If you were a bunny, would your ears be down?
My Mum does the cutest imitation of a bunny with their ears down to ask if I'm having a hard day. She puts her hands on her head like ears, then flops her fingers over like sad little ears, pouts her lips, and looks up at me and says "Bunny ears down?"
It always makes me smile, but it's also a great analogy for when you feel like the chips are down, or, in this case, your ears are down.
Have you been feeling like this lately? Maybe you've had a few rough days, or maybe it's been a few rough months or even years.
I'm here to warm your heart today. I wanted to share with you some compassionate prayers and practices to help you through
Here at Gabriella de Mori & Co Counselling, we are all incredibly passionate about compassion and sharing it with our beloved clients.
We believe it's the biggest antidote to criticism, shame, and negative self-beliefs, which we know so many of you struggle with.
So today, we are sharing our favourite compassionate affirmations that you can use on the days when:
You're not feeling as brilliant as Beyoncé.
Your inner critic is having a field day with you.
You need something gentle and kind to say to yourself over and over and over again to bring yourself back to a place of gentleness.
Try this compassion- exercise with me:
Put your hand on your heart, take a few slow breaths, and then read these statements to yourself:
My compassion practice today is remembering who I was at the time and what I was deeply longing for. It’s remembering that I didn’t know what I know now, that I couldn’t have foreseen it and yet it was deeply important for me to explore what would happen.
My self-compassion practice today is recognizing that anything can be viewed in 1000 different ways and that the open-hearted view is often the hardest way to accept the hard moments.
My self-compassion practice today is allowing myself not to expect myself to be above my human longings, and not expecting myself to be able to intellectually talk myself out of wanting what I want.
My self-compassion practice today is to do nothing, know nothing, and be nothing to others. I will sit in stillness and silence all day and have nothing profound to come of it.
My self-compassion practice today is to hope that one day I can hope again while accepting now I don’t have the space to be hopeful anytime soon. I will have hope to know one day that it was worth it, without any pressure to forgive it.
My self-compassion practice today is knowing that if my only true mantra today is ‘I am breathing,’ I am still exceptional.
My self-compassion practice today is to drop my mask and refuse to worry about others even though I am very worried.
My self-compassion practice today is to eat chocolate for breakfast, and cereal for dinner, unnecessarily use the expensive heater, and order one single coffee from the café I can see from my house via Uber Eats.
My self-compassion practice today is knowing one day I’ll look back on today and it will all be a good story.
My self-compassion practice today is repeating these affirmations:
“I am enough just as I am.”
“I embrace my imperfections with love.”
“It’s okay to take it slow and be gentle with myself.”
“I deserve kindness and understanding.”
“My worth is not defined by my challenges.”
Finish with a few gentle, heart-warming breaths.
Ahhhh How does that feel?
Being a compassion-focused therapist is one of the top reasons I was so excited to bring Jen Vellios and Jo Bealey onto my team.
We all know we have to listen to that playlist all day long, so make it a fun one, and add in a few Beyoncé hits along the way.
I can see your Halo...🎶
