The Art of Self Worth
Did you know 85% of people have low self-esteem? Join Sarah Anne and Sarah Kelly for conversations about discovering our worth. Each of us has the potential to make a positive impact on the world. However, we often forget this and become disconnected from our true worth. Finding our worth is a lifelong journey that includes play, joy, pain, fear, healing, unlearning, re-learning, and more. In this podcast we share the good, bad and in-between around self-worth. You are worthy.
The Art of Self Worth
Embracing Compassion to Unlock Self-Awareness
In this episode, Sarah and Sarah discuss how to practice compassionate self-awareness and use it to balance out the negatives with positives.
Compassionate self-awareness is at the center of our wheel of worth - and for good reason! By being honest about ourselves we can better identify our gifts as well as the things we want to improve and areas of growth.
We suggest starting the day with a positive self-reflection, accompanied by compassion, and talking to your body in moments of anxiety. Through connecting with oneself, you have the ability to not only understand the world on a more meaningful level, but to make conscious choices about how to act moving forward.
We end with a homework assignment to help you become more self-accepting. Think of one thing you love about yourself, one thing you are good at, and one thing you bring to the world. Write it down, and share if you're feeling brave. If it is too difficult, start small! Ask for help from a friend or loved one, to show how we can lift each other up in community.
Throughout, we invite you to explore:
1. What if we added compassion to self-awareness?
2. How can we balance the negative thoughts in our minds with the positives?
3. How can having self awareness benefit not only ourselves, but our communities?
✨ You are meant to shine. ✨
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Sarah Anne 00:07
So this is a really exciting episode because we're together.
So we're gonna be talking about compassionate self awareness today.
Sarah Kelly 00:26
I feel like I'd breathe better just with hearing that.
Right?
Compassionate self awareness.
I feel like so often when we think of self awareness, there's this heaviness that comes with it.
Almost like, self awareness means bad.
Sarah Kelly 00:33
Self awareness means pain, self awareness means, oh, I'm gonna have to look at that.
But what if we added compassion?
Sarah Anne 00:43
That word the word compassion just anytime I say it, it releases my shoulders.
Sarah Kelly 00:44
Mhmm.
Sarah Anne 00:52
Like, my heart just feels a little softer.
And the breath that I take next is a little
Sarah Kelly 01:05
deeper.
So true.
So as you're listening to this, if you're in a safe place to do so, We actually like you to bring both of your hands to your heart.
Sarah Anne 01:07
And
Sarah Kelly 01:22
if you feel safe, close those eyes.
And let the word compassion just fall over you.
As you hear compassion,
Sarah Anne 01:23
what
Sarah Kelly 02:01
does that feel like in your body?
What happens for you?
Just noticing it in that awareness piece, the second part, compassionate awareness.
And whenever you're ready opening your eyes and dropping your hands.
When I think about compassion and a lot of times thinking about people we love, Right?
Sarah Kelly 02:36
Like, we can have such deep compassion for those we love, who are suffering, particularly when we see someone having a hard time that compassion can come out.
And yet when we're having a difficult time or the self awareness is like, Like, it's the opposite.
There's often this late picking up.
There's stick to beat us more, like, to hurt more when we're already in this, like, vulnerable state of awareness.
Sarah Anne 03:03
I love what you said at the start, which is the fact that awareness does sometimes have a negative connotation.
And that is part of human nature.
We have a negative bias.
It's so easy for us to focus on the bad things that we're aware of.
Like, think about the last time that you rejoiced because part of your body felt good.
Sarah Anne 03:31
Right?
Now if you recovered from an injury or a sickness, that's probably the last time that you rejoiced because that markitation from how bad you felt, went away so you could realize how good you felt.
That's what so many people need to feel that positive.
Mhmm.
And for me, the compassionate self awareness is just remembering to balance those negativities in our mind with the positives.
Sarah Anne 03:52
So, of course, we need to still be aware of the more negative things with compassion But for me, part of compassion of wet self awareness is also rejoicing and acknowledging.
The positive things that we're doing, the way our body feels, the things that we're doing and moving in the world.
Sarah Kelly 04:10
And that is why I was thinking about the first thing when we get out of bed.
Right?
And you're like, oh, I'm a little tight and I'm a little sore.
Oh, I'm so sleepy.
And what if just as a challenge to yourself, you added what feels really good today?
Sarah Kelly 04:25
Or what am I looking forward to?
So as the creeks and, like, everything's coming out of, like, oh, and those birds are singing.
That's beautiful.
Like, oh, my heart feels full.
Oh, wow.
Sarah Kelly 04:26
My legs feel really good today.
Sarah Anne 04:42
Yeah.
I have an old boss, Carla from the Omega Institute toot who does this exercise every day with her family.
I think she got it from the Obamas.
They do orchids and onions.
Sarah Kelly 04:43
Oh.
Sarah Anne 05:03
So every night at the usually, it's around dinner, but if they're not doing dinner, it's just before bed.
