5 Ways to Feel More Love & Compassion For Yourself & Others

By Erin Lanahan

“The amount of happiness that you have depends on the amount of freedom you have in your heart.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Lately I’ve been feeling a sense of vulnerability that I always wished I could feel without being afraid.

I have always wished I was one of those people who could show my authentic self to the world, and still be able to look you in the eye, after I let you see me, without quivering in shame or regret.

Not too long ago, I shared my feelings with someone who I deeply loved. This was one of the hardest, scariest things I’ve ever done, but it gave me the freedom to be vulnerable and to finally have a heart that’s ready to let love in.

Loving this person has taught me so much about love, forgiveness, and acceptance. Although he did not want the same things I want, just having him in my life has taught me more about how to feel unconditional love and genuine compassion for myself.

As a result, I am experiencing a deep level of unconditional love and compassion for others.

I use to walk around taking things very personally.

If I walked by a stranger who gave me a dirty look, or if a bank teller was rude, or if the man I loved didn’t want to love me back in the way I wanted him to, I thought it meant there was something wrong with me. However, what I’m realizing is that none of it has anything to do with me.

I have a brand new sense of awareness now.

When I begin to experience negative self-talk inside of me, I seem to be shifting almost immediately to a place of self-love, forgiveness, acceptance, and compassion for myself. This inner awakening has begun to translate into a new perception of my outside world.

Instead of my usual thoughts and reactions that occur when confronted with less than ideal responses from the external world, I am able to see me in you and you in me.

Right away I begin to feel compassion, because I know you hurt, just like me, and you feel joy, just like me. You worry and feel scared sometimes, just like me. You have bad days, just like me, and you have amazing days, just like me. You are seeking, just like me. You want to believe in love, just like me.

I look at people passing me by in the store, on the streets, or in traffic, and have a deep sense of knowing that they too feel separate sometimes, and they too have times when they fear they will never be enough—just like me.

We all feel the same things.

This realization has allowed me to continue loving even when it isn’t returned to me in the exact way I initially wanted it. True love, after all, is to love someone and expect nothing in return.

I practice this daily by being honest about what’s in my heart, without holding on too tightly to the outcome.

For me, practicing love is the same as practicing the art of letting go, and giving others the freedom to just be—accepting them exactly the way they are. It’s something we can do with friends, family, love interests, and strangers alike.

I can now look this special man in the eyes and smile because I know he is just like me. I know that he can see me now, because I finally revealed myself to him, and I feel good about myself for doing that.

I can accept him and just experience him for who he is and where he is on his path because I know now that we are the same. I know that what will happen, will happen, and what will not, will not.

In the meantime, I continue to make more room inside of my heart to give and receive love.

The simple act of making a shift within has completely transformed the type of relationships I’m attracting. When you live from a place of self love, the world mirrors love and compassion back to you.

When you give yourself unconditional love, compassion, forgiveness, and acceptance, you’re then able to give that to others.

Here are 5 tips to feel more love and compassion for yourself and therefore reflect that back to the world:

1. If you don’t feel real love for yourself yet, act as if.

Act lovingly towards yourself and do things that nurture you, make you stronger, and make you proud of who you are and how you live your life. Exercise, meditation, helping others freely, and eating a healthy diet work really well for me. Practice progress, not perfection.

2. When you feel hurt by someone else, remind yourself that they are just like you.

They hurt, feel fear, have insecurities, and feel the need to defend and protect themselves. They are no different than you and me.

At times, we all react to the programming in our minds. As you commit to feeling unconditional love and compassion for self and others, you will begin to transform the programming in your brain. All you need is awareness. Just be aware.

3. Remember, others are on their path just like you are on yours.

You are both just doing the best you can.

4. Be of service in the world.

Nothing will help you find compassion within yourself and for others like coming face to face with people who have much less materially and way bigger problems than you.

5. Turn within and ask your higher knowing to show you where you lack integrity, love, trust, compassion, forgiveness, and acceptance.

Then ask yourself to heal.

Be patient with the process. Sometimes small shifts happen over time. Allowing your own process to unfold is an act of love in and of itself.

A Time Of Spiritual Rebirth

-Unity consciousness is at it's highest peak during the Christmas season because it is an extraordinary time of self-love, acceptance and forgiveness of ourselves and others. -

For most of us Christmas is one of the most challenging times of the year, because it's a time, whether we are consciously aware of it not, when we undergo a huge inner spiritual cleansing and life transformation.

It's not uncommon during this time of year to deeply reflect on what we feel we have or haven't accomplished in our lives and for many of us, we can often feel overstretched, unaccomplished and underappreciated because it is a time when we check -in and grade our overall personal growth.

But Christmas is not about scrutinizing how much you do or don't have in your bank account, who you do or don't have in your life and it's definitely not about becoming an ultra-consumer.

Christmas is about accepting and loving who you are right now and honoring your personal journey.

It is a time to forgive yourself and others and it's a time to embody the meaning of 'Christ' in Christmas, regardless of your personal beliefs or religion because the word:'Christ' translated simply means 'unity' or 'oneness'.

As students in life, we can choose to use this extraordinary time of the year to forgive past hurts. We can choose to focus on love and compassion and we can choose to allow ourselves to be truly thankful for the experience of life itself and the journey we have thus far been graced to live.

There is no greater gift that one can buy which is more precious than your life. Your life is the miracle of Christmas! It is the closing of one chapter in your story and literally the beginning of a new one.

So in this sense, Christmas is profoundly and powerfully magical because it's one of the only times during the year when we are forced to directly look at our perceived shortcomings and realize what truly matters to us the most. The gift of life itself.

Merry Christmas readers! And congratulations on accepting and respecting your personal journey through life this year!!!

