I’m not used to offering myself kindness, but when I did, some of the tension I carry in my body relaxed. Tara’s teaching has long been a touchstone for me, but having these videos where she is talking directly to me, as her listener, is a very powerful way to experience her wise counsel.
margaret, (marnie) aeschlimann, Another Field, CAsays
this is a very helpful exercise for me. I am currently working with an energy healer to open blocked energy pathways. I am 70yrs old with an early childhood history of abuse followed by an adult life of self neglect, bad decisions etc. I often think of myself as too old for this, too dense somehow, but as she points out, because i am retired, i have the time. And it does seem to be a full time thing, I cry a lot and wonder often if i would not be better off getting some anti-depressants. I also get taken over by a very harsh inner critic who insists that this is all self-indulgent, navel-gazing bs and i should be out trying to save the planet at this time of environmental and political crisis. But essentially i am hooked into this process and do not feel i can return to old solutions. So i spend lots of time in meditation and trying to understand what is going on inside me. Tara has been an important resource for me for years and now, her suggestion of this 3 step practice is proving to be very helpful to me. Thank you so much for this.
I have foot pain, and the thought around a painful financial setback during the recession, the thoughts in the exercise, were I shot myself in the foot, and further, I don’t have a leg to stand on. Alot of leg and foot pain (also I am flat footed) comes from there.
It was hard to open my heart to financial failure! (let my family down, hurt others, stupid, should have known better and many other phrases).
Still finding ways to heal my open heart around the feelings of failure, shame, self- anger, and fear connected to that!
I really resonated with the concept of the ocean and the waves. I am the ocean and my thoughts of unworthiness are my waves and they will always be there. They will come and crash, but also be calm and settled at times. I must trust in this constant shift and believe that I am worthy to feel loved by myself and others.
I started with 3 full breaths. I noticed the sensation of tears beginning, maybe the fear of opening up to this private pain. I asked Hannie (my childhood name) what is hurting you? I acknowledged it was the same old fears related to work. I let Hannie know that she is safe, she is loved, she is strong, and at the same time I noted I was holding my hands together. As I felt more safe, and letting some of the stress released, I brought my right hand to my heart, began slow breathing and felt peace enter. I continued to say you are loved, you are safe. The sun is rising here, and it seemed the symbol of awakening.
Lindsey Chudzik, Social Work, Fort Myers, FL, USAsays
Thank you for sharing!! I am loving these videos. This exercise was a bit more challenging, as is something that needs continual practice. I noticed much thought that needed to be unhooked and actually allowing myself to be vulnerable in the heart space was enlightening. We need to remember as human beings to take care of ourselves as much as we take care of others. We would not want the other person to be so hard on themselves and need to practice that same forgiveness with ourselves! Be our own best friend, as we do not judge our friends as much as we judge ourselves!
Katie Van Horne, Another Field, Ojai , CA, USAsays
I loved the ocean and waves analogy. Like Ajahn Chah’s Leaf story.
We are all belonging, cocreative – bumper cars of delighting in each other, and coming to rest as the ocean incorporating the bumps of the surf… or instead self or other judging and reenforcing the wrongs of the bumps and scrapes felt from the 1st arrow with the 2nd arrow of “we should have known better”. Coming to the heart space feels like coming to Emptiness in the Heart Sutra of the Prajnaparamita. There is in this heart space for me spaciousness and tenderness along with the wisdom of dis-illusioning ourselves from the “concreteness”, (believing we are attempting improvement) set up in the types of accusatory bumps and blows of the two arrows you described. Hope this makes sense.Thank you, Tara.
Susan Yurasevecz, Student, Bloomfield, CT, USAsays
Thank you for the work you do. I like this approach of head to heat to heart space, especially the analogy of being the ocean. Waves come up and go down, always to disappear back into the mighty ocean.
I felt sad at times and the looked at where I was in that moment and how old I was. I reassured myself that I would be there for little me and that I no longer needed to swear or shout and that I was there to look after little me. I kinda felt sad and an overwhelming sense of relief
I found that without noticing, my left hand had taken my right hand, as if I was subconsciously comforting myself. Automatically comforting myself is new. I’ve been learning to be compassionate with myself for a long time, and it’s always taken some effort. I guess I… No, I should be proud of myself for putting the work in for so long. I’m trying to be proud of myself. I’m working on it.
