Hard on Yourself
Are you hard on yourself? A better question might be, are you aware of being hard on yourself? When I ask that question, it always surprises me to see the look in people’s eyes. The look I get back is often one of complete cluelessness.
Most of us are harder on ourselves than we are on others. More than that, we’re hard on ourselves without realizing we’re treating ourselves badly.
This is how what’s intended to be introspection morphs into self-flagellation without our even noticing. Judgment is the unconscious link between introspection and self-flagellation.
Is it even possible to look at ourselves without judging?
Is it even possible to look at ourselves without judging? It is, but it’s hard to do without an awareness of how quickly judgment can appear. When we’re trying to look at ourselves and get an idea of what it is we’re looking at, we very quickly get mixed up.
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Here’s why it can be so difficult to look at ourselves and get any kind of accurate picture of what we’re seeing. We were meant to live our lives, not view our lives as an observer might.
I often talk to clients about how it’s impossible to think about yourself and be yourself at the same time. I’m usually talking about it in a slightly different context, one of presentation or public speaking, but it’s also true when we attempt to look at ourselves.
Think for a second of the words that creep in when we try to get an idea of who and what we are.
Think for a second of the words that creep in when we try to get an idea of who and what we are. Should, shouldn’t, must, must not, cannot, won’t; these are just some of the words we’ll likely use.
What makes those less-than-helpful words spring to mind is simple. We believe the comparison is necessary to know ourselves, so we compare ourselves to the people we know and see around us, thinking that’s going to give us some useful information. But it never does.
How helpful could it possibly be for me to compare how my life feels with how someone else’s life looks? That’s all I’m doing when I make that ridiculous comparison.
The funny thing is, even though I seem to know better, there are times when I notice I’m on the brink of making that comparison. I don’t notice my thinking has gone haywire; I’m alerted by the way that thinking makes me feel. I get a strange, off-kilter feeling in my body.
That’s all I need. That feeling tells me my thinking is off, which lets me know I shouldn’t pay any attention to what I’m thinking. The instant I know I don’t have to take the thoughts I’m having seriously, I’m released from the impulse to give myself a hard time.
I didn’t have to “fix” anything, because there was nothing that needed fixing.
I didn’t have to “fix” anything, because there was nothing that needed fixing, only something that needed noticing. Once I learned what I was looking at and looking for, I found that simply noticing took care of it. And the impulse to be hard on myself evaporated.
Want to learn to be easier on yourself? Start to notice when you’re experiencing that “off” feeling. If you’re in the habit of taking yourself to task because you don’t “measure up” (and from what I’ve seen, most of us are) you might be surprised by several things. You’ll probably be surprised at how often you notice you’re being hard on yourself. You don’t have to give yourself a hard time for giving yourself a hard time. The other thing that may surprise you is just how simple it really can be to just leave yourself alone!