Finding The Love Of Your Life By Ben Ormonde

Ben Ormonde - Personal Transformation Coach


Originally Published on : Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Finding The Love Of Your Life


by Ben Ormonde
Personal Transformation Coach


How to attract and keep The Love Of Your Life.

St Valentines Day is approaching, love is in the air for many and others are wondering when, if ever, their Prince Charming or Princess Perfection is going to arrive.

If you’ve been longing to connect with “The Love Of Your Life” or “Soulmate” and he or she has been elusive I’m going to explain what’s happening and what to do about it from a Law of Attraction perspective. The word “soulmate” has now become part of popular language. It really does sound so absolutely wonderful and romantic because what you’re asking for is a mate for your soul.

If you are looking for your soul mate, what you are indicating is that you are aware that you have a soul and that there is a part of you that you may call spiritual or divine and that you would really like to share your human journey with someone who’s a match to that deeper part of you.
Many people never get to know or get in touch with that deeper part of themselves, so they’re likely to just attract partners, not soulmates. The romantic notion of a soulmate is one of a perfectly matched other half who makes us feel balanced, loved, wanted, safe and complete.


Soulmate is not necessarily defined as a romantic, sexual or marriage relationship. Soulmates show up in many different forms. You can have friends, business associates or family members who are soulmates and even pets who you would call soulmates.

What we’re really here to talk about is the romantic soulmate, meeting the one, finding the love of your life, to share our lives with, the one who is going to enhance this human experience and who we may possibly even marry and spend the rest of our lives with.

Why then is finding the love of our life so illusive for so many? This is where the rubber meets the road. The answer is that you need to first fall in love with yourself. I don’t mean that in a conceited or narcissistic way. What I’m saying is that you need to already have a life in which you feel valuable, contented, and you are living a life that is on purpose and full regardless of whether you have a partner or not. This is an inside job.


Before you can know your soul mate, you have to know your own soul. If you don’t know yourself and like yourself, you really don’t stand much chance of meeting someone who will want to know you and like you.

You literally have to fall in love with yourself before anyone else is likely to. This may not be what you want to hear because you’d rather have someone just love you than you loving yourself, but it just doesn’t work that way. It works from the inside out.


The feeling of euphoria early in a new relationship has absolutely nothing to do with real genuine love. It has everything to do with a rush of all the feel good hormones rushing to our brain in the same way as addictive drugs do. It feels absolutely fantastic. We’ve all been there, we meet this new person and we have such a great time and I just love being around you, time flies, I’ve got butterflies in my stomach, I feel weak at the knees, I feel like I’m in love with you and I want to marry you and live with you forever and have children with you! Sound familiar? This is why people get so addicted to getting that feeling of “being in love”. It’s all hormones. Real long term love relationships need to be built on very solid foundations. In human terms, this means a relationship built by two grounded, contented people who are already living their lives on purpose.


Being dependent on the behaviour of another person to make you happy and to give you a feeling of wellbeing is profoundly unhealthy. It puts you in a prison of dependency and sows the seeds of co-dependency. In co-dependencies, people end up blaming each other.
Healthy long term romantic, soulmate relationships are grounded in unconditional love, meaning that you live your lives as self actualized people who choose to get together in a spirit of sharing rather than neediness. This means living independent of the opinions or behaviour or the other person.


Anyone who says, I have so much love to give and nobody to give it to, is really saying, I’m the emotional black hole and I will suck every bit of life from you that you allow me to. What this means is that somebody who ‘needs’ a soul mate is coming from a sense of desperation and if you’re desperate, desperation repels. The more desperate you feel, the more you push away what you want. That’s just the way the Law of Attraction works. We’ve all met people who are very desperate and it’s really very hard for them to find a mate because they don’t like themselves.


If however you’re a person who has a real sense that you’re a valuable, good person and that there’s love in you and beauty in you, and that you would like to share your love instead of needing someone to fill in a black hole, then you are in the perfect position to attract someone who will enhance your earthly experience.


The Law of Attraction says that Like attracts Like. You may have noticed that desperate people attract other desperate people. Have you also noticed what happens when you feel really good about yourself, when you’re relaxed, joyful, creative and playful, you feel like you could just be alone and have some fun on your own if you want to? When you get to that blissful inner feeling of contentedness regardless of having a partner, that’s when the right people seem to magically show up. The reason is because whole people are attracted to whole people. So before you can attract a whole person, you have to become whole person. You have to become the person you want to attract.


The worst line I have ever heard used in a movie was in Jerry McGuire. The line was “You complete me”! What that line means is that if you are somehow empty, broken, lost, screwed up or messed up and if you just found that right one person to fill the void and be everything to you that you are not to yourself, well, you’ll then be ok. Does that mean that two broken halves will make one perfect whole couple? I don’t think so.

If you define yourself as a broken or half person and you think that if I could just get with another broken or half person, maybe we could fill in each others blanks and somehow end up with a whole one. What you end up with is less than what you started with. This is all about self love and the moment you can genuinely fall in love with yourself, you become extremely attractive to other people. I know, it’s a bit of a paradox. The way it works is this; before you can really have somebody else, you have to not need somebody else. In other words, when you are totally willing to go it alone, if you have to, then almost magically, the chemistry happens for you and you end up going with someone else. That someone else may well be “The Love Of Your Life”.

I hope that you find the idea of falling in love with yourself and your life regardless of having a partner as exciting as I do. When you get yourself to that point of contentment, you will be radiantly attractive and your soul mate will be drawn to you like a magnet.


What do you think? I would love to hear your comments below and answer your questions.
Please also feel free to share this post with our friends on Twitter or Facebook.


I look forward to your comments and questions.


Ben Ormonde
Personal Transformation Coach
Contagious Enthusiasm Self Development and Wellness Centre.