When I put my hand on my heart and told myself that it’s ok, my feelings were a natural, a sense of calm and compassion washed over me. The tightness I my chest softened and my breathing slowed down without me focusing on slowing it down. Thank you so much for sharing this simple exercise to quieten my inner critic.
Thank you. Something shifted by the end of the exercise. initially it all seemed easy, no concerns, no hope -from the head came the negativity well known, and sometimes effective in the need to refrain from words or actions that could make things worse. With “you shouldn’t”, came the notion that the condemnation was even more right than I first had thought. Felt miserable. Something changed with the notion of accepting both arrows as the what was actually happening, without explaining, without rationalizing. Observing more than accepting. Then came a bit of an opening for a bit of willingness for kindness – the sort of heart ache that came was a surprise and forever old. Head – to- heart to heartspace journey – I hope will intentioally be part of my life for always. thank you for teaching this. Life will be different I think with some of the people I’ll be seeing in the morning.
It was so helpful to see the layers – the second arrow of blame for putting myself in an uneasy situation and without my sweetheart, the first arrow of fear of love and passion fading away. I cried.
My pain is in my heart and stomach. I was able to release some of that pain but there’s still some lingering. I am having a difficult time figuring out where it’s coming from, but will keep at it. I’m done allowing this anxiety, negativity, and self-hatred control my life. It’s time for an eviction!
It was difficult for me to access the pain in my body. I needed longer to get there. However, something must have connected because the kindness offered was followed by a breath/ letting go and some tension left chest and stomach
I am still a bit tight. I could feel a warnth when i put my hand over my heart & said “i am here for you. It will be all right.” I am 74 years old. My hurts, fears, anxiety, jealousy & lack of self confidence have been fueled by many people, relationships, situations over all these years. It hasnt just happened. Trusting anyone inclding myself is almost impossible. My thoughts mess me up do bad!! I call it ,”my old tapes”.
BRIAN STEPPACHER, Other, SOUTH PORTLAND, ME, USAsays
Tara,
I have been consumed with guilt (self blame and self judgement), fear and unworthiness. I was consumed with the thought that if I suffered enough, if I was severe and harsh enough with myself (something that others weren’t doing, so I had to try that much harder), if I punished myself enough, I would eventually come out the other side vindicated. (“The A+ for effort.”The story of the failing under-achiever.) There has been a lot of time I am unable to account for. There have been significant others who have applied a comforting and healing balm, who have listened and allowed the thoughts and feelings to arise and be named. There have been times of isolation and fragmentation when I rocked myself to wholeness. Right now I am able to sit with most remaining feelings of vulnerability (they don’t seem to be as paralyzing) and in some cases I move past the vulnerability to places of security and, occasionally, thriving. I am slowly becoming aware of new life, an ecosystem of inter-dependency within the human and natural worlds. Things might have been otherwise for so many reasons, but here I am here and now.
Thank you Tara for guiding me to a practical way to do what I have known to be helpful but never knew how to achieve. I felt myself softening toward self.
So appreciate this three step reminder! I immediately softened during the exercise even though I haven’t practiced it recently. So helpful. Essential re-wiring that we can all practice. Over and over and over. Thank you, Tara.
When I was about 19 yrs old and a college freshman my psychology professor administered a psychological personality test to whoever in the class wanted to take it. Afterwards we had the opportunity to meet with him 1 on 1 to discuss the profile results. I arrived for my appointment prepared to hear about what a smart and amazing person I was. Once I was seated and comfortable my professor said to me ” Well, the one thing that stands out in your test results is that every question that even slightly approached the subject of intimacy, you completely rejected.” I was devastated. Because I was expecting to hear things that would stroke my ego and make me feel good about myself I walked into the interview wide open and his statement got past all my defenses. I started to cry. I had no conscious idea that I was so afraid of letting anyone in, I had myself convinced that I was just very independent and was not willing to be tied down.
