Self-Compassionate Living Newsletter, December 2025
There are few treasures of more lasting worth than the experience of a way of life that is in itself wholly satisfying. Such, after all, are the only possessions of which no fate can deprive us; nothing can alter the fact if, for one moment in eternity, we have really lived. - Eric Shipton
I once spoke to my friend, an old squirrel,
about the Sacraments -
He got so excited
and ran into a hollow in his tree and came
back holding some acorns, an owl feather
and a ribbon he found.
And I just smiled and said, “Yes, dear,
you understand
everything imparts
His grace.
St. Francis of Assisi
If you live the life you love, you will receive shelter and blessings. Sometimes the great famine of blessings in and around us derives from the fact that we are not living the life we love; rather, we are living the life that is expected of us. We have fallen out of rhythm with the secret signature and light of our own nature.
John O'Donohue
Thank you for subscribing to the Self-Compassionate Living Newsletter! You can create and cultivate self-compassion by learning and practicing it. Engaging with a supportive community usually makes it easier. You signed up to receive this monthly newsletter as part of that effort. I will endeavor to inform and inspire you, and together, we will explore ways to treat ourselves better. Thank you for inviting me to join you on your journey!
This month's newsletter focuses on a term I first heard Fr. Thomas Keating discuss many years ago: over-identification with an idea: the concept of believing a thought your brain holds so firmly that the thought intentionally or unintentionally controls your feelings and potentially causes suffering for yourself. This topic, of course, naturally leads to navigating these powerful internal forces with grace as you let go of the holding drives and become more self-compassionate. Finally, I’ll discuss how being self-compassionate is better for our loved ones than selfishly sacrificing ourselves for their interests, or at least our perception of their interests. (This last point is a logical and counterintuitive area of self-compassion that I’ll discuss partially here and in more detail in January’s newsletter.
Before we start, here is the paradigm we’ll be working from: survival has a model built into you; let’s call it the survival model. Part of that model is simple: first, do what it takes to stay in the tribe; second, take care of your feelings about fitting in your tribe; and third, take care of your authentic self if, after doing the first two, you have any energy left. In other words, say yes to everything asked of you to satisfy some drive in you, before you care for your authenticity.
First: What is over-identification with an idea?
Over-identification with an idea is personalizing or attaching to a thought or thoughts. It means allowing your mental or emotional well-being to depend on or be controlled by the perceived or physical properties of a person, place, object, or mental construct*. All this means is that you allow your brain’s thoughts about something to control how you feel. Consequently, if something (anything) controls how you feel, there is some overidentification with that something; another way is that part of your brain believes that something is a direct extension of yourself. This concept is neither good nor bad, right nor wrong; instead, it is simply a necessary part of survival. For example, if parts of your brain identify with the tribe or the tribe’s beliefs, then you are going to do what it takes to make sure you aren’t left outside of the tribe to die alone. That’s all an attachment is; it’s a survival mechanism, and therein lies the problem.
Civilization has made physical survival easier; it has expanded the possibilities for physical survival so much that we no longer need to depend on a close-knit tribe to survive. Tribes are great for survival and excellent for staying not-dead; however, they are frequently not necessary for thriving and experiencing joy, peace, and contentment (JPC). Unfortunately, powerful parts of our brain prioritize the tribe over thriving, and thus we “sacrifice” ourselves to “benefit” our group or perceived group.
JPC requires a new priority, a new way of thinking, especially in the way we experience our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. JPC benefits from managing our minds, in other words. Yet, prioritizing our thriving frequently conflicts with the survival drives we have built into us.
Thus, developing a new way of thinking helps us balance the two, allowing us to thrive while we survive.
Thriving while surviving doesn’t come naturally.
Thriving while surviving is generally not something that many of us know how to do. We tend to be great at sacrificing ourselves to others’ interests while we starve our souls; we give until it hurts! Yet, we also don’t know another way! We were taught and learned to say yes to everyone because it’s the “right thing to do”.
Except, it’s not.
Here is another way to think about it. Life, the Universe, God, Source, whatever name you call the Ultimate Reality, seems to be a consistent giver of love and compassion. Unfortunately, we frequently can’t see it because we were taught and learned to be hole-y buckets; buckets with holes at the bottom. We want to be full of love and compassion, yet we never seem to fill up because we learned to believe people and things fill us, not the Ultimate Reality. We don’t know any better; we do what people ask of us, searching for the perfect filler, hoping those sacrifices will fill us up. Yet, the emptiness remains because all they give us runs through the holes at the bottom. To make matters worse, others are working from the same survival belief; they are taking from us, trying to fill their leaking buckets. It’s a human condition; it’s a constant effort to fill leaky vessels by taking from others and acquiring things, hoping that something will satisfy the emptiness inside of us, while everyone else hopes for the same thing from their loved ones and the stuff they acquire.
