Are you dodging a challenging dialogue? Begin with a dose of self-compassion. It's not about avoiding the issue, but rather understanding your emotions and reactions. Let's explore how self-compassion can be the first step towards navigating difficult conversations with grace and confidence.
Here are a few things to remember about difficult conversations:
You’re not avoiding difficult conversations because you’re bad or broken. Your brain is protecting you.
- Self-compassion helps you face the discomfort of tough conversations. It’s courageous. It transforms the muck of difficult interactions into moments of connection, solutions, and leadership in our relationships at home and at work.
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Why It’s Important to Have Difficult Conversations
We are neurologically wired to protect ourselves from pain and seek satisfaction.
- And yet, even though our brains prime us for less-than-ideal communication habits, we can encourage ourselves to do better by bringing mindfulness to your emotional pain or distress, connecting to the universal nature of these pain points in many other people, and intentionally bringing a stance (and action) of kindness and care to this pain.
- Developing habits (like self-compassion) in difficult conversations means we can counter polarization, disconnection, prejudice, decreased productivity, and overall poorer outcomes.
Practice: A Simple Gesture of Self-Compassion for Difficult Conversations
Call to mind a recent painful conversation in which you may have behaved unskillfully. Vividly imagine it until your body and mind are stirred with some degree of discomfort.
- On a slow in-breath, bring your hands to your heart.
- Feel the warmth of your hands and notice the effect this gesture has on your experience of this moment.
