Feeling Bad About Yourself? Try Self-Kindness to Feel Better

Feeling bad about yourself can trap you in a vicious cycle. Clinical psychologist Raksha Rajesh explains how self-kindness can help us escape by balancing out our negative thoughts and feelings.

These are your negative thoughts — dark, bitter. Doesn’t taste good, doesn’t feel good.

Most people think that getting rid of these negative thoughts, eliminating them, or shutting them off, are the only ways to stop feeling bad about yourself. But that is something that makes it stronger.

One way to manage feeling bad about yourself is balancing it out with one supportive thought, one warm thought, a day.

Thoughts like: “I’m good enough,” or “I’m doing the best that I can.” It almost seems like a warm hug, doesn’t it? And the result is, you balance out your negative thoughts and feelings about yourself enough for it to feel better. (And actually taste better, too!)

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Related:

• When Being a Perfectionist Becomes a Problem (Mitsu)
• How to Cope With Failure at Work, When You’re Used to Success (Mitsu)
• How to Identify and Challenge Negative Thoughts (Mitsu)
• What Is Self-Confidence? (Positive Psychology)
• Give Yourself a Break: The Power of Self-Compassion (Harvard Business Review)

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Raksha Rajesh (M.Sc., M.Phil., CRR No. A80195) is a clinical psychologist licensed by the Rehabilitation Council of India (RCI). She has 5+ years of experience in helping people from diverse backgrounds build skills to understand and manage their emotions.