the Henny Flynn podcast

Self-Compassion, Authenticity and Holding Our Own Hand (S16E5)

• Henny Flynn • Season 16 • Episode 5

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This season of the podcast has been threading together a quiet but powerful theme - the many ways we navigate fear. 

This week’s episode takes that theme deeper, exploring how self-compassion gives us the courage to stand in our own space, to hold our own hand, and to live with authenticity.

A quote from Dr. Kristin Neff helped spark this reflection:
 "One of the most pervasive findings of the research literature is that self-compassion leads to authenticity, because when we aren't dependent on the approval of others for our self-worth, we are free to express our true selves."

What does it mean to express our true selves? And what happens when we begin to return to ourselves, rather than seeking safety, validation, or belonging outside of us?

In this episode, I share my own recent experience of moving through a deeply challenging time - one that called for profound self-compassion and the willingness to stay present with myself, rather than retreating into old patterns of avoidance. 

Through journal reflections, poetry, and the simple yet profound practices that support me (like the physicality of running, walking or taking baths plus the emotional connection of clear communication with others and sitting with what is), we explore how we can hold ourselves with care and step forward with quiet strength.

This is an episode for those who are navigating their own moments of returning - those who feel the pull to reclaim their own space, their own self-worth, and their own power.

Settle in, listen, and see where it takes you.

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Speaker 1:

I often find that seasons of the podcast have a theme loosely threaded through them, and this season is no different, though the theme might be something that for many of us, can feel very, very challenging. It's the theme of how do we manage fear in all its guises. The intention is that with each exploration we're able to see, maybe, some hope, some light, a way forward that perhaps we haven't yet seen before. Welcome to the Henny Flynn podcast, the space for deepening self-awareness with profound self-compassion. I'm Henny, I write, coach and speak about how exploring our inner world can transform how we experience our outer world, all founded on a bedrock of self-love. Settle in and listen and see where the episode takes you.

Speaker 1:

I came across a quote from Kristen Neff, the self-compassion researcher, expert and guide, and if you're not familiar with selfcompassionorg and you're curious about the science of self-compassion, then I highly recommend the work that Kristen Neff shares. Her materials, her videos, her books are incredibly enlightening and really demonstrate that self-compassion isn't a nice to have. It is an absolutely vital, essential part of how we show up in the world and how we show up in the world for ourselves as well as for other people. Her work has really influenced me in terms of how self-compassion threads through all of the therapeutic coaching, all of my writing, all of my courses that I create. And this quote from her really landed very deep within me and I wanted to share it with you, partly as an introduction to the topic that I'd like to talk through today. And the quote goes one of the most pervasive findings of the research literature is that self-compassion leads to authenticity, because when we aren't dependent on the approval of others for our self-worth, we are free to express our true selves. I think there are layers within that, one of which being the clarity that self-compassion leads to authenticity, that when we are compassionate toward ourselves, we are more able to show up as our true, authentic self. This has ramifications in so many ways, because it also means that we're more able to stand in our own space in the world, particularly if there are troubling things happening around us, so we're more able to remain aligned with our value set, to maintain a more positive mindset. And the other aspect of this, which I think is incredibly important, is that with self-compassion, we aren't dependent on the approval of others for our self-worth and therefore, with self-compassion, we build self-worth and self-esteem.

Speaker 1:

Now, there's often a bit of complexity around this concept of self-worth have absorbed stories through our society, our culture, our family system. That having a high sense of self-regard is a bad inverted commas is a bad thing because we can look around us in the world today and see what we might consider to be a demonstration of people who've got an excessively high sense of self-regard, and to because with self-compassion we are also able to tap into far deeper reserves of compassion for others. So with self-compassion, the self-regard, the self-worth that we, the self-esteem that we develop, comes from this rich, deep, very powerful place. That means that we also have a deep, rich and powerful respect for other people and for the space that they inhabit in the world space that they inhabit in the world. Now I'd just like to read that quote again, because there is also something in here about this concept of being free to express our true selves. So one of the most pervasive findings of the research literature is that self-compassion leads to authenticity, because when we aren't dependent on the approval of others for our self-worth, we are free to express our true selves. I think I mean there are so many reasons why I think that that is such an important message for us today, but it relates directly to what I would love to share with you, which is another my Darling Girl poem, something that landed on the pages of my journal last week, and also another piece of writing from my journal.

