What if compassion isn’t just one means to regulate the nervous system, but a broader container and compass that makes all other regulation strategies work better?

• Universal Entry Point: Works as an effective starting place for any regulation strategy

• Attunement to Key Signals: Enhances real-time attunement to cues (safety, threat, connection)

• Motivates Change: Deepens the drive to reduce suffering and engage with other tools

1. The Empathy-Compassion Gap: In both empathy for suffering and compassion, empathy for suffering is the starting point, but then there’s divergence that grows as we venture further downstream from the event. We see different patterns of brain activity, regulation, and eventually, meaningful differences in helping behavior. For more, see Chpt. 4 of my book, From Self-Care to We-Care.

2. Care Bypassing: Care bypassing occurs when compassion for ourselves goes down as the amount of others’ suffering we’re empathizing with increases. This devalues our self-compassion in ways that ultimately weaken our capacity to show up fully across our lives. For more, see Chpt. 9 of From Self-Care to We-Care.

3. The Regulatory Key to Resilience: Recent research in the science of regulation is pointing to the importance of regulatory flexibility – which means having a toolkit of potentially effective strategies, and ability to employ them in context-sensitive and flexible ways. For more, see Troy et al. (2023), “Psychological Resilience.”

Each of these quotes by counselors with compassion training can be found in Quaglia et al. (2022), “Caring for You, Me, and Us.”

1. “It seems really contrary or counterintuitive—but somehow, the more compassionate I can be with a client, the less frustrated I feel, the less likelihood there is of feeling burnt out, or any of those kinds of things. The more I care, the less it affects me.”

2. “When I when I'm able to hold compassion for myself and to be with whatever is coming up, there's more space to be with whatever clients are showing up with, and it becomes this loop of compassion”

3. “A client brought in something that kind of caught me off guard because it was something that was occurring in my personal life. So I was, you know, feeling myself having that compassion towards the client of like, wow, that does sound really difficult, and also then coming back for a second and being like, yeah, this is oddly specific and this is definitely pulling at your own heartstrings. So, like, breathe and it’s okay, and also be with this client.”

1. Compassion Spark vs. Empathy Spark: See Chpt. 4 of From Self-Care to We-Care.

2. Reverse Self-Care Journaling Activity: This activity involves listing different “self-care” activities, followed by who benefits from each one to encourage reflection on the potential interpersonal and social benefits of caring for oneself.

3. Free-Flowing Care: See Chpt. 5 of From Self-Care to We-Care.

1. Can I open to others’ suffering without taking it on as my own?

2. Can I honor and tend to my own suffering—even when it seems small compared to others I’m empathizing with?

3. Can I fluidly navigate the flow of care—inward, outward, or both/and—as the moment calls for?