Aspects of Self-soothing

William R. Colagrande, MS

Knowing how to sooth yourself is a crucial art in our modern, fast-paced society. The need arises almost everywhere, at home, at work, in dealing with children, spouses, co-workers, supervisors and customers alike. What is self-soothing? It is the ability to calm or center yourself, particularly when confronted with a stressful situation. It can take many familiar forms, from counting slowly to ten, taking a deep breath, exercising, meditating or employing affirmations. (Remember Ralph Kramden repeating “Pins and needles, needles and pins, it’s a happy man who grins!”)

A lot of people nourish themselves proactively by taking walks, making and listening to CDs/tapes of their favorite music, taking long baths or just periodically covering their faces with a moist, hot facecloth. Activities such as these, along with eating right, exercising regularly and getting plenty of rest help keep residual stress levels low and make it easier to regain one’s equilibrium when the need arises.

I do a lot of work with married couples and often see couples that have become over-dependent on each other to provide comfort and emotional support. By over-dependent, I mean they turn to their spouses or no one, and I don’t think this is a practical strategy. While your spouse might be your primary source of emotional support, I think it important to have alternative sources available. For one thing, your spouse may not always be physically or emotionally available when you need them. When this happens you may tend to feel angry with or abandoned by them, and this only complicates matters for you. This is why it is a good idea to have a group of friends who are available to mutually support each other when the need arises. And there is no reason why you can’t extend the function of this group into social/recreational areas as well.

At base though, we need to be skilled at soothing ourselves. A critical skill in dealing with such serious issues as sexual abuse, self-harming behaviors, eating disorders, anger management and post traumatic stress disorder, it is nevertheless a vital skill for anyone to practice. Most people are familiar with the notion of comfort foods, of having a favorite pair of pajamas, sweatpants or sweater, favorite pieces of music or favorite books, movies, stories or poems. Utilizing any of these techniques could be described as self-soothing behaviors.

One thing I often recommend is to practice talking to yourself, what is commonly referred to as self-talk. I know there are a lot of jokes and eye-rolling that goes on around the notion of talking to yourself, but no one has to know you’re doing it, so you won’t need to deal with all the pithy comments others will want to make. With self-talk, I think the simpler the better. When you are feeling anxious or frightened, I recommend that you say silently to yourself It’s going to be alright or simply I love you. The best time to practice this is when you go to bed at night and are composing yourself for sleep. Don’t be too concerned if you don’t achieve results right away. Many of us have issues around betrayal or the sincerity of such statements and it may take several trials for our inner self to trust the message he/she is hearing. You may even notice some inner resistance to hearing this message; you may notice feelings of anger or resentment from unhappy past experiences and this may take some working through. But if you are patient, as you would be with a hurt child that you care about, and keep the message simple, you’ll see positive results. Through continued practice, you’ll be better able to calm and re-center yourself quickly in instances of distress.

At other times, particularly if you are feeling unsure of your place in the world or are dealing with feelings of anger or resentment towards others, you may find it helpful to say silently to yourself May you be free from harm. May you have health, happiness and prosperity It’s amazing to consider how many bases wishing yourself or others freedom from harm covers! I find it to be a very centering thought which brings on a sense of peace and equanimity, and, as I’ve said elsewhere, is a wonderful antidote to the harmful affects of holding onto resentment and anger. This is a good one to practice while driving your car, where fresh opportunities for feeling anger and resentment abound!

You can see I prefer brief, repetitive statements. This is because I believe we are addressing a younger, still underdeveloped part of ourselves, and brief, repetitive statements are the easiest to take in. A lot of people have success with longer, more complicated affirmations as well.

Once you get over your judgments of such practices sounding silly, I think you’ll be very pleased with the results. Like any other skill, the more you practice it, the better at it you will become. You needn’t feel in distress to give yourself loving and supportive messages before you go to sleep at night. I think falling off to sleep in this ways also promotes a more restful and revitalizing sleep and deeper, more interesting dreams. Try it. Don’t give up if you don’t get immediate results. Listen to hear what response you are getting from yourself and just accept it in a loving and compassionate way. Stay on message and the desired results will come. It is simple and effective way to make the world a more peaceful place both for yourself personally and for anyone with whom you come in contact.

2005

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I’m always interested in hearing your comments and feedback on my essays. You can send them to be by e-mailing bill@i4hd.com