Ripples of Resilience

Episode 10: Self-Compassion, Real Resilience

• Jana Marie Foundation • Season 1 • Episode 10

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Self-compassion isn’t a shortcut around hard feelings; it’s the sturdy bridge that carries us through them. We sat down with clinical child psychologist and mindfulness teacher Dr. Peter Montminy to unpack what self-compassion really is and why it’s the missing ingredient that turns stress into resilience rather than burnout.

We trace the roots of our self-critical habits, from the brain’s negativity bias to the pressure cooker of unfinished to-do lists and social comparison. Then we turn to what actually helps. Dr. Montminy breaks down the three pillars popularized by Dr. Kristin Neff, self-kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness, and shows how each one shifts your inner stance from punitive to supportive. You’ll hear a guided self-compassion break you can use anytime, plus simple daily practices: the friend-to-self exercise, the “oh” pause that interrupts spirals, and short loving-kindness phrases that re-train your attention toward care.

Along the way, we connect the dots between compassion and performance, exploring research that shows how being kinder to yourself preserves motivation, reduces shame, and expands your ability to face challenges. We talk about modeling self-regulation for kids, why “perfectly imperfect” is a powerful reset, and how to apply compassion when you feel like you’re failing at compassion. Expect grounded tools, clear language, and steps you can try the next time your inner critic gets loud.

If this conversation helps you breathe easier, share it with a friend who needs it, subscribe for more resilience tools, and leave a quick review to help others find the show. Your small actions support big change. What practice will you try today?

If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text 988 for immediate support.

This podcast is brought to you by Jana Marie Foundation and A Mindful Village.

Jana Marie Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization located in State College, Pennsylvania which harnesses the power of creative expression and dialogue to spark conversations build connections, and promote mental health and wellbeing among young people and their communities. Learn more at Jana Marie Foundation.

A Mindful Village is Dr. Peter Montminy's private consulting practice dedicated to improving the mental health of kids and their caregivers. Learn more at A Mindful Village | Holistic Mental Health Care for Kids.

Music created by Ken Baxter.

(c) 2025. Jana Marie Foundation. All Rights Reserved.

This podcast was developed in part under a grant number SM090046 from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The views, policies, and opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of SAMHSA, HHS or the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Welcome to the Ripples of Resilience podcast by Jana Marie Foundation, where we explore practical ways to support young minds and foster emotional resilience. I'm your host, Marisa Vicere, president and founder of Jana Marie Foundation. Today we're talking about something that sounds simple, but can be incredibly hard to practice: self-compassion. We often show kindness, patience, and understanding to others, but when it comes to ourselves, those same qualities can feel out of reach. To help us unpack what self-compassion really means and how it can strengthen our resilience, I'm joined by our resident expert, Dr. Peter Montminy, a clinical child psychologist, certified mindfulness teacher, and parenting coach from a mindful village. Thank you for being here, Dr. Montminy. I'm really excited for this conversation, as I believe it's one we all need to hear.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

We sure do, and thanks. Glad to be here again with you.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

So let's take a closer look about what this really means. When people hear the phrase self-compassion, they might think of being soft or letting themselves off the hook. But there's actually a lot more depth to it. How would you describe what self-compassion really is?

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Yeah, you're you're spot on with that. And what I want to suggest is we let's think about being compassionate with a friend, a loved one, one of our children, a partner. When you are caring to another partner, is that soft? Is that weak? Right? We don't think of caring for others as somehow having a negative spin. We hope to be caring for our loved ones, yes? So the trick is really about reframing understanding self-compassion as befriending ourselves, befriending ourselves. It's not about self-esteem or self-pitying or overly self-critical or self-excusing. Self-compassion is really about realistic self-appraisal. It's about not avoiding the hard feelings or hard truths about yourself, but acknowledging them with care. And I start from the point of view of accepting this premise. Everyone on the planet has strengths and weaknesses, true or false. Everyone has strengths and struggles, yes?

