This lesson is so straight forward yet so many of us struggle with it. 

There was a conversation in our planning workshop where one of the participants was feeling burned out and knew they needed to start a series of self-care practices, however the thought of starting them all was overwhelming. 

We put so much pressure on ourselves to be able to do it all and do it now.  

This led to a very important conversation around self-compassion. 

We continually look outside ourselves and judge ourselves against those around us, or even those we view from afar. 

The thing is we are looking at it all wrong. 

Firstly, we don’t know the complete ins and outs of everyone else’s lives. Maybe they are on the verge of a breakdown. We can’t know. 

So let’s start looking inward. 

Show yourself some self-compassion. 

This is the one thing you can control. 

Not all those other people around you and out there. 

Stop putting these crazy expectations on ourselves. 

I talk more about expectations and self-compassion in this video. 

One of the most important things we can do to be compassionate to ourselves is to make sure our perspective is correct. 

We look at ourselves in our 20’s and wonder how we had the energy to do so much. 

Then we see ourselves in our 40’s and think we should be able to do the same. 

But we are not the same. 

Our energy is distributed differently. 

We run businesses and households. 

We coach kids soccer teams and volunteer at the local charity. 

We have children, partners, pets and a host of other responsibilities. 

All of these take energy that was once used for all those things you are judging yourself for not doing anymore. 

Shift your perspective and show yourself some compassion. 

If we want to be the best versions of ourselves so we can achieve the things we want to then we have to be compassionate to ourselves and be kind to ourselves. 

Stop putting unrealistic pressure on ourselves to do everything that we have a perception that maybe we thought we once could. 

Our energy just gets distributed differently at different stages in our life. 

I want you to really think about that and be kind to yourself. 

Louise x 

P.S. Understanding how we view our time and how our perceptions are actually not only holding us back but sucking up energy that could be used on positive things is just part of the Organise Yourself Out of Overwhelm course you have access to as part of the Inner Circle. Find out more here. 

P.P.S. I talk about staggering the implementation of practices like this so they are successful in a previous article, you can read it here.