And since that time I never tried to look at those feelings to see what was there, I called it “trust issues” and kept the lid on. All these years I’ve been looking away frantically and I have never known why or from what. I self medicated for many many years. It worked great. It kept the hounds at bay. I never learned how to form healthy honest intimate relationships. I’m 66 now and I’ve never been in a relationship for longer than 3 years. All the energy that should /could have gone into my creative/artistic expression got trapped in the addictive cycle of shame and blame. I’ve been alone and running all my life from this overwhelming despair that I must keep buried for fear that it will destroy me. I have met with my inner child and held her, cherished her, forgiven her, reassured her. The wall is still there but now I am ready to look at it and meet whatever is there. I want to break the cycle and be free of it.The ocean imagery is very helpful and calming. I just have to remember to use it.
Thx Tara for the wise guidance it’s good to be reminded doing this regularly helps. We can all get caught up in our busy lives and then the ‘old tapes’ start playing again
I think her perspective will be helpful to clients with trauma and extreme self-judgment. She gets to a spiritual level and get core of people’s sense of shame an inadequacy. I have worked on building compassion with clients but this gets to a deeper level. Thank you.
Lovely and so simple in many ways. I loved the metaphor of the ocean and the waves -I think I have heard this before. Connecting it to the Head to Heart to Heart Space I think will help me retain this to use often -with myself and with my clients. Thank you.
This practice was so helpful – I felt so much sadness when I got how much the self blame arrows stir pain in me – I felt more opening to the space of loving and accepting myself!
The thought was when I was younger I was a bad mother. Then I thought about it and told myself I was a single mother very young with no help and i tried my best and don’t be so hard as I was also suffering mental illness.
I realised I’ve been blaming myself for things that have happened in my life since I was a child. And there was no compassion or love from adults to tell me it was not my fault. As I grew into my teenage years this continued, then into adult years and relationships I continued to blame myself for anything and everything that went wrong. I have and do blame myself for everything no matter what it is or was or how big or small. My relationships have all been abusive. Also my fault. As you said decades of my life. It will take me time to stop myself doing this.
Peter Sibner, Physical Therapy, Pittsfield, MA, USAsays
When I’m able to connect with that sense of self-love, kindness and offer compassion to the feelings of unworthiness (and I’ve been doing this more often over the past year), I realize, 1) that these feelings are just a story I’m telling myself and that they are not are true reflections of what I have accomplished in my life (I’m almost 60 now) and, 2) how deep these feeling/memories are embedded in my history. But just remembering to bring compassion, again and again, helps take the harshness off the emotional reaction.
Thank you Tara. I’ve been struggling with self judgement and inner critic for a while, and while there have been moments of surrendering and coming home to myself before they are still fleeting. This time as I sat listening to your voice and shifted from mind to heart, and to heart space tears started trickling down my face. I felt sadness but also strangely a sense of relief, like I didn’t have to endure the self punishment anymore. I could accept and love myself for who I am, not who I am meant to be, at least in this very moment.
The head spoke loud voices of anxiety and insecurities iv held onto for years to protect myself from being hurt like this again. However, the heart, I felt a knot in my throat, breathlessness and turning in my gut. The waves are still crashing like the storm it is inside me and I went blank. I must practice this video again.
Actually thoughtfully experiencing the movement from head to heart is helpful. Mindfully doing this is I important for me as it becomes a time for the truth the set in.
I’m not used to offering myself kindness, but when I did, some of the tension I carry in my body relaxed. Tara’s teaching has long been a touchstone for me, but having these videos where she is talking directly to me, as her listener, is a very powerful way to experience her wise counsel.
this is a very helpful exercise for me. I am currently working with an energy healer to open blocked energy pathways. I am 70yrs old with an early childhood history of abuse followed by an adult life of self neglect, bad decisions etc. I often think of myself as too old for this, too dense somehow, but as she points out, because i am retired, i have the time. And it does seem to be a full time thing, I cry a lot and wonder often if i would not be better off getting some anti-depressants. I also get taken over by a very harsh inner critic who insists that this is all self-indulgent, navel-gazing bs and i should be out trying to save the planet at this time of environmental and political crisis. But essentially i am hooked into this process and do not feel i can return to old solutions. So i spend lots of time in meditation and trying to understand what is going on inside me. Tara has been an important resource for me for years and now, her suggestion of this 3 step practice is proving to be very helpful to me. Thank you so much for this.