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Yeah.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

So you are not the one person out of 8 billion people on the planet who doesn't have some of both, who doesn't deserve to be cared for and supported for your strengths and struggles. Having our struggles and being caring about them does not make us a loser. It makes us human, right? It is part of being human. So that brings us right directly to often how the self-compassion is studied and practiced and taught is the three core components borrowed from Dr. Kristen Neff and others of self-kindness, caring for ourselves, befriending ourselves the way we would another, recognizing the common humanity of it, that every one of us is in the same boat. And this is human, not personal. And having the mindful awareness and acceptance of all that, bringing real present moment attention to caring for ourselves and connecting with our humanity.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

I especially like the idea that self-compassion isn't about avoiding those hard feelings, but actually acknowledging them and recognizing that we're all humans and we have a variety of different struggles and successes in life that all deserve to be nurtured and cared for. Why do you think so many of us struggle to offer ourselves that same understanding that we give to others?

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Yeah. I think of it in two parts, as I often do, kind of both the internal and the external. And the internal, what I mean by that is we have a biological predisposition to the brain's negativity bias, which is to say we attend to and remember negative experiences more than we do positive experiences. That includes negative aspects of ourselves more than positive aspects of ourselves. Why are we wired with a brain that r attends to and remembers the negative more than the positive? It's an old leftover survival instinct. We need to pay attention to the harmful situations in our lives and remember them so that we don't maybe repeat walking into a harmful situation again, right? So we already start with this negativity bias. And without regular practice, mindful practice of bringing ourselves back to the positive, we more easily slip into forgetting our positive qualities or forgetting the idea that we we deserve care as well. The other is that psychologically, internally, we have this strong inner critic, many of us. We've internalized through years of conditioning, corrective feedback, scoldings, you know, parents with good intentions. We still bring the ways we've been kind of criticized or corrected into our working model of ourselves. And then we carry things often through that lens more than maybe is healthy or even accurate. It contributes to one of the big things that I work a lot with, and maybe we've talked about before, the not enough syndrome, not good enough syndrome that's so pervasive in many of us. We have a loud inner critic and a very soft, sometimes absent, inner compassionate caring person, yeah? So that's the inner world. The external world that contributes to that, what makes it so hard for some of us to give ourselves that caring, and why we're so negative. The reality of the modern digital age and the constant level of to-do-to-do-to-dos, constantly 24-7, the demands. And how many of us get to the end of the day and have our to-do lists all done, right?

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Right.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

None of us, hardly any of us. And the fact that then we go to bed each night feeling literally undone, like we didn't do enough, and waking up next morning already feeling less than, again, starts to incline the mind to this negative looping. And we put that on top of that, the whole social media phenomenon where either there's really rude, horrible put-down stuff coming at us, or there's this really beautiful positive stuff. People are putting their best stuff up there, and then we do what? The social comparison thing and say, well, my life really sucks by comparison, or I must be a fraud because look, I don't look as good or sound as cool as those people. So we're perpetuated with these messages all around us, accelerated by the digital age, that makes it harder for us to kind of think well of ourselves at times.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Absolutely.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Does that make sense?

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

It does. And I think you're right. We often are our own toughest critics. And sometimes we feel like, oh, well, it can motivate us to be hard on ourselves. But in reality, that often just cuts us down and wears us out and makes us even more exhausted, especially when compounded by all those external factors that you were just mentioning.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

That's exactly right. Research shows, in fact, the more self-critical you are, the more you sap motivation and energy to face struggles. And the more caring and compassionate with another person, yeah, easier to do. The more caring and compassionate we are with ourselves, the more we actually can be empowering to step in to face our struggles. So you're spot on with that.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Thank you. At Jana Marie Foundation, we often talk about resilience as the ability to adapt, to recover, to keep moving forward and find hope, even in those difficult moments. How do the concepts of self-compassion connect to resilience?