Speaker 1:

This is about me expressing my true self. This is about me showing up here with you with the most profound self-compassion and being authentic and saying I have been through a really challenging time, a period of what I would call in the past the veil coming down. If you listened to the beautiful episode with Aisling Mustan about moving through the darkness, when she was talking about her own experience of Samhain and Dark Night of the Soul, then you'll have a sense that this is an experience that I'm familiar with. I'm familiar with and my sense is that this experience of Samhain is something that resonates with so many of us. The messages that I've received from people about the last few episodes of the podcast have been incredibly moving and hopefully what I'm sharing with you today is useful to you in some way, even if simply to see that everybody experiences challenging times and that we can use these incredible tools that we have available to us journaling, meditation, running. You'll hear that that's one of my tools in order to help bring ourselves through the darkness, not up and out and squashing it and ignoring it and pretending it's not happening, but actually allowing ourselves to be in it. And in fact, last week's episode was really about that sense of being within it, and this week's is that my writing that talks about returning, talks about returning.

Speaker 1:

There's been a bit of a break since I recorded that first part, because there were some noises that I needed to let settle in the space around me, and I've noticed that in the time between recording sort of recording that introduction and um, and speaking now, that I've needed to tap again into my self-compassion in order to share this next part of the reading, um, and and I think this really speaks to what Dr Kristen Neff was talking that in order for us to show up with authenticity, to be able to really stand in our own space with these gentle but powerful boundaries, boundaries that enable us to not be influenced by either external voices or the internal voices that want to keep us small, want to keep us quiet, want to ensure that we don't say anything that sets us outside of what we've learned is a social norm, and those voices only say these things because they want to keep us safe, but when we sink deeper inside ourselves and see, ok, well, hang on, what is what is my truly authentic perception of what feels OK here, then we can find ourselves anchoring in to a sense of courageousness that can really serve us and potentially serve others too. So that's the part I'm anchoring into right now, as I share this very vulnerable piece of writing with you, and you know, as before I've you know've shared, you know I share this because it is safe for me to do so. It is really important that we are also extremely mindful about our own psychological safety, something that feels potentially vulnerable for us, that we know that we are able to maintain this anchor point within us. So, okay, so I feel myself returning. Holding my own hand seems to be my new mantra, a gift from everyday compassion that's truly landed in me. Isn't that what self-care truly is? Holding our own hand, tending to ourselves with power and grace, helping ourselves across the stepping stones of life.

Speaker 1:

There's something here about that correlation between self-care and power too, something about the true experience. When we care deeply for ourselves, we are giving our power to ourselves and not handing it over to another's fears, and so this act of reaching out to ourselves, taking our own hand. We are remembering that we do not need to carry the belief that we are only safe in the context of how we relate to others. We are only truly safe in the context of how we relate to ourselves, not in an isolated, isolationist, separated way, but in a deeply connected way. Because if we're always leaning out of our own space into others, whoever they may be, then if, when that security and protection we crave and seek is no longer there, we are abandoned. Likewise, if we believe our job is only and always to care for and protect others, who are we in the absence of them? Do we simply scan the horizon until our gaze lands on the next worthy cause? And who cares for us? Is our ego or parts with those understandably profoundly human egoic tendencies, so large and bruised that we have to only see ourselves in relation to others? Or can we learn with wit and wisdom to stand in the space we inhabit without stretching out into another's or demanding they step into ours? And how do we hold our own hand? By taking the steps we know support us Today?