A deeper awareness of where I was hurting and a sense of well-being when placing my hand over my heart. Self-compassion was present.
I have foot pain, and the thought around a painful financial setback during the recession, the thoughts in the exercise, were I shot myself in the foot, and further, I don’t have a leg to stand on. Alot of leg and foot pain (also I am flat footed) comes from there.
It was hard to open my heart to financial failure! (let my family down, hurt others, stupid, should have known better and many other phrases).
Still finding ways to heal my open heart around the feelings of failure, shame, self- anger, and fear connected to that!
Found myself breathing deeply on fear!
I really resonated with the concept of the ocean and the waves. I am the ocean and my thoughts of unworthiness are my waves and they will always be there. They will come and crash, but also be calm and settled at times. I must trust in this constant shift and believe that I am worthy to feel loved by myself and others.
So true.
Thanks for the reminder and strategies. ?
I started with 3 full breaths. I noticed the sensation of tears beginning, maybe the fear of opening up to this private pain. I asked Hannie (my childhood name) what is hurting you? I acknowledged it was the same old fears related to work. I let Hannie know that she is safe, she is loved, she is strong, and at the same time I noted I was holding my hands together. As I felt more safe, and letting some of the stress released, I brought my right hand to my heart, began slow breathing and felt peace enter. I continued to say you are loved, you are safe. The sun is rising here, and it seemed the symbol of awakening.
I felt a peacefulness
Thank you
Thank you for sharing!! I am loving these videos. This exercise was a bit more challenging, as is something that needs continual practice. I noticed much thought that needed to be unhooked and actually allowing myself to be vulnerable in the heart space was enlightening. We need to remember as human beings to take care of ourselves as much as we take care of others. We would not want the other person to be so hard on themselves and need to practice that same forgiveness with ourselves! Be our own best friend, as we do not judge our friends as much as we judge ourselves!
I loved the ocean and waves analogy. Like Ajahn Chah’s Leaf story.
We are all belonging, cocreative – bumper cars of delighting in each other, and coming to rest as the ocean incorporating the bumps of the surf… or instead self or other judging and reenforcing the wrongs of the bumps and scrapes felt from the 1st arrow with the 2nd arrow of “we should have known better”. Coming to the heart space feels like coming to Emptiness in the Heart Sutra of the Prajnaparamita. There is in this heart space for me spaciousness and tenderness along with the wisdom of dis-illusioning ourselves from the “concreteness”, (believing we are attempting improvement) set up in the types of accusatory bumps and blows of the two arrows you described. Hope this makes sense.Thank you, Tara.
Thank you for the work you do. I like this approach of head to heat to heart space, especially the analogy of being the ocean. Waves come up and go down, always to disappear back into the mighty ocean.
I felt sad at times and the looked at where I was in that moment and how old I was. I reassured myself that I would be there for little me and that I no longer needed to swear or shout and that I was there to look after little me. I kinda felt sad and an overwhelming sense of relief
You’re an Angel for Sharing this information with us… Thank you thank you thank you.. I am truely greatful.. ???????????????????????⭐⭐??????????
I found that without noticing, my left hand had taken my right hand, as if I was subconsciously comforting myself. Automatically comforting myself is new. I’ve been learning to be compassionate with myself for a long time, and it’s always taken some effort. I guess I… No, I should be proud of myself for putting the work in for so long. I’m trying to be proud of myself. I’m working on it.
Keri
When I put my hand on my heart and told myself that it’s ok, my feelings were a natural, a sense of calm and compassion washed over me. The tightness I my chest softened and my breathing slowed down without me focusing on slowing it down. Thank you so much for sharing this simple exercise to quieten my inner critic.
