Self-compassionate journaling has been proven to help integrate challenging experiences and improve our relationships with both ourselves and other.
Write in your journal daily for 7 days using these prompts:
"What feelings did I experience today?" Acknowledging the presence of our emotional experience is step one in self-compassion. These don't have to be difficult emotions either. Include the good, bad, and the ugly.
Think of something challenging you are going through. Now, imagine a friend of yours is the one dealing with it. Write them a compassionate letter about their situation without offering any advice.
"I forgive myself for how I handled (write the situation). I was feeling..." In this prompt we aren't making "excuses" we are offering self-comprehension of what we did and why we did it. This self-awareness is critical to help maintain a less-reactive approach in the future.
Write a letter thanking yourself for offering yourself either compassion, care, or concern at some point today. If you didn't, lovingly apologize to yourself and commit to one of those actions tomorrow.
"I need to protect myself better by..." Actions of fierce self-compassion are protective and preservational. They are not destructive to either the self or others that have harmed us. This prompt is to help identify actions or boundaries that need to be made for our own psychological, emotional, or physical safety.
"A part of me wishes I could say..." A "sit down and shut up" society has trained us to assimilate rather than vocalize our needs. This prompt is an open invitation to give words to things we have been needing to say but haven't been able to just yet. Focus on what you need to express, not the story behind why you haven't shared it with others yet.
"I know I'm not alone in this because..." A critical piece of self-compassion is the understanding that we are not alone in what we are experiencing. The struggles we go through and the mistakes we make are shared by our common humanity. There is nothing "wrong with us". This is simply a part of the human experience.