They go around as a family, and they say an onion, something that made them feel not so good today, and then an orchid.
Something that was just beautiful that they can remember from the day.
Sarah Kelly 05:10
I've only ever heard that as roses and thorns.
Me too.
I really like the lemons and onions.
And, you know, wait, you could do that with any birds.
Yeah.
Sarah Kelly 05:17
I could be like, no.
Nachos and handshowies.
Okay.
That's still weird.
Sarah Anne 05:20
Our next
Sarah Kelly 05:27
episode is on food and nourishment.
So my mind already may be some wear.
Although my mind may always be there,
Sarah Anne 05:35
especially right now because we are recording this at Ameloa, which has the best food in the world, best food in the world.
Yeah.
Sarah Kelly 06:10
So when you talk about the compassionate self awareness, you've already heard us bring up the body.
And so this episode is just full of exercises because we're breathing and things.
I wanna also share 1 of my favorite exercises.
That happens and I have personally found that the compassion that I can serve myself in a moment serves me so much better than the anxiety my body is showing me.
So my example is when I get anxious, or nervous or and that's the same word.
Sarah Kelly 06:28
But when something's going on and I can't quite name it or sometimes I can, my inner joint of my elbow.
It gets really loud.
It gets very painful.
Since I was a kid, my entire life, I can't remember this as a spot that assumed like I would know something's
Sarah Anne 06:28
wrong.
Sarah Kelly 06:47
It took many years for me to realize that that's my body's alert system.
Right?
So when I knew that, I started talking to it.
So I started just sharing And you'll hear this in somatic healing practices a lot of talking to your body.
Right?
Sarah Kelly 07:05
And so what I do is I say thank you.
Joints or elbow.
Like, you are showing me that I'm nervous.
Say that I am an adult and I actually know what's happening.
I'm aware of this anxiety right now and I'm so grateful that you've alerted me all these years.
Sarah Kelly 07:24
But now, I I've got it.
So you can rest.
You can just do your joint duty for whatever you do because I think you do a lot on a daily basis.
And just give it love.
You know, and that's where that compassion comes in, that self awareness of, like, oh, rather than saying, oh my god.
Sarah Kelly 07:29
What am I nervous about?
What's going on?
Oh, okay.
Oh, my joints are bad.
Am I gonna be sick tomorrow?
Sarah Kelly 07:36
What's going on?
It's just this, like, stop.
Hey alert system.
You're doing your job.
That's really cool.
Sarah Kelly 07:39
I love you.
I'm gonna take it over from here.
Sarah Anne 07:53
And love that.
Yeah.
The body is such a strong messenger.
Mhmm.
It's, you know, it's 1 of the reasons why I do the joint freeing sequence every day.
Sarah Anne 08:08
Right?
Because it's a check-in with my body from the toes all the way up to the top of the head.
And it doesn't happen every day, but there's definitely things that arise in that in different ways.
Yeah.
Go.
Sarah Anne 08:20
Taking it a little bit differently.
Oh, yeah.
Let's do that.
Yeah.
You know, I think when you look at compassionate self awareness, we don't always go to the body first.
Sarah Anne 08:31
Mhmm.
Like a lot of times, we look at choices that are past selves made.
And we can really judge them.
Yeah.
We can.
Sarah Kelly 08:38
I I can.
I can.
I do.
Well, we could use the weave hear as they The sarah's do.
Oh my god.
Sarah Kelly 08:46
That judgment of past self is 1 that haunts me.
Yeah.
So, compassionate self awareness.
Sarah Anne 09:00
When we look at the past is how can you give past, Sarah, a little hug.
Right?
I mean, yeah, I don't think anybody has gone through life without making mistakes and bad choices.
Sarah Kelly 09:01
You know?
Sarah Anne 09:04
If so, leave a comment, tell us, see your ways.
Sarah Kelly 09:09
We will have you on the podcast, actually, because that would be fascinating.
Fascinated.
Sarah Anne 09:46
So just give, like, just know that your past self had certain tools that made the decisions that were made, but now you have new tools, you have new knowledge.
And that situation gave you that knowledge.
Yeah.
For many of us, the only way that we know something's the wrong choice especially if we're not connected to our body, is by trying, is by making a choice and seeing what happens.
And I think the compassion comes from remembering that you can always change your choice.
Sarah Anne 09:52
You can't change what you did, but you can make a different choice now with the tools and knowledge you have.
Sarah Kelly 10:23
And you can have compassion for that that was the right choice at that time.
Right?
Like, that was you doing the best you could do.
And as humans, we make mistakes.
If that's our journey, we're here to make mistakes and feel what that's like, in my opinion, And so part of that mistake making and that compassionate self awareness to bring it full circle is trusting the whole process.
Sarah Kelly 10:47
Us.
Like you said, we learn from mistakes.
So it's trusting that that decision or that thing that was right for you in that moment at that time.
Moving forward, you've grown, you've learned, you've changed, and If that mistake harmed anyone else, we also get to make the amends.
Right?
Sarah Kelly 10:56
Part of compassionate self awareness is wow, I'm really I'm really sorry.
I hurt you.
Or like, I'm really sorry that choice affected you in a negative way.
Sarah Anne 11:17
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think that's we've been, of course, talking about the self aspect of self awareness, but The fact is we live in community.
Our choices impact ripples of people.
And I love the fact that compassionate self awareness does include your community.
Sarah Anne 11:43
Wow.
It's never too late to look at the past and to acknowledge just kind of the impact that your choices had negative and positive.
Again, remembering not just to focus on the negative, Right?
If you find yourself getting into that story, pause.
Every decision, even if it's a nightmare of a decision, you chose it for a reason.
Sarah Anne 11:49
There had to be some benefit even if it's 1 that now you wouldn't term a benefit.
Sarah Kelly 12:16
And I think part of having this self awareness, just like self love, just like self work.
Just like all of this work we do on ourselves is to serve community in a larger sense.
Right?
Is to connect more.
Because when we're not having self awareness of both the good and the bad, then we'll miss We're missing this whole beautiful world around us.
Sarah Kelly 12:25
And so why we serve with compassionate self awareness is because when we connect with self, then we connect with the world.
Sarah Anne 12:47
I love that.
And it's not that you can't connect to the world without connecting to yourself, but it's just so much deeper.
You can do it on a different in a different way because you know where you're coming from.
Yeah.
You know your strengths and you know what it is that you wanna focus on to shift.
Sarah Anne 12:50
You have the shifting as huge.
Right?
Because I
Sarah Kelly 13:11
think so much when we talk about self love or self awareness.
It's easy for the mind to go to how is that selfish?
Yeah.
Right?
Whereas, like, really thinking about that having this process is actually kinda loving on the ego and, like, being gentle with it.
Sarah Kelly 13:25
Trading the ego, like, a child almost like, hey, buddy.
It's like, yeah.
I hear you.
Whereas when we don't have this awareness, we don't have this level, we don't have this word, the ego can take over.
And that's when selfishness comes in.
Sarah Kelly 13:55
And there's a huge difference, a huge shift where that connection to community is more harmful often.
You know, you can just look around right now.
Like, so when we're coming back to that continued path of when we're talking about all this stuff on self, it's that love of of all of these pieces.
To be like, okay, how do we serve?
And that means serve ourselves, serve our communities, serve the world.
Sarah Anne 14:32
Yeah.
Part of self awareness is knowing what your gifts are, knowing what your strengths are, and then knowing that you have the power to share those gifts, to share those loves with others and make the world a better place.
I know it seems like, idealistic, and it is more complicated than that in our world.
But if you have the compassionate self awareness to identify your gifts, to develop them, you have the potential to ship the world.
Goosebumps.
Sarah Anne 14:35
Goosebumps.
And
Sarah Kelly 14:37
so I think we'll leave you with a homework assignment.
Sarah Anne 14:41
Yeah.
Great.
That's fun.
Let's do it.
Let's
Sarah Kelly 14:50
do it right now.
It could be we're in retreat mode.
We're in, like, deep work mode.
It's easy homework.
I
Sarah Anne 14:50
mean,
Sarah Kelly 15:09
I can always yeah.
We'll just leave all that laughter.
Your homework is to have a little compassionate self awareness.
So act actually this exercise people find really difficult, which is why I laughed.
Yeah.
Sarah Kelly 15:26
I can imagine.
If you would love, if you find and name.
Internally, you don't have to say this out loud.
1 thing you love about yourself.
1 thing you're good at and 1 thing you bring to the world.
Sarah Anne 15:51
I love that.
And folks, If you can't think of anything, start small.
Start so so small.
Something you're good at could be that you take care of your beloved cat every day.
You know, like start small and then allow that feeling to build and grow and maybe start with 1, but keep adding.
Sarah Kelly 16:12
If you're feeling super duper brave, you could bring this to a friend or a loved 1 and share and ask them theirs.
And if you're not quite there yet, Just tuck it away with a little love.
How about a build on that where you just Oh, wow.
And your homework's not
Sarah Anne 16:34
done.
Well, only if you're is a troubleshooting option.
If you're having a hard time doing it and if starting small isn't working either.
Or you feel ridiculous talking about how you take care of your cat as your self compassionate self awareness.
Take this homework to a friend, to a loved 1, and ask them to do it for you.
Sarah Anne 16:43
Yes.
And then you can do it for them.
Yes.
And that is how community can lift us up together
Sarah Kelly 16:53
and open that door to your journey to starting to find it yourself.
Yeah.
Our communities hold us.
Our loved ones hold us.
Sarah Anne 16:55
I love that.
Sarah Kelly 16:55
Until next time, our listeners, we wish you well and a reminder that you are worthy.