Thank you. Something shifted by the end of the exercise. initially it all seemed easy, no concerns, no hope -from the head came the negativity well known, and sometimes effective in the need to refrain from words or actions that could make things worse. With “you shouldn’t”, came the notion that the condemnation was even more right than I first had thought. Felt miserable. Something changed with the notion of accepting both arrows as the what was actually happening, without explaining, without rationalizing. Observing more than accepting. Then came a bit of an opening for a bit of willingness for kindness – the sort of heart ache that came was a surprise and forever old. Head – to- heart to heartspace journey – I hope will intentioally be part of my life for always. thank you for teaching this. Life will be different I think with some of the people I’ll be seeing in the morning.
When I closed my eyes and listened, I felt relaxed. Not sure if I was doing it right, think it was your relaxing voice. But felt nice x
It was so helpful to see the layers – the second arrow of blame for putting myself in an uneasy situation and without my sweetheart, the first arrow of fear of love and passion fading away. I cried.
My chest and stomach were tight. Hand in heart with words of comfort helped reduce the tightness but didn’t remove it completely. It’s a start.
I am not sure
I am uncomfortable doing the exercise alone. (Without any support near me.)
I Will try it again, at a later time, if it’s still available to me.
My pain is in my heart and stomach. I was able to release some of that pain but there’s still some lingering. I am having a difficult time figuring out where it’s coming from, but will keep at it. I’m done allowing this anxiety, negativity, and self-hatred control my life. It’s time for an eviction!
FEAR…. mind…. self talk…..throat, chest…. self- reiki… deep breathing…. focus upon compassion- heart centered….. release of tensions…. calm
It was difficult for me to access the pain in my body. I needed longer to get there. However, something must have connected because the kindness offered was followed by a breath/ letting go and some tension left chest and stomach
I tried to focus on where the blame came from and shift it. I felt a bit strange. Mine is all in my heart and it sort of changed a bit
I struggled to be kind to myself in the heart space. I couldn’t be kind to myself. There’s too much anger, sadness and disappointment.
A lot of psin
I am still a bit tight. I could feel a warnth when i put my hand over my heart & said “i am here for you. It will be all right.” I am 74 years old. My hurts, fears, anxiety, jealousy & lack of self confidence have been fueled by many people, relationships, situations over all these years. It hasnt just happened. Trusting anyone inclding myself is almost impossible. My thoughts mess me up do bad!! I call it ,”my old tapes”.
Tara,
I have been consumed with guilt (self blame and self judgement), fear and unworthiness. I was consumed with the thought that if I suffered enough, if I was severe and harsh enough with myself (something that others weren’t doing, so I had to try that much harder), if I punished myself enough, I would eventually come out the other side vindicated. (“The A+ for effort.”The story of the failing under-achiever.) There has been a lot of time I am unable to account for. There have been significant others who have applied a comforting and healing balm, who have listened and allowed the thoughts and feelings to arise and be named. There have been times of isolation and fragmentation when I rocked myself to wholeness. Right now I am able to sit with most remaining feelings of vulnerability (they don’t seem to be as paralyzing) and in some cases I move past the vulnerability to places of security and, occasionally, thriving. I am slowly becoming aware of new life, an ecosystem of inter-dependency within the human and natural worlds. Things might have been otherwise for so many reasons, but here I am here and now.
Thank you Tara for guiding me to a practical way to do what I have known to be helpful but never knew how to achieve. I felt myself softening toward self.
So appreciate this three step reminder! I immediately softened during the exercise even though I haven’t practiced it recently. So helpful. Essential re-wiring that we can all practice. Over and over and over. Thank you, Tara.
When I was about 19 yrs old and a college freshman my psychology professor administered a psychological personality test to whoever in the class wanted to take it. Afterwards we had the opportunity to meet with him 1 on 1 to discuss the profile results. I arrived for my appointment prepared to hear about what a smart and amazing person I was. Once I was seated and comfortable my professor said to me ” Well, the one thing that stands out in your test results is that every question that even slightly approached the subject of intimacy, you completely rejected.” I was devastated. Because I was expecting to hear things that would stroke my ego and make me feel good about myself I walked into the interview wide open and his statement got past all my defenses. I started to cry. I had no conscious idea that I was so afraid of letting anyone in, I had myself convinced that I was just very independent and was not willing to be tied down.
