If you have Strabismus or Amblyopia or somebody you love does, you’ll understand that sometimes it comes with feelings of doubt, frustration, embarrassment, defeat, and self-pity. With any trial in life, those feelings are going to come, but I would recommend turning your self-pity into self-compassion. Self Compassion motivates action while self-pity stifles motivation.
It’s an important distinction. Being kind and compassionate towards yourself is very different than self-pity. The distinction between the two can make all the difference when you find yourself on a difficult journey.
I love the podcast “Better Than Happy.” It is put on by Jody Moore and I love her outlook on life. Following her podcast and program has been life-changing for me. One particular podcast that really hit me was called Self-Compassion vs. Self Pity. She never once mentioned having a cataract, strabismus, or amblyopia. But as she went through these differences between self-pity and self-compassion, I saw so many parallels to the experiences I’m having in Vision Therapy and with correcting my strabismus.
Self-P
Jody Mooreity is a Destructive, Painful, Trap
If you find yourself stuck in self-pity like I have so many times throughout this process, consider trying some new thoughts that will energize you and propel you on your journey, whatever it may be. Just seeing the difference that replacing pity with compassion can make, inspires!
You should check out the podcast, it is amazing. I’ve taken Jody’s words and broken them down and applied them in a way that makes sense for those of us struggling with our vision. Learn to distinguish between self-pity and self-compassion and you will unlock all of your
1. Self-Pity is Resentful While Self-Compassion is Curious
When you are living in self-pity you believe that you are trapped in your life, that you are stuck and that you have to do certain things. When you feel forced, it brings on feelings of resentment. Resentment towards yourself, your doctors, and especially that lazy eye.
Some thoughts that may create Resentment:
- I have to patch my eye
- I have to have surgery
- I have to do vision therapy
- Vision Therapy is taking all my money
- There isn’t enough time for all of my exercises
- My Doctor didn’t do a good job and now I’m ruined
- My parents didn’t take the right steps when I was young, now there is no hope
- I will always have a lazy eye, nothing can fix me
Do you see how all of these thoughts do not motivate you to take action? Just reading this list makes me want to go
If you take some of those same things and turn to self-compassion you will become much more curious. Instead of feeling forced, you can feel curious about how you will figure out solutions and solve your problems.
Some compassionate thoughts that are Curious:
- I wonder how I can make patching fun
- I have a lot of choices; surgery, vision therapy, nothing. I wonder which one I’ll choose.
- I don’t have to patch, do vision therapy or even worry about my eyes, but I wonder if I can do things that I don’t want to do.
- I wonder if I can do _________ and prove to myself that I can get my best possible visual outcome.
- I wonder why my doctor recommended that
- I wonder what kind of information was around when I was young that led my parents to try what they tried with my vision. They definitely did their best.
- I wonder what options are available to me
Do you see the difference? A simple switch in thoughts can create so much momentum for you. My big thought right now is “I wonder if vision therapy is the right step for me, I’m going to find out!”
2. Self-Pity is Victimizing While Self Compassion is empowering
Do you ever find yourself thinking thoughts like, “having an eye condition is so hard.” or “My lazy eye is so embarrassing.” or “These exercises make my head hurt and they are so difficult.” or “Why do all the bad things happen to me?” or “I will never get a date/job because I have a lazy eye?” Each of these thoughts put you in the victim’s chair and create overwhelm and disappointment.
So how does self-compassion look different? It makes me think of an experience I had a few days ago. I was teaching a class of 10-year-old children at church and one of them was very distracted by my lazy eye. She kept looking over her shoulder and finally asked, “are you looking at me?” I replied, “yes you are, I know it’s kind of confusing because my eyes aren’t looking the same direction. This is the eye that is looking at you, just ignore the other one.” Then she and her friend covered their mouths and started to giggle.
Initially, I entered self-pity; “This is so embarrassing and hard. Having a lazy eye is the worst. I have a sad life.”
But I thought about how I could change it to compassion and it changed everything for me. My thoughts switched to, “It’s okay for me to feel embarrassed for a minute, then I’m going to keep trying to figure out how to communicate about my lazy eye more effectively. Everyone has challenges, today mine is having a lazy eye and I can figure this out. It’s okay to feel sad, I can totally do sad, I’m going to allow myself to feel bummed for a few minutes and then I’m going to fix my lazy eye.
Telling yourself that you shouldn’t ever feel negative emotions and running to self-pity every time you do, is not going to be near as empowering as accepting the good and bad and learning to cope with it and embrace it, allowing it to fuel
This leads right into the next comparison, resistance vs surrendering.
3. Self-Pity is Resistant While Self-Compassion is Surrendering
When you look back at events that have happened in your life, how do you view them? Have you had an unsuccessful surgery? Have you been teased about patching or glasses or a wandering eye? Have you spent thousands on vision therapy without results? Did you or your parents fail to take action early on when favorable results were more probable?
Self-pity will try to resist all of those things:
- That doctor shouldn’t have done surgery if he wasn’t 100% sure
- Something has gone terribly wrong and I’ll never be able to fix it
- It isn’t fair that I was told Vision Therapy would work and it didn’t
- It’s not right for kids or adults to bully people with vision problems
- My parents should have done more research before choosing x, y, or z
It doubles the pain because not only did you get bullied, now you’re resisting it and that just magnifies the feelings. The more you dwell on those thoughts that bad things happen and they shouldn’t, the more frustrated and upset you will become.
