8/22 (Sat.) Self-Compassion / Maturity (Host: Andy)

[Andy]

Hello! I'm Andy. It's my pleasure to be the host on 8/22.

Recently, we have discussed some topics about self-improvement.
No more self-improvement and self-change!
Instead, being yourself and accepting who you are as you are.

Session I: Self-Compassion

Overcoming Objections to Self-Compassion
[Questions]
1. Self-compassion is extending compassion to one's self in instances of perceived inadequacy, failure, or general suffering. In your opinion, what is the difference between having compassion for yourself and others? Which one is easier for you and why?
2. Is comparing yourself to others important and needed? How do you feel about the idea that people need to feel better than others to feel good about themselves?
3. Is self-compassion a form of self-pity, self-indulgence or excuse-making? Do you think self-compassion can help your sense of self-worth?
4. How do you feel about the sentences with "Negative Energy" below?
- If life knocks you down, then just stay lying down.
- Sometimes you worry about your abilities is not good enough, don’t, because you are correct.
- People who are gifted are still working hard in life, there’s no point to try anymore.
- While you are still young, take more challenges so when you grow old, you will get used to it eventually.
Source: http://blog.etalkingonline.com/negativeenergy/

Session II: Maturity

25 Signs of Maturity: How Mature Are You?
Article: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/25-signs ... _b_6423960

[Questions]
1. In your opinion, what is maturity and how can the maturity of a person be defined?
2. Is maturity of people related to their age, their upbringing or their personality?
3. How do you know if someone or even your life partner is mature or not?
4. What did you learn as an adult that shocked you?
5. Do women really mature faster than men? Do you agree that girls are more mature than boys and men are more mature than women?

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Agenda:
3:45 ~ 4:00pm Greetings & Free Talk / Ordering Beverage or Meal / Getting Newcomer’s Information
4:00 ~ 4:10pm Opening Remarks / Newcomer’s Self-introduction / Grouping
(Session I)
4:10 ~ 4:50pm Discussion Session (40 mins)
4:50 ~ 5:10pm Summarization (20 mins)
5:10 ~ 5:15pm Regrouping / Instruction Giving / Taking a 10 Minutes Break (Intermission)
(Session II)
5:15 ~ 5:55pm Discussion Session (40 mins)
6:00 ~ 6:20pm Summarization (20 mins)
6:20 ~ 6:30pm Concluding Remarks / Announcements

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Meeting Date: As shown on the Subject Line
Meeting Time: 4:00pm – 6:30pm
Meeting Venue: 丹堤咖啡 Dante Coffee (Minimum Order $85)
Address: 台北市濟南路三段25號[MAP]-捷運忠孝新生站3號出口步行3分鐘

Important Notes:
1. We advise participants to print out the discussion questions and bring them to the meeting for reference. As for the supporting articles, feel free to print them out, as well, according to your preference.
2. We suggest that participants read the articles and think about the questions in advance.
3. Newcomers should prepare a two-to-three minute self-introduction in English to deliver when called upon by the host before the start of the discussion. The host may also ask you to give brief feedback about the meeting at the conclusion of the meeting.
4. We conduct the entire meeting in English. All participants should have at least moderate English-conversation skills and be able to articulate your ideas for each discussion question.
5. We welcome newcomers and other guests to attend the meetings and join the discussion freely for two times. After that, we hope you will consider becoming a YoYo English Club member. We charge a NT$1500 lifetime membership fee, or NT$1000 for students.

[Janice Wang]

What makes human beings different from animals? We not only possess thoughts and feelings but also can deliver them to the people in need on a timely basis. Compassion is one of the most powerful emotions that connects people and helps us understand each other no matter what economic, social, or ethnic background we have. I believe that compassion is a capacity within each of us. No one is a stranger to pain and suffering that allows us to be in tune with how others feel, communicate, and understand one another, and including with ourselves.

Is self-compassion possible to be misconstrued as a form of self-pity, self-indulgence, or excuse-making? I think it all boils down to the fact - how honest are we with ourselves? It can often be confusing if we do not make inquiries to ourselves or let the inner voice speak volumes for clarity. However, for a person who gets used to being critical and strict to oneself, a self pep talk or self-compassion can really brighten up one’s life!

“Negative energy “, a playful sense of humor, is part and parcel of getting a bang out of those negatives that inflicted on us. One can laugh with all those trials and tribulations and hope to bounce back from where we fall as soon as we can! Besides, we can always make the best of whatever life throws at us other than self-compassion. When life gives us lemons, make lemonade!

[Andy]

Is self-compassion possible to be misconstrued as self-pity, self-indulgence, or excuse-making? I think it all boils down to the fact - how honest are we with ourselves? It can often be confusing if we do not make inquiries to ourselves or let the inner voice speak volumes for clarity. However, for a person who gets used to being critical and strict to oneself, a self pep talk or self-compassion can really brighten up one’s life!

I totally agree with you. Being honest with ourselves is key to living life to the fullest. We tend to be picky to ourselves with self-criticism when we don’t meet our high standards. Instead of endlessly chasing self-esteem, we should encourage the development of self-compassion.

[Kooper]

Janice has been kicking into high gear when it comes to using idioms. I always spot countless idioms to learn from her writing. To name but a few:

be in tune with sb/sth: able or unable to realize, understand, or agree with what someone else thinks or wants

get a bang out of sth: to enjoy (something) very much

trials and tribulations: the difficulties and problems involved in something

Trying to catch up with Janice is like