And since that time I never tried to look at those feelings to see what was there, I called it “trust issues” and kept the lid on. All these years I’ve been looking away frantically and I have never known why or from what. I self medicated for many many years. It worked great. It kept the hounds at bay. I never learned how to form healthy honest intimate relationships. I’m 66 now and I’ve never been in a relationship for longer than 3 years. All the energy that should /could have gone into my creative/artistic expression got trapped in the addictive cycle of shame and blame. I’ve been alone and running all my life from this overwhelming despair that I must keep buried for fear that it will destroy me. I have met with my inner child and held her, cherished her, forgiven her, reassured her. The wall is still there but now I am ready to look at it and meet whatever is there. I want to break the cycle and be free of it.The ocean imagery is very helpful and calming. I just have to remember to use it.
I cried, because what you were saying is where l live in myself.
Thx Tara for the wise guidance it’s good to be reminded doing this regularly helps. We can all get caught up in our busy lives and then the ‘old tapes’ start playing again
So another words accept who you are
I think her perspective will be helpful to clients with trauma and extreme self-judgment. She gets to a spiritual level and get core of people’s sense of shame an inadequacy. I have worked on building compassion with clients but this gets to a deeper level. Thank you.
Lovely and so simple in many ways. I loved the metaphor of the ocean and the waves -I think I have heard this before. Connecting it to the Head to Heart to Heart Space I think will help me retain this to use often -with myself and with my clients. Thank you.
This practice was so helpful – I felt so much sadness when I got how much the self blame arrows stir pain in me – I felt more opening to the space of loving and accepting myself!
The thought was when I was younger I was a bad mother. Then I thought about it and told myself I was a single mother very young with no help and i tried my best and don’t be so hard as I was also suffering mental illness.
I realised I’ve been blaming myself for things that have happened in my life since I was a child. And there was no compassion or love from adults to tell me it was not my fault. As I grew into my teenage years this continued, then into adult years and relationships I continued to blame myself for anything and everything that went wrong. I have and do blame myself for everything no matter what it is or was or how big or small. My relationships have all been abusive. Also my fault. As you said decades of my life. It will take me time to stop myself doing this.
When I’m able to connect with that sense of self-love, kindness and offer compassion to the feelings of unworthiness (and I’ve been doing this more often over the past year), I realize, 1) that these feelings are just a story I’m telling myself and that they are not are true reflections of what I have accomplished in my life (I’m almost 60 now) and, 2) how deep these feeling/memories are embedded in my history. But just remembering to bring compassion, again and again, helps take the harshness off the emotional reaction.
Thank you Tara. I’ve been struggling with self judgement and inner critic for a while, and while there have been moments of surrendering and coming home to myself before they are still fleeting. This time as I sat listening to your voice and shifted from mind to heart, and to heart space tears started trickling down my face. I felt sadness but also strangely a sense of relief, like I didn’t have to endure the self punishment anymore. I could accept and love myself for who I am, not who I am meant to be, at least in this very moment.
Felt calmness leave and a sense of feeling hollow
I couldn’t get into the exercise so quickly, but I know that the heart space kindness will help. I’ll keep trying.
I felt great hope and peace in the thought that this feels like the real answer to the heart peace I haven’t felt for years. Thank you.
The head spoke loud voices of anxiety and insecurities iv held onto for years to protect myself from being hurt like this again. However, the heart, I felt a knot in my throat, breathlessness and turning in my gut. The waves are still crashing like the storm it is inside me and I went blank. I must practice this video again.
Thank you Tara. I experienced a great sense of warmth and compassion towards myself.
It gives me space to breathe and listen to me, rather than just dismiss what I’m going through
Actually thoughtfully experiencing the movement from head to heart is helpful. Mindfully doing this is I important for me as it becomes a time for the truth the set in.