Speaker 1:

I ran not because of those stories I still occasionally see bubbling up about weight and age and unworthiness, but because it's part of how I can return to myself. And then I ran a bath, not because it's a hackneyed practice of self-care with bubbles and candles, but because this act of rinsing away the tendrils of the veil that has been covering me the past many days is one I know to serve me. Scrubbing away the old, allowing the new to be sensitive and revealed this is such a powerful metaphor for me. In the past, when the veil fell, I would retreat. It was the only tool I had in my armory against the darkness. But now I know there are so many ways I can support myself as I keep moving through the darkness. And it's not about keeping on pushing out my energy, creating artificial light, something I am also oh so used to doing. It's about holding that light, that energy within me, keeping the flame burning for me, not believing the parts that still believe. If I just keep shining brightly, then I will be loved back into being. Because that is just another form of reliance on others to rescue, to save. It's giving away power. And even though the people I would have relied on in the past love me deeply, it is not their job to keep me safe from my thoughts. It is not their job to push away the stories and the fears that come to crowd me at times. Their job, if they have one at all, is to love themselves fully and, through that, to know, to learn how to love me and others too. And of course that is all any of us can do. And of course that is all any of us can do. So by holding my own hand, I'm fueling my fire, shining my light and returning home with love, and, as ever, I ended with thank you and some kisses.

Speaker 1:

I'd like to go straight into my darling girl poem that arose around the same time as doing this piece of writing. I have shared this on Instagram too, and if you, if we are connected there, then you may have already seen me reading this. It begins my darling girl, you are in the thin place, the liminal space where what's out pours in, what's in spins out, or at least I see it's how it seems to be. You say I do not feel okay. I say that is often the way, and yet I know, you know that within all this, you are okay, and I say you need not fear the fall. Within this rushing world, turning, churning, sits the omnipresent. All I say my dear, you are not so porous as you fear, and there is much wisdom here, and so, my love, it is time to draw your boundaries near. Mark them clear. Ask sacred sage to wash your body with her smoke. Allow her burning leaves to evoke what it is you truly need. Send your love within and venture deep. You can travel far. The walls are thin.

Speaker 1:

So the correlation between both these pieces of writing is this idea that we have a way through when things feel dark, and part of that is about this deep connection with ourselves, this willingness to hold ourselves with compassion and the willingness to stay with ourselves in the space, with ourselves in the space, and that means not abandoning ourselves into things that we might have used in the past as distractions. For me, that would have been work, or alcohol, or lighting another cigarette, or going going out, distracting myself with noise, um, or the technique that I think I learned at quite a young age, when all of those distractions didn't work, of pulling down what I call the veil, creating a form of separation between me and the outer world and me and my inner world, a form of protection that served me well for many years, until I was able to come to the place where I can sit with my whole self without needing to create this sense of separation. And I think what's really vital here is that none of those things that I've just mentioned are bad. If what we need it's something that Aisling said in the conversation that we had if what we need is to lie down and watch a series on Netflix, then to do that and to do it consciously, to be present with what we are experiencing, that is really what is at the heart of this aspect, of this deep inner work, I feel. And if all we can do is say to ourselves, oh my darling, this is hard, then we do that. That. Um, I feel it's so vital to say to that we will. Each of us have our own tools, our own way of supporting ourselves.

Speaker 1:

I mentioned in the journaling that for me, one of those things was going out for a run. For Aisling, it was walking for a long time out in nature. Um, she also mentioned about having showers, and for me it's having a bath. You know, it's like it's this scrubbing away, this washing away, moving the energy through us. You know, both of both of us have our own techniques for moving the energy through us and you will have your own um, and not forgetting that these apparently very simple practices can be incredibly restorative too.