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Aaron Powell Yeah. Well, again, very much was just reading a study recently that really showed stress plus self-compassion equals resilience, strengthens resilience. Then if you have stress without self-compassion, you get into negative spirals and you aren't more resilient to meet again your problems, your life problems. If you have self-compassion, but you're not facing some stress or struggles, then you're not able to develop resilience either. So you actually, those people who experience stressful times with self-compassion show that they are more resilient, adaptive, flexible, capable of managing the difficult emotions and situations that come up. It's a beautiful thing. It also kind of confirms this idea, again, of accepting that life as a human inherently includes pain and suffering. And opposed to pushing away or denying it or wallowing in it, when we can say, yeah, this part of my life is really hard, or this part of my personality, or this is something I do sometimes that's I'm not proud of, or isn't difficult for me or for others around me. The more we can again pause, breathe, notice it and name it, right? Name it to tame it. We talk about that. Name, oh yeah, this is a difficult thing, and it's human, not personal. It's not a fault other than it's being human. Now that's not a get-out of responsibility free card. That's again a more realistic self-appraisal that when you can say that, it can soften your ability to be defended against it, or fight against it, or even deny it. And to start actually accepting responsibility for that's something that I want to caringly work on and take care of myself better. And that then can start to broaden and build better resources or a positive upward spiral. When you combine self-compassion with stress, you see studies show time and time again, less anxiety, less depression, less shame, and increased mental health or awareness. And I'll just say one more thing about how I think that happens. Think of self-compassion as a buffering effect against secondary suffering. So we come back to this quote that I'm fond of using a lot again. In life, pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional. There's no such thing as life without pain and struggle and stress. Right. But the degree of suffering, how much we suffer, depends on how we choose to relate to the situation and the struggle with more caring that can hold us up or with more criticism that can push us down. It's really an important part of resilience.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

And so when we're kind and caring to ourselves, we create that space to grow instead of getting stuck in that guilt or that fear that we can sometimes have. So let's talk about what this can look like in everyday life. So for someone who's listening today and who might be saying to themselves, okay, I'm willing to give this self-compassion a try, what might that look like or what might those first steps be to incorporating that self-compassion concept into their life?

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Yeah, great. So let's let's play with a couple basic exercises or starter steps, as you say. Beautiful. One is let's just start with the idea of picturing a friend right now. And go ahead and just, you know, join humor me with this little mental visualization exercise. Imagine you have a friend, a loved one, someone you care a lot about and have a good relationship with, and they're struggling. They're struggling with a mistake they've made. They're down on themselves, they've messed up somehow, uh, and they're really, really kind of upset, frustrated, uh, really kind of discouraged and distressed about themselves, their life, what they've done with situation or otherwise. I want you to picture, really picture what do you think and feel when you're sitting with a loved one who's really beating themselves up and down themselves for a problem they have that maybe they did contribute to, but they're really stuck in the negativity of it. What do you think and feel? Picture how you're feeling right now being with that person. What do you notice comes up for you, Marisa, about what you're thinking and feeling in such a situation?

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Yeah, I think for me, I just want to wrap them in support and be with them, want to be empathetic and listening, and you want their pain to go away. Yeah.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