Ironically, usually everyone learns that none of those endeavors work, no matter how much effort they put into people and acquiring stuff, many people constantly feel empty.
So, what can we do with this hollow dissatisfaction residing in many of us?
How do I prioritize thriving while surviving?
An alternative to the survival model is to prioritize yourself (self-compassion). By being self-compassionate, you will have reserves to share with those close to you, compassion for others, in other words. Prioritizing yourself means patching the holes in your bucket before you give to others. Remember, the Universe is always giving to us; thus, after you’ve patched your bucket and you begin to overflow, you can share from your overflow.
This process usually doesn’t feel natural and tends to feel selfish at first. Yet ask yourself. Which is more selfish? Taking from others to fill your constant emptiness because they are taking from you while you’re also leaking out the bottom of the pail or patching the holes in the bottom of your bucket, and then receiving the love and compassion from the Ultimate Reality until you are overflowing? You give from that overflowing! You have reserves built up by living self-compassionately; then you can share from your fullness!
Sometimes that which feels selfish is, in fact, fantastically compassionate. Thus, learning that feelings aren't always accurate indicators of reality is a primary skill of self-compassion. The airlines demonstrate a form of this in their safety videos: “Put your oxygen mask on first before you help others with theirs!”
And, yes, thriving while surviving is a delicate balance to strike. Accurately, it is working with reality, as it truly is. A delicate tension between being arrogantly selfish, because it feels good to be seen as “selfless” by giving till it hurts, and self-compassionately selfish, so you fill up with love and give to others from your fullness.
Start with recognizing the thoughts underneath the drive “to give till it hurts”.
Begin with your internal experiences. You may recognize the thoughts, or you may recognize the feelings those thoughts generate; either way, start there. Look for negative thoughts and feelings you experience whenever you say a sacrificial “yes”. When you sacrifice your thriving to please the tribe or internal drive to fill the emptiness, somewhere, your brain will also think and feel negatively about yourself and the sacrifice. The tricky part is recognizing that negativity; it’s subtle. Usually, the negativity is hidden under several layers of “positive thoughts and feelings” from rewarding you for sacrificing from the survival model (This is the logical and counterintuitive part I mentioned in the intro).
Thus, when you say yes or buy some unnecessary item, a still small voice inside of you will whisper warnings asking you to reconsider. The reconsideration sums up in: “Am I sacrificing my thriving for this?”
The answer is challenging to recognize because it’s hidden in the myriad of feelings floating around the person or item. Thus, the secret is sitting with your complicated feelings long enough to discern your most authentic desires. Then, once you recognize the negative feelings that confuse your brain into prioritizing survival over thriving, the next step is to desensitize yourself to the built-in drive to satisfy that survival compulsion.
How do I desensitize my unhelpful survival drives?
We desensitize our brains to the unhelpful survival-generated thoughts by repetition. We practice the way we want to respond next time we are faced with the desire to say yes or buy in. We practice mentally.
Practicing mentally is exercising the way you want to think. It means going through the scene in your head (thinking about it) enough times that you can do what we really, Really, REALLY want to do, even while feeling the survival-pressure to do the survival thing and sacrifice your thriving. Thought-exercising is choosing to practice thriving! As I’ve said in many earlier newsletters, I recommend a daily time of stillness to do some of this practice.
Stillness: practicing being the person you really, Really, REALLY want to be.
Stillness is a gym where you practice the mental skills to refocus your brain on thriving as much as possible. Some stillness activities are walking, swimming, yoga, meditation, or just sitting in the garden watching nature, etc. It’s a gym with no interference from media; no internet, no TV, no talking, no media-driven thinking. Instead, you pick one thing for a tether or anchor to keep bringing you back to being present, aware, non-reactive, and intentionally passive to the unhelpful drives of your thoughts and feelings.
Stillness is a dedicated time where you mentally practice redirecting your mind to just being. Stillness is not zoning out, day-dreaming, or memory surfing. Instead, it is sitting open to whatever arises in your mind and then, as soon as you recognize your mind thinking about that arisen thought, redirecting your mind to watch all the thoughts again actively. Stillness is similar to being high above a city, watching all the cars drive around. When your mind sees one car (a thought) that grabs its attention, you use your tether or anchor to bring you back to watching all the cars (thoughts) race around; it’s a bird's-eye view of your brain activity.
As you practice stillness daily, you gently desensitize and train your reactive brain. You learn to consciously notice a reaction and then learn to consciously respond in a way that allows you to thrive even as you survive. With daily practice, the next time someone asks you to do something that saps your thriving, you'll recognize the unhelpful survival drive and then say no, even though it may feel uncomfortable. You’ll also feel self-compassionate. With further practice, you eventually learn how to say yes and thrive simultaneously. (I’ll discuss this in a future newsletter.)
Being self-compassionate helps you create more win-win scenarios in your life and in your interactions with your loved ones.
