Showing Compassion to the Girl with the Bad Heart

I’m genuinely fascinated about how our minds make sense of our lives and our experiences. I’ve also learnt to appreciate the importance of self-compassion in response to some of the ideas our minds might generate.

At a young age, my mind well and truly hooked onto the idea that I was born with a “bad” heart. Medically, I was born with a heart condition: a fairly rare, not very well understood and possibly life-limiting heart condition (I’m clearly still here though).

I can’t remember how or when I was told something about this heart condition. I can’t remember how I made sense of visiting Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children as a child. I also can’t remember having any sense that this condition might impact my life in any way. I can remember loving the Care Bears and I can remember understanding that in the World of Care-a-Lot, having a bad heart meant you were evil. I can also remember wondering why my “bad” heart was so bad that even the Care Bears couldn’t save me. When my child mind put these ideas together, it came to the “logical” conclusion that I must therefore have been really evil.

With the help of psychological therapy (initially Eye Movement Desensitisation Reprocessing – EMDR - in my case), I have been able to update my mind and can now smile with immense compassion at that little girl who came to such an adorably ridiculous conclusion. EMDR allowed me to understand my mind’s logic, mindfulness and acceptance allow me to notice when my mind or body returns to this thinking pattern, and self-compassion allows me to smile at and comfort the part of me that still connects with feeling evil. Self-compassion calms my mind so that it doesn’t feel such a need to shout and grab my attention in order to protect my “badness” from being “discovered”.

I wouldn’t want anyone to think that I have gone through life consciously and constantly thinking “I’m evil.” I have rationally, for many years, understood the biology of my congenital heart condition and feel lucky that it doesn’t have a massive day-to-day impact on my life. This sense of feeling evil has also rarely entered my mind (this is something my friends and family very rarely, if ever, saw). However, at certain times, when under some form of immense threat, I could experience that horrible sense of shame that linked with this “impostor” syndrome and the fear that people may discover how evil I really am.

Experiencing “Impostor Syndrome” is really common. It’s that voice in our mind which says: “I’m not good enough”, “I don’t deserve to be here”, “someone will soon notice I’m a fraud”. It’s as though we’re living with an extremely personal and painful football commentary, and we just can’t turn it off. My mind would say “They’ll see how bad you really are”. I’m still not sure what my mind thought would happen after this, I just knew that it felt horrible and scary and that I wanted that feeling to stop.

Although it’s not something that’s often talked about, I’ve not met many people who don’t experience this “impostor” or “I’m not good enough” mind in some form. At these moments, one of the most powerful things we can do is notice and name this thinking, and therefore gain some emotional and mindful distance from the commentary. This distance allows us to then see how much this commentary is trying to protect us. My mind thought something awful would happen if I was “found out” for being evil. It therefore wanted me to escape and to not show the true me “just in case”. My mind was wrong, and it was trying to protect me. I therefore now call this commentator my “misguided protector” (MP – no political gag intended).

Once we can notice our “misguided protector” mind talking and understand that it is trying to keep us safe, then we can show ourselves compassion and decide how we want to be. Do we behave as though our MP is true (maybe run away, shout at someone to keep them away from us or try to avoid the situation with alcohol, computer games or some other addiction)? If we’re able to calm this misguided protector, we can behave from a “wise” perspective and engage with whatever it is that has triggered this sense of threat (which is often linked with something that is important to us – in my case some form of survival or not wanting others to think I’m bad).

For me, no amount of logic or reason would help me reduce the sense of fear, shame and panic that I experienced when I thought someone might discover how evil I was. The process of noticing, then appreciating that these ideas came from a creative mind that was trying to keep me safe, and then showing myself compassion for this, allowed me to calm my mind and body and return to functioning as my adult self.

We can all benefit from noticing, from self-compassion and from being more compassionate about the impostor syndromes that we all might be carrying.

I have a lot of compassion for people when they are in the moment of feeling an “impostor”. I also have great respect and admiration for those who can notice and feel able to share their own misguided protector minds and insecurities. Throughout writing this piece, I have felt torn between wanting to share a personal experience to illustrate something I value (engaging in psychological therapy, mindfulness, acceptance and compassion) and feeling threatened that others might use this knowledge of my mind’s vulnerabilities to attack or harm me in some way. I can’t know or control how other’s (if anyone reads this) might respond to this writing. I can only hold onto knowing that I, and I believe all the people I love and appreciate in my life, would also value, rather than criticise, me for sharing these ideas (even if their initial response is that I’m silly or naïve to do so).

I still love the Care Bears. I still appreciate the Care Bear message of compassion and I can still connect with that hope that the Care Bears would come to earth and protect me from the fear and shame of living with a “bad heart”. My adult self can now also appreciate and feel immense compassion for how my mind came to such conclusions. Minds are incredible at linking words, experiences, emotions. It is this linking that allows our mind to be so impressive and also to feel fear and shame in response to fantasies that our minds create (the Care Bears were never going to come, and no one ever suggested or told me I was evil).

As a child, I linked the fear of attending hospital, the idea of a “bad” heart, my experience of watching the Care Bears, and my understanding of the words “kind-hearted” and “heartfelt” (which meant good and kind) and concluded that I was “bad”. I don’t know how anyone could have explained or helped me understand that there was a difference between a biological heart and the heart that means love and kindness. I’m very aware and glad that Clinical and Counselling Psychologists are now more present in physical health hospitals: I absolutely believe in the value of Psychologists within these settings and the impact they can have on adjustment and emotional health (I’ll save that chat for another blog).

It’s taken time, some painful and emotional self-understanding, some courage, plenty of time with friends and family who, through their actions, allow me to feel valued, a lot of thanking and smiling to my mind when it feels scared, and a genuine curiosity to learn and understand how our minds work to get me here. I value the experience that living with a heart condition has given me: such appreciation and compassion for what it means to be human: to struggle, to strive, to make comparisons, to feel fear and shame, to feel love and compassion and to seek meaning.

We can all learn to notice our misguided protectors (our MPs), and to show them compassion and thanks for working so hard to try and keep us safe. Once we can notice, then we can start being and living without the influence of this misguided commentary. This can allow us to do the things we never dared, connect with people on a deeper level and to increase a sense of meaning and purpose in our lives: to live and not just stay safe. Sometimes this is really tough to do, sometimes I still respond as though my MP is telling me the truth, and sometimes I’m not very compassionate towards myself: it’s still worth trying though – we could all benefit from our inner Care Bear!