And when we think about why is that, is because we have an authentic caring for them and respect for them and belief in them, then they have value beyond this mistake, beyond this problem. Whatever it may be, you can love them for all of who they are. Absolutely and that's authentic. If we're doing that blowing smoke just to make someone else feel good, that doesn't land, right? That doesn't work. But you would do that because you honestly feel that for that other person, right? And that your caring includes accepting them warts and all. And you would want to wish that for them beautiful. So what you might say and do while you're feeling that, either literally or figuratively, as you say, wrap your arms around them, you would say reassuring things like, it's okay, you know, you're still loved, you're still a good person. You would find your own words in a way that's meaningful for you and them. Again, doesn't just ring hollow. It's not placating, it's beyond authentically about, I see your value beyond this hard moment. So that's how we literally offer friendship and care to others. So the key is if I can picture doing that with someone else, how can I then befriend myself? And so we're still back to how might that be hard to start? Because there's all this conditioning and negativity bias and reasons why we might not apply it to ourselves. So then let's combine this little exercise with this notion I said again. Everybody on the planet has weaknesses or problems. Everybody is imperfect. Everybody, even with their imperfections, is worthy of care, is worthy of love. And if you believe that to be true, you are not the lone exception on the planet for whom that doesn't apply. Pause, breathe, wait a minute. And we can kind of laugh and joke, oh yeah, there I am again, thinking I'm the only person that doesn't deserve care or love that isn't worthy. Now, I'm not laughing at this or thinking making light of it. We can get stuck in really negative feelings and self-talk, and some of it based on very difficult, if not abusive, or traumatic life experiences. So I am in no way laughing at that difficulty. I am saying a way to be with that and cope with it and be more resilient about it in applying self-compassion is to be able to zoom all the way out and go, wait a minute. I am part of the human race. I do believe people are all worthy and deserving of love and respect. I'm included in that circle. So then we come back to ourselves, hopefully with a more mindful presence, practicing non-judgmental present moment awareness. And a little starter trick I have for that is rather than saying, no, no, no, no, I don't deserve it. No, that makes sense to everybody else, but not for me. No, I am crap, no, I feel like crap right now, no, this is too hard for me. Which any one of us will have moments like that. In those moments, rather than saying no and pushing away or no to ourselves in terms of I don't deserve love, can we just say, oh? Just say, oh, there's that negative feeling again. Oh, there's that negative voice putting myself down again. Oh, there's that self-doubt again. Notice it and name it with just saying, oh, oh, there's that self-doubt. Oh, there's that self-loathing. It doesn't feel good, but I can notice it and name it as a human emotion, and in that way start to create space that allows me to choose how to respond to it in a more constructive way rather than just keep reacting to it and spinning downward in it. Yeah.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Love it. It's almost like that built-in pause that we've talked about in so many other episodes of just that quick breath, something to reframe, and then we can move forward from it.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Absolutely. Beautiful. The power of the pause. And another way to pause is to just say, oh, give yourself a little space to look back at the situation, maybe just a little more objectively and a little bit more compassionately. So there's many other exercises. We won't have time for all of them today. We can practice loving kindness exercises for ourselves and others. And when I say exercises, some people call them meditations. I'm literally talking about brain exercises or little habits of mind. A loving-kindness habit of mind is to literally repeat little mantras and sit a few times, you know, for a few minutes a day and say, May I be healthy? May I be happy? May I be peaceful? May my child be healthy. May my child be happy. May my child be peaceful. May my friends and family be healthy. May they be happy. May they be peaceful. May the people I work with today be healthy. May they be happy. May they be peaceful. May the stranger I meet at the checkout counter at the store. May that person as I meet them, as I'm checking out in line, I can silently say to myself, May you be healthy. I wish for you, may you be happy, and may you be peaceful today. Think and incline the mind to be kind. Center your heart on compassion care for all those you see throughout the day. Pause and recite this simple little mantra, and then come back to again, I'm not the only one on the planet that doesn't deserve that. So let me practice, even if, even when it's hard or awkward or weird at first, let me also then bring those same wishes back to myself. May I be healthy, may I be happy, may I be peaceful today, maybe just a little bit more. So there are ways to practice mindful meditations or simple brain exercises or affirmations that can start to shift the energy around what feels awkward or difficult. Um and you can grow into it that way. So we there's others.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Yeah, and I had mentioned Dr. Kristen Neff earlier. Um, and self-compassion break is something that comes from her studies and one that I often use when I'm feeling unbalanced or struggling.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Awesome.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

