The vow of kindness is based on an intention to practice greater kindness, both to yourself and others. ‘Kindness to self and to others is a vital key to enjoy greater love and happiness’. But when we ask ourselves to score how kind we are – based on a scale of very, quite, not very and not at all – most of us say, ‘quite’ kind to others and not very kind to ourselves. Most of us are unconscious of how we treat ourselves, how unkind we are to ourselves.
Life is hard because we are so hard on yourself.
We need to drop the knife, we need to stop beating ourselves up. We all make mistakes, the greatest gift is to forgive and learn from them, grow from them. We never make the wrong choices or take the wrong path because this is the route we were meant to take. It was the way we were meant to learn in this life journey.
A vow of Kindness: I would like you to write a short list of one, two or three ways to practice a greater kindness to ourselves. If you write any more than three the list become too long and rarely works. Here are a few e.g.
- ‘I will be less self-critical and I will celebrate my successes more.’
- ‘I will be more open and accepting of people’s offers of love and help’
- ‘I will be kind to the child in me that sometimes feels frightened by the world.’
- ‘I will stop pushing myself so hard and I will go out to play more.’
- ‘I will appreciate the real me more and I will smile then I catch myself comparing myself negatively to others.’
We can do anything, but not everything! Be kind to yourself.
Hayley Bennett Wellbeing