Speaker 1:

And as I sit here now, I you know, I have a smile on my face. I feel fully present in my body existential feelings of sort of doubt and angst and complexity that I've been navigating on a deep inner level. They've settled and I also recognize that a really powerful piece of inner work, the resolution of something incredibly important from my past, has also happened during this, this sort of period of introspection and and and inner work, and one day maybe I'll share that with you. At the moment that is still raw and and I'm holding it safe, I'm tending to it with my kindest, gentlest attention, and that comes back to this point around. You know, so deep self-compassion is what enables us to really see what it is that we most need in the moment.

Speaker 1:

And and I suppose through all of this I want to send so much love to anybody who might be feeling deeply challenged and to say that sometimes what we really need to do is not only to reach in to ourselves but also to reach out to others, and that's something that I've absolutely done over the past, sort of during the days when this was feeling particularly challenging for me, I was able to clear my diary so that I had some time for myself and I was able to connect with people who really loved me, people who weren't going to try and fix me, people who weren't going to try and give me their answers, people who were able to really listen. And I recognize how fortunate I am that I have people like that in my life. And if that doesn't feel available to you, then reach out to somebody like me, or to a therapist, a GP, or maybe there's someone that you wouldn't consider to be someone that you would ordinarily reach out to, but you just have a deep sense that they could be, somebody who would be able to listen deeply and allow you to express whatever it is that you're feeling, without them having an urge to fix or to change what you're feeling in some way. As is so often with these episodes, I feel as though we've you know I've taken us off into some different threads and I think you know my inner critic can start piping up and saying oh, is that all a bit rambly? How useful is that? I really don't know. Um, and my compassion says it's okay, my darling. Let's just trust that this is useful for someone and maybe it's useful for you this day. All right, my loves.

Speaker 1:

The other thing I'd really love to share is in the beginning of the reading from my journal, I mentioned about this concept concept of holding, holding our own hand and um, and I said you know it's a gift from everyday compassion and if you're not yet familiar with everyday compassion, it is something that I send out into the world. Um, they are tiny messages of hope and love and compassion. They're land in your inbox, um, I think it's four days a week. Now I say I think. I mean I'm doing it, but you know it is four days a week, um, and they're super easy to digest. You need do nothing with it, but it is a reminder of um, a way of looking at the world, um being in relation with others, being in relation with ourselves.

Speaker 1:

Um, and one of the messages that I shared recently was about this concept of being able to reach out and hold our own hand whenever we need our hand held and um. If, yes, if you don't already receive everyday compassion, then there is a link for it in the show notes of this episode of the podcast, every episode of the podcast, in fact, and they're completely free. It's just there for you, I think. Um, so far, there's like six months worth, and my intention is to to take us through a full year and maybe longer, who knows?

Speaker 1:

Um, and then, lastly, I've just uh finished, uh, creating a brand new audio course called Vision the Day. In many ways, it connects with these themes that we've been talking about today and in the other episodes of the podcast, and, in fact, it's been one of the tools that I've returned to in order to support myself with coming through this this Samhain that I've been experiencing, and it's a piece of image work, which is a therapeutic practice. I'm an image work therapist and, as part of the course, you it takes less than an hour you get a lovely deep relaxation and then I guide you through how to look ahead to the end of the day or the end of an event that you have coming up, or the end of, to see the end of the day and you're feeling bad. Now, that might sound counterintuitive, but bear with me You're feeling bad, really understanding what it is that you're feeling and how you got there and being able to visualize exactly what it looks and feels like to be in that bad feeling at the end of that day or event. And then we shake that off and we say you've seen it and you don't have to have it. And then we vision it's the end of the day or the event and you're feeling good and we see in real clarity, through the guidance that I share, how you got to that good outcome and then you anchor that good outcome.

Speaker 1:

It's such a beautiful practice, and at times I've used it daily myself, and other times I use it when I need to. Either I've got something really specific coming up or there's something happening that I'm worrying about, or I'm just going through a period where I feel maybe slightly less confident than I might ordinarily feel. So I'll also include a link to that in the show notes too, and I really recommend taking a look at it if that's something that speaks to you. So I am sending you so much love and I send you a hug and a wave. Thank you.