And so let's just quickly walk through this together. So first, take a slow deep breath in and out. Allow yourself to pause. You don't need to fix anything right now. We're just simply noticing what's here. And we may say to ourselves, this is a moment of struggle or this is hard for me right now. That simple acknowledgement helps us recognize what we're feeling instead of pushing it away. Next, remind yourself that you're not alone. Struggle is part of being human, and everyone feels this way sometimes. That phrase gets us to that power of common humanity. It reminds us that pain and imperfection connects us rather than isolate us. And finally, offer yourself some kindness. You may place a hand on your heart or wherever you feel tension and say something gentle like, may I be kind to myself in this moment. Or may I give myself the care and understanding that I need. And then take another deep breath. Breathing in. I know I'm breathing in. And breathing out, I know I'm breathing out. And that's it. That short pause to notice, to connect, and care, that can completely shift our mindset in a moment that's stressful. And so this really helps us with modeling that self-compassion for young people, whether we're a parent, an educator, or a mentor.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Yeah. Amen. Beautiful. Thank you for that. I appreciate just sitting in your guidance there and some the support of bringing that care to myself. So thank you. That was beautiful, Marisa. And yes, right, we can't give what we don't have. So self-care, self-regulation is how we build self-regulation and resilience in our kids. We got to start there. Simple mnemonic for remembering Dr. Neff's self-compassion break that Marisa just guided us through there. I call it name it, normalize it, nurture it, name it. This is a hard moment right now, right? Don't personalize it. It's not I messed up. This is hard right now. This is a difficult moment. This is a difficult feeling. Just name it and then normalize it. It is human. It is not personal. It is not me. I am not alone with this. Many people feel this. And then nurture it. Nurture the moment, nurture yourself with some of the guided phrases that we just had there. Name it, normalize it, nurture it. Practice that every day, and you'll start to build this capacity for self-compassion that will build your capacity for being resilient in hard times.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Thank you. And I think it's an important reminder that self-compassion doesn't take away from others. It actually helps us show up more fully for them. What would you tell someone who's trying to be more self-compassionate but feels like they're failing at it?

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Yeah. It's bringing that mindful present moment awareness and acceptance to even that struggle. Like, oh, I'm struggling to be patient with myself. Oh, there I am. See, I can't even do this right. Damn it, I'm screwing this up too. I really am a, you know, mess up. Pause, breathe. Oh, there's that inner critic voice again. Dang, it's loud and it's annoying. Yeah, yeah, it is. And I am more than my negative thoughts. I am more than a moment of self-doubt or self-reproach. I'm I am, in fact, perfectly imperfect. I am imperfect. Go ahead. Repeat after me, everybody. I am imperfect. I am imperfect. I am imperfect. In fact, I am perfectly imperfect just as I am right now. I can't be anyone other than who I am right now. And in that little silly mantra, I do recommend practicing it. Try it. See if you can grow into it. Fake it till you make it, some people call it. But repeating these little habits of mind, these little exercises, it's about accept recognizing and accepting our imperfections and then choosing how we're going to be with them. We're going to make mistakes, we're going to screw up, we're going to feel crappy about our mistakes, we're going to feel guilty, we're going to feel shame at times. Pause, breathe. Oh, there's that feeling of shame again. I'm imperfect just like everyone else. Am I going to pile on to make it worse and be more miserable? Or am I going to choose to have this be a moment of opportunity, an opportunity to practice, practice mindful acceptance and caring, practice self-compassion? Am I going to use this moment in this pain to grow my misery and self-pity? Or self-anger, perhaps even self-hatred at times? Or am I going to use this moment, pause, breathe? This is a hard moment. Am I go how am I going to be with it? Am I going to use it to grow with self-understanding and self-care, to be less miserable instead of more miserable? It's an opportunity to practice, an opportunity to grow.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Thank you. Beautifully said. And so this week, I challenge all of our listeners to notice a moment when they're hard on themselves. Pause, take that breath, and try offering the same words you'd share with that close friend. So, Dr. Montminy, thank you for joining us today and sharing your wisdom and your warmth.

Dr. Peter Montminy:

Yeah, thank you for your wisdom and warmth. It's been a great conversation, an important one for all of us.

Marisa Vicere, Jana Marie Foundation:

Absolutely. In our next episode, we'll be talking about building resilience through the holidays, how to stay grounded, care for yourself, and find moments of connection during what can be a both a joyful and challenging season. I hope you'll join us for that conversation. This podcast is brought to you by Jana Marie Foundation, where we're dedicated to opening minds and saving lives through conversations that matter. And by A Mindful Village, where Dr. Peter Motminy provides holistic mental health care for kids and their caregivers. Together, let's keep showing up, speaking up, and supporting the young minds who need us most. Remember, even the smallest actions can create waves of change.