MI-Rpb9vl8k) --- ## tl;dr **Self-compassion and pain** - Self-compassion influences pain - Higher self-compassion = less negative mood, reduced pain catastrophizing and pain - Judging ourselves for pain makes it worse - Turning pain against ourselves is a massive DIM - We can’t hate ourselves out of pain - Treat yourself like a dear friend - Replace negative self-talk with compassionate thoughts - Self-compassion is part of the puzzle **Authenticity and pain** - Authenticity wasn’t in the original plan but came up in research - Living authentically = better mental health and well-being - Inauthenticity = more distress and pain - Internal vs external life often don’t match - Especially true for women in their 40s and 50s - Incongruency between inner and outer world creates problems - Links back to pain **Self-concealment and inauthenticity** - Self-concealment is a form of inauthenticity - Linked to higher levels of acute and chronic pain - Hiding your true self = emotional suppression, burnout, mental health issues - Sometimes we don’t even realize we’re doing it - If something feels off, it probably is - Ask yourself: are you living a life true to you? - That question can influence your pain --- ## Transcript Now we're on to self-compassion, and I'm guessing that you will probably have guessed already that self compassion influences pain and of course Yep, this is absolutely the case. So studies have shown that higher levels of self compassion is associated with less negative moods, reduced pain catastrophizing and pain itself. I think this is an important part of pain, you know, with regards to self compassion, because I have seen myself that with so many clients, just how we can turn pain and the judgment of pain against ourselves and we can become more annoyed and frustrated and angry that we can't do more or that we have this pain our lives in our in the first place. We might start to blame ourselves and this is definitely not going to help our situation. The more self compassion we can give ourselves, the more this can influence those SIMs. Because again, when we turn things against ourselves, that's a massive DIM, right? And that's where our body will do things to try and get us out of that situation. And obviously, pain can be an output. For you, if you are someone who is judging yourself for being in pain, if you're feeling frustrated and angry, and I completely get it, But that is not going to change things, and we can't hate ourselves out of pain. So this is where we need to start treating ourselves as we would a friend. A dear, close friend. A real friend. One who needs our help. One who does not need our judgment. But needs compassion and love and understanding. So what can you do to stop hating on yourself and to give yourself that little bit more compassion? It doesn't have to be a huge step, even just acknowledging the negative thoughts, the negative things that you say to yourself, that you're not good enough, that you need to do more. Something, that something's wrong with you, that you're broken, all those thoughts, they need to go, right? Because they're not helping and we need to replace them with things that you would say to a friend because self compassion is another part of the puzzle. Now I couldn't finish off this presentation without talking about authenticity, could I? And if I'm honest this actually wasn't planned originally. I didn't even think about the connection between authenticity and pain until I carried on researching. And of course, I found the research consistently shows that living authentically is associated with better mental health and well being and living inauthentically It's linked to increased distress and pain, and it's that question of what does it mean to live an authentic life? That's the thing I'm really trying to work on at the moment in terms of understanding and helping other women understand too, that we have this image and feeling of how we want our life to be. This internal world that we have created for ourselves or that we aspire to have. And that is our authentic self. That's our true self. And then we have this external life, the one that we're actually living. Often we find, and I think this is especially true for women in their 40s and 50s, that they are not living their authentic life, that there's this incongruency, between the life that they want and the life that they've hoped for and dreamed about and the one they're actually living. When those two things don't match, when their outer world doesn't match their inner world, that's when we have this inauthentic life, and things, there's this incongruency and that's when things can become a problem. And again, this does link back to pain. One of the things I found out about actually when researching this was about self concealment, which is a form of inauthenticity. And it was actually found that this is linked to higher levels of acute and chronic pain. So again, self concealment, which again is a form of inauthenticity. is linked to higher levels of pain and this basically means that hiding one's true self is connected to emotional suppression, burnout and increased risk of mental health problems too. This makes sense, right? If we are not living a life that is true to us, if we are not being authentic, if we're not being our true selves, if we're hiding things, that's self concealment. And sometimes we might not even realize we're doing it. Sometimes it takes something like this course this that you're listening to right now to give you that nudge and to make you realize that something isn't quite right in your life. And that's what I found when it comes to, inauthenticity or living an authentic life that if something feels off, even if you can't name it, even if you can't describe it, but something just feels off, chances are it is, so trust that feeling, trust what your body is telling you. It may be that the life you are living is not the life that you want to be living. It is not authentic to you and what you truly want. So this is a question you need to ask yourself and dig deep to figure out if this is the case for you. Are you living a life that is true to you? Because that question can influence your pain. --- Next lesson → [[Untangling Pain – Module 3 Lesson 01|next lesson]] %% - [[Self-compassion influences Pain]] - [[authenticity influences pain]] - [[Self-concealment and Inauthenticity influences pain]]