Self-compassion, on the other hand, surrenders to what has already happened. That doesn’t mean you simply give up and don’t try, it means that you accept what has happened and instead of focusing on all that went “wrong,” you focus on the solution. The circumstances are a given, you can only choose what you do with those circumstances.
- What is having a failed surgery going to teach me?
- I tried Vision Therapy and it didn’t work, what’s next?
- Who do I want to be when people say unkind things about my strabismus?
- I did patching and surgery in my childhood, now I’m going to try something new.
There is no use fighting against the past, try to accept what has happened and use it to learn and move forward towards wherever you are headed next.
4. Self-Pity is Judgemental while Self-Compassion is Empathetic
When you are living in self-pity you judge everyone around you and especially yourself and the situations you are in. You may think things like, “I’m not as good as this person because I’m doing surgery instead of vision therapy.” Meanwhile, I’m over here saying, “I’m not as good as that person because I’m doing vision therapy instead of surgery.” Nothing we do makes us good or bad. We have a fixed value. Self-pity wants to make us feel like we are less than others or our life experiences are less than others.
When you start judging yourself, you stop taking action and moving forward. Instead, I would suggest offering yourself compassion in the form of empathy; “I understand this is a hard choice, I know you’ll make the right one. I’m so sorry you’re struggling. You have worth, no matter what you choose.”
5. Self-Pity Stalls while Self-Compassion is Progressing
This is the biggest overall problem I see personally with self-pity! When I’m hanging out in self-pity I might complain to those around me, “I don’t know what to do.” and then I stall. My husband or eye doctor or friend can offer me endless solutions, and what is my response? “That won’t work, it’s too hard, I don’t have the money, it will be painful,” etc. The truth is that in those moments, I don’t want to move forward and find a solution, I want to be confused and stuck.
How much better is self-compassion? Self- compassion recognizes that there is a problem, but also says, I can do problems and this problem doesn’t define me. Self-compassion says, “Yeah, correcting strabismus is a ton of work, but I will figure it out. I have endless resources and there is no rush. I will definitely get through this and come out better at the end.
6. Self-Pity is Closed While Self-Compassion is Open
When I decide to feel bad for myself because I have monocular exotropia or amblyopic strabismus or lazy eye or whatever you want to call it, I close myself off to new people, ideas or feelings. This shuts down the endless host of solutions that are available to me.
I went to an Ophthalmologist recently and asked him about what he thought about Vision Therapy. He was the definition of closed, he may have even physically taken a step back and folded his arms. I was trying to explain that I was considering surgery, but only after at least six months of vision therapy, but he heard “vision therapy” and went into an immediate lecture about how bad it was. There was no conversation, even when I brought up success stories, he just said nothing but surgery would work for me.
How much is he missing out on because he is closed off? He felt threatened and like vision therapy was dangerous, so he closed himself off. There are many Ophthalmologists who have embraced vision therapy and recommend it to their patients in addition to surgery because the combination has improved results for their patients.
Being open to possibilities allows solutions to come to us. The solution that is right for you will find you, but only if you are open to it. Everyone has a path to where they are going. The only way to fail is to sit down in the middle of it and hope that you somehow progress while sitting there waiting, expecting to fail the whole time.
Expect success. Expect to find answers. Expect to be amazing. Expect that there will be hard times. Expect that you can handle anything life throws at you. Expect to be amazing.
Expect success. Expect to find answers. Expect to be amazing. Expect that there will be hard times. Expect that you can handle everything life throws at you.
7. Self-Pity Turns Away from God While Self Compassion Turns Towards God
I believe that there is a God, that he loves each of us, and that he has a plan for us. When we are functioning out of self-pity our first instinct is to blame and question God. “If God loved me, why would he make me have strabismus.” “If God were all-powerful, he would take this struggle away from me.”
These thoughts turn you away from the ultimate healer, the person who can and will help you. If we operate out of compassion, we can see it all in a different light. “God loves me and gave me this challenge so that I could learn something, I’m excited to find out what it is.” “God is all-knowing, I trust in his timing for me and my life.”
When we view God’s plan with compassion instead of judgment and pity for ourselves, we turn to him. We pray and we seek his guidance. I know that as I’ve turned to the ultimate healer, I have found answers and been led to the people and ideas that could have only come from him.
Open yourself to the amazing possibilities in your life. Realize that the challenge you have been given is an opportunity. Who knows what your end result will look like. Each of our paths will look different; Surgery, Glasses, Patching, Vision Therapy, Physical Therapy, Occupational Therapy, Acupuncture, Cranio-Sacral therapy, Spiritual Healing, Chiropractic Work, Syntonics…so many possible solutions to vision problems. Realize that choosing to have compassion for yourself and everyone around you will energize you and inspire you to take action.
The good news is that by changing your thoughts, the solutions will find you.
Good luck. Be Awesome. Choose Compassion.
Source
Jody Moore, Better Than Happy, Ep 101. Self Compassion vs. Self Pity, https://jodymoore.com/101-self-compassion-vs-self-pity/, June 23, 2017