Being Kind to Yourself

This Era of Being Easily Psychologically Scarred

Since long ago, in every culture, people have considered it a virtue to be hard on themselves and kind to others. These days, though, it seems that we need to be kind to others and kind to ourselves as well, because there are many more people suffering from psychological scars than ever before.

In the world of social media, which seems to be symbolized by incidents of people being driven to suicide by anonymous postings that deny them their identity, many people are inflicting psychological scars on others by repeating baseless slander. Some experts are even saying that in this era, in order to protect your mental health, being overconfident is just about right. Surely that tells us how easy it is these days to become psychologically scarred.

At the same time, the problems leading to reports of child abuse and people being tormented by bullying and harassment are not going away at all. The reality is that such traumatic events leave their victims with many psychological scars that may make them become masochistic or self-denying. In light of this, it may be that we need to be kind to ourselves now more than ever.

An era like this must be calling out for self-compassion—not blaming yourself for some failure or trouble but doing self-care when facing such events—as the idea has been attracting attention in recent years. While this thinking comes from psychiatrists, who are working to improve our mental health, we can also say that it is derived from Buddhist teachings. In other words, basic Buddhist teachings, such as the importance of self-respect and accepting phenomena just as they are, protect our mental health.

Making Yourself Cheerful and Healthy

Self-care means, for example, that when you make a mistake, instead of viewing that as a negative event, you accept it broadmindedly as something that happens to everyone. When you can positively accept that such an experience will become one of your personal assets, you will not give in to the urge to unilaterally blame or punish yourself. By moving away from the viewpoint of making one-sided judgments about things being good or bad, you can face matters calmly, realize that the situation is not entirely bad, and put your mind at ease.

However, the expression “self-care” may sound like spoiling yourself, and some people might think it is the opposite of the self-discipline of being diligent and pursuing the Buddha Way. Actually, self-care ultimately means facing yourself calmly, encountering your one and only irreplaceable self, and maintaining inner harmony, which is the same thing as being diligent for we Rissho Kosei-kai members. In that sense, we can say that every day, we are practicing a method of maintaining good mental health.

In any case, what really matters is that through self-care, you clear away your worries and make yourself healthy. The result of everyone’s mind being worry-free is that our homes and societies become healthier and brighter. Indeed, one research report states that people who are kind to themselves interact with others more kindly.

A man who was perplexed about how to cheer himself up asked for advice from Mark Twain, the author of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, who told him “The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.” At Rissho Kosei-kai, we often hear stories of people distressed by worries who come to know of others’ painful experiences and, before they know it, have forgotten what they were worried about. By helping others we help ourselves, and so those who have helped themselves feel compelled to help others.

People whose minds have been liberated in this way will all be healthy and cheerful. A society with many healthy, cheerful people is said to be a happy society. And that is precisely why, as long as there are people around us who seek spiritual growth and liberation from suffering, we must make certain that our own selves are cheerful and healthy, so that we can expand our circle of caring.