My personal experience.
As I went to bed the night before working on this section, I was thinking about the next day and subbing in a local high school recording studio class. It started snowing, and the weather-guesser app predicted 4 to 6 inches. All night as I slept, a part of my brain was busy wondering if I’d be needed to sub or if there would be a snow day. Another part was worried about missing some fun work. I got up at three to get a drink and wondered if I should go look outside to see how much snow was on the ground and if it was still snowing. Then another part of my brain thought, “You can’t control the snow or the school closing. Let it go and crawl back in bed.” I debated for a second and decided to let it go and return to a warm bed.
The next morning, my wife got up before me, and I thought about asking her to look outside. I didn’t. I waited, and twenty minutes later, I got up and went to school. While driving to school, I was simultaneously thinking they should have called a snow day, it’s too dangerous for students to be driving, while I was also feeling pleased that I’d get an easy day, making money doing something I love: audio (I owned a recording studio for 27 years). I experienced very conflicting emotions.
It’s normal, and usually uncomfortable for me to experience conflicting emotions. I chose to be self-compassionate and allowed myself to experience all the ways I was feeling, though. Yes, parts of my brain wanted to shut down the uncomfortable feeling thoughts and focus on the pleasant feeling thoughts; for me, though, that isn’t being honest with myself. To be completely authentic, I allowed myself to experience all the various feelings. I’ve learned that when I let all the data in my brain express itself, my brain has the most information available and usually makes the best decision among the possibilities.
I’ve found that self-compassion often balances opposing emotions that are equally weighted. My survival brain (Limbic system) pressures me to resist negative thoughts and feelings, and my self-compassionate brain (Frontal cortex) urges me to maintain a broader perspective and gather more information. Self-compassion, for me, is allowing complex thoughts and feelings to reside in my brain without interference.
Next Month
In next month’s newsletter, I’ll probably discuss being honest with yourself, even amid the subtle layers of thoughts and feelings swirling through your body, conflicting with each other. I’ll also discuss being honest and authentic with yourself, self-compassionately.
If you have a particular topic you’d like to see discussed, please reply and suggest it to me.
On a Personal Note
My goal to create a video series called “An Introduction to Practicing Self-Compassion" is progressing slowly. I mentioned last month the difficulty I was experiencing with the AI image creation. Eventually, I started to feel discouraged from the difficulty. Thus, I put the series away for a couple of days and took several walks (one of my two daily sessions of stillness). During those walks, I noticed my brain overidentified with the goal of completing the series within the time I had expressed. With that realization, I decided to rest for a couple of weeks, and during that time, a new, unrelated possibility arose. I have a meeting next week with the people who presented this new possibility. I still intend to complete the video series; I just don’t think it’ll be in the next two months. I will release it as soon as I finish it, and if you are on the newsletter mailing list, you will receive access to it. Thank you for being so patient with this creation.
Your replies of encouragement, support, and love mean a tremendous amount to me; thank you! I thank God for this community. Each of you has been an inspiration to me. Thank you! As Ram Dass said, "We are all just walking each other home.” We are stronger when we help each other. Thank you for being so helpful!
Self-Compassion Discussion & Inspiration Group
The Self-Compassion Discussion & Inspiration Group is fantastic! We’ve had between two and nine people at every meeting. We’ve also had some insightful and impactful conversations. Please consider joining us soon.
The next Self-Compassion Discussion & Inspiration Group meeting is scheduled for Saturday, December 27th, from 10:00 AM to 11:30 AM MDT. If you would like to join us, please click this link or visit the Self-CompassionateLiving.com website to register.
If you would like to be reminded of the biweekly Self-Compassion Discussion & Inspiration Group meetings, please reply to this newsletter, and I’ll add your name to the notification list.
In each meeting, after a brief introduction, we observe 10 minutes of silence, followed by a discussion of any topics related to self-compassion that arise from the participants. I may also spend about 10 minutes unpacking the themes that emerge in the discussion.
I ask for a donation of $10 to $15 per session; however, all are welcome. I will not turn anyone away for financial reasons. I have some scholarship money available.
In conclusion
By this point, you've probably realized that self-compassionate living is about building a new relationship with your brain, specifically with managing your mind to create your life instead of just reacting to life. Self-compassion begins with mind management, allowing you to live with greater joy, peace, and contentment (JPC) and experience fewer negative emotions. I have learned the information I share in these newsletters from spiritual teachers, philosophers, and psychologists during the last thirty-three years. I share it with you, hoping it will help you practice self-compassion. Please utilize the material that resonates with you and explore and learn about your mind. You can create the life that you want to live.
See you next month, and may the rest of this month be peaceful.
Thank you for inviting me to walk with you.
Happy Holidays!
Blair
*I have made a glossary for many of the words I use in these newsletters, my classes, and coaching. You can find the glossary here: https://blairashby.com/glossary.html.
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