When I was around 9 or 10 years old, my family went for a summer weekend to visit some close relatives in their country cottage out at the end of Long Island. We all tramped out to the beach one day, everyone’s arms filled with all sorts of picnic and sit-on-the-sand stuff. For whatever reason, I chose to walk along the edge of a tarred road up a little rise from the path that everyone else was on. As we all chattered away, I was looking over my left shoulder toward my cousins rather than watching the road ahead of me.
Suddenly I was shocked with excruciating pain. I had walked, head on, into the corner of a rusty stop sign. My hands flew up to cover my right eye and cheek as I howled with both pain and terror, dropping whatever I’d been carrying.
I understand, from friends who are mothers, that such behavior is not necessarily that extraordinary or bizarre. Getting angry with her child can be in the emotional mix of the agitated upset a mother feels when, for example, her child has run out into the street and nearly been hit by a car. Still, this was just one moment in a, by then, endless stream of experiences I’d had of my mother raging at me when I came to her hurt, sick, terrified or needy.
The grown-up in me understands that my neediness, terror and pain frightened and overwhelmed her. The grown-up in me understands that she was so ill-equipped emotionally that rage/anger was, for the most part, her only available response when she felt threatened by my upsets or injuries. The grown-up in me understands she was in fact doing the best she could, given her own damaged, stunted emotional capacities.
Still, the child that I was in those years was repeatedly devastated and terrified by the screamed recriminations, threats and harshly mean responses that came at her when she went to her mommy seeking solace. When I’d come hurt or sick, her responses always led me to feel it was my own fault: that my own stupidity or carelessness was responsible for my predicament. Or, her responses made it clear that she thought I was making a "big deal out of nothing" or that I was malingering. In all cases, the message was that I deserved no sympathy.
The legacy of her responses was an awful one. I would feel terrified whenever I’d hurt myself. Then, I would be petrified by my own terror because I had no safe place to go for support or comfort. I learned that I had to find ways to handle all of it by myself. As a young child, though, I had no real resources to do that. I developed an internal version of my angry, critical, belittling mother’s voice that yelled at me even when I was all by myself with my pain. It was all I knew to do.
For much of my life I met every accident or illness that befell me with the same harsh meanness that I'd experienced from my mother. Every trip or fall or bump-into-something (and over the years there were many ) would have me calling myself stupid, clumsy, careless, klutzy. l'd feel full of guilt every time I'd get sick with a cold or the flu, unsure whether I was malingering, not really as sick as I felt; worried that my illness might be a manipultion on my part.
With anyone else in similarly distressing plights, I would be tender, gentle and sympathetic, solicitous and compassionate. Only with myself was I so negating and so harsh.
This mean, unforgiving way of speaking to myself extended beyond the times of physical trauma. Any of my emotional upsets, any mistakes I made, any slips or forgetfulness, any social mishaps, etc.––all these called forth in me responses that were equally critical and unsympathetic. My response to myself was invariably the very opposite of what I needed and craved. It was the opposite, as well, of what I freely offered to any and everyone else.
When someone treated me compassionately, solicitously or with kindness in these moments that I saw as lapses, I'd feel guilty, fearful that I had somehow manipulated them into this undeserved caring toward me. Needless to say, these responses of mine confused and baffled everyone who might act caringly toward me.
When at 44, in the depths of despair, I first uncovered and began to connect with the little one inside me, this awful pattern began to change. This precious, delightful little creature inside of me stirred a love, compassion and caring for her/my self that I had never before imagined being able to feel.
Suddenly, it was unthinkable to allow anyone, including me, to be mean or harsh or critical with my self. For the first time in my life I found permission to speak as lovingly and kindly to my wounded, hurt, upset, confused, imperfect self as I’d always spoken to others. (See The Little Ones Story for more about this.) The more lovingly I treated myself, the more kindly, softly and sweetly I spoke to myself, the more I began to flourish and grow. The transformation that began with that phenomenal shift has led me to the who that I now am.
Along the way to here, I’ve come to understand that no one ever deserves to be spoken to with harshness, to be undermined by words, to be denied a sympathetic hearing. And, I’ve come to trust (despite what our culture would have us believe) that more real change grows from tender nurture than from drill-sergeant-like blastings of criticism or ridicule.
Along the way to here I’ve learned that speaking with love even to the parts of me that have mean, nasty, self-serving thoughts and feelings helps me to grow. When I am kind with these usually abandoned, angry and unhappy selves, they feel safe enough to reveal their woundings to me. Then I am able to help them find healthy ways to release their pain and heal.
Along the way to here I’ve learned to talk generously to myself even when I’m being somewhere, or doing something that I don’t like for me to be being or doing. Only when I can caringly allow myself to be where I am while I’m there, can I ever move beyond that there to somewhere else.
Along the way I’ve learned the language of tenderness toward myself. When I fall, trip, stumble, fumble, spill or break something, inadvertently (or sometimes advertently) do something that hurts or upsets someone––I hold myself and say, "Poor Honey!" And, "I’m so sorry you’re hurting/upset/unhappy that you did that!" And "It’s okay, Honey, we can make it right/fix it/tell the truth!" And, "I’m right here with you Sweetie, we’ll be okay!" And some times I rock and rock and rock and cry and cry and cry. And, I feel really, really sorry for my sad little self and let her feel really, really sorry for herself until she’s done with feeling that way.
It’s not easy to change a lifetime of mistreating ourselves in the ways we’ve been mistreated by others. Still, beginning consciously to choose to speak softly, kindly and lovingly to ourselves in all the moments of our lives is a practice that can and does begin to turn the tide. In the middle of starting such a practice, it’s especially important to speak kindly to ourselves when we notice that we’ve slipped into speaking unlovingly to ourselves!
Consider talking softly, kindly and lovingly to your self as much of the time as you possibly can,
P.S. So many of your delicious e-mails send appreciations for the affirmation, support and nourishment you receive from the site. When I answer them, I don’t always remember to let you know that having your own deck of the Rememberings and Celebrations cards is a way to bring this same loving voice into your everyday world, to have it at hand as you need to remind yourself of the "real" truth moment to moment in the crazimakingness of the so-called real world!
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The card on this page is part of a set of 64 bookmark-size cards called the Rememberings and Celebrations deck. They can be used as an oracle, a meditation focus or a "book-in-pieces" to kindle and grow a compassionate, gentle, unconditionally loving, fiercely protective inner-Mother to help you carve safe healing space for your emerging self and for the wounded little ones inside.
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