A child with an imaginary friend may be considered cute, creative and resourceful. By the time you are eighteen though, you might not get invited back to that dinner party if you insisted on a place being set for your invisible friend “Hugo”. But if you want to overcome low self esteem, reduce self criticism and feelings of shame then an imaginary friend might be just what you need. It may sound strange, but research supports the effectiveness of this technique from “Compassion Focussed Therapy” which is widely delivered in the NHS.
What is Compassion Focussed Therapy?
Compassion Focussed Therapy is an evidence based psycho therapeutic approach developed by Professor Paul Gilbert. It was first used with patients hospitalised due to severe depression but has now reached the mainstream and is a common intervention in private therapy. It can also be used as a self help tool for a range of mental health concerns, including low self esteem.
You can read more about what happens in Compassion Focussed Therapy sessions here.
What is low esteem esteem?
Self Esteem describes how a person percieves themselves such as their personal qualities, skills and attractiveness but also includes whether they feel loveable and worthy as a person.
Low self esteem means that a person has a low opinion of themselves, for example, feeling there is something wrong with them or that they aren’t as good as others. It can also mean lacking in confidence about their skills and abilities or feeling that they are only worthy of love if they behave in a certain way.
Low self esteem can have a big impact on relationships as a person can struggle to feel secure and worthy of love and friendship. It can also affect a persons career and quality of life aswell as increase stress, depression and anxiety. You can read more about signs of low self esteem here.
Why is Compassion Focussed Therapy helpful for self esteem?
Compassion Focussed Therapy is based on cutting edge research into evolutionary neuroscience which shows that we our brains have 3 different emotional systems which have helped us survive since pre historic times. These are called: Drive; Threat and Soothing.
Lets first consider the threat system and how it might contribute to low self esteem. The threat system makes sure we feel anxious enough to act when in physical harm (i.e. if a sabre tooth tiger or its modern equivalent attacked us) but it also keeps us alert for social safety. This is because, from a survival point of view, being accepted by our tribe kept us safe. So we can’t help wondering how we are perceived by others and feel anxious about rejection.
But if we have already experienced high levels of rejection or criticism in early life then our minds will be on high alert for it happening again in order to protect us. So we’ll especially prone to worrying what people think, often assume we are being judged by others or think we need to change ourselves in order to be liked. Behaviour which erodes our self esteem.
But being protected against threats isn’t the only way the brain tries to keep us safe. Gaining more resources and having high status in our tribe was also a survival skill. So our “drive system” tries to keep us alive by pushing us to achieve, comparing ourselves to others and switching on the inner critic to help us keep up. As you can imagine the more we do this the worse we can feel about ourselves.
In between all this protection and competition we need to sleep, procreate and eat so the soothing system’s job is to help us rest, digest as well as give and receive love. All essential for our survival too! When this mode is switched on we feel calm, content, safe and have the ability to offer ourselves compassion. As you may have guessed, in people with low self esteem this system is very underdeveloped so the threat and drive are overactivated.
Therefore, Compassion Focussed Therapy aims to help people activate the soothing system through compassionate meditations and other exercises. Like any other muscle that has been worked, eventually you can offer yourself compassion instead of criticism and feel soothed instead of shame.
How do I use an Imaginary friend in Compassion Focussed Therapy?
If you struggle to be compassionate to yourself its obviously going to be hard to suddenly start new habits. This is particuarly true when we are triggered by a stressful situation as our threat and drive systems will be switched on and we’ll be more self critical. Such vicious cycles can make it feel impossible to get a kinder perspective.
But if you imagined eating a lemon you’d probably salivate and wince even if you knew it wasn’t a real lemon. This demonstrates the powerful effect that imagery has on our body. On this principle, if we visualise an imaginary friend being deeply compassionate towards us we are still giving our compassonate soothing system a work out. The more we are able to stimulate the compassionate part of our brain the bigger this system gets.
So next time your inner critic rears its head or you think people are judging you, it would be helpful to pause and imagine a friend being by your side offering a compassionate perspective instead.
But what would our compassionate friend say and do?
If a friend was being truly compassionate would they avoid you when you were struggling or come to see you? Would they tell you that it was all your fault or remind you that you can’t help how you feel? Would they leave you to carry on struggling or try to help you?
If you have answered the questions correctly then you will know that self compassion means being brave enough to deal with difficulty, wise and non judgemental to know that we cannot help our reactions but also caring enough to want to alleviate it. And this is how we would imagine a compassionate friend feeling, thinking and behaving towards us.
Your compassionate friend doesn’t have to be human. You can think of an animal (i.e. a dog or owl), something from nature (a tree), religious figure (such as angle or saint) or even a character from a movie (Dumbledore or Yoda are good options!). It can also change over time as well as have any additional qualities you feel you need (i.e. unwavering support, unconditional acceptance etc)
How else can I overcome low self esteem?
Sometimes a person needs therapy to improve self esteem, particularly if due to stressful childhood experiences, but if the symptoms are not complex it can be possible to use self help tools. It may feel like an impossible task to change how you feel about yourself but this is because it is how you have been thinking and feeling for years. Trying new ways of relating to yourself may seem hard at first but with practice it can become second nature.
Record positive qualities: People with low self esteem are more like to focus on their negative traits and overlook positive ones. For example, remembering mistakes they have made or things they feel they are not good at. Using a journal, make a conscious effort to spend each day writing down things you are good at, compliments you have recieved, qualities you are proud of (such as being kind). It does not matter how small, just keep finding examples and your brain will start to notice more.
Challenge thoughts: This technique comes from Cognitive Behaviourial Therapy and involves looking for evidence for the thoughts you are having. Most of the time we think in a certain way because our brains are programmed to jump to conclusions and assume the worst but not based on actual evidence. If you are assuming people are judging you or don’t like you ask yourself “Is this a fact or a feeling”? “Is there any evidence for this? Is there any evidence against?”
Mindfuness helps us to give space to difficult thoughts and feelings. Often if we have low self esteem we will be caught up in ruminating with unhelpful, self critical thoughts which make us feel worse. Mindfulness can help you take a step back from them as well as tune into a accept uncomfortable feelings in the body.
How can I access therapy for low self esteem?
If you would like assistance to improve your self esteem then I offer specialist therapy which incorporates the above techniqes. You can visit my main page to find out more about this or contact me to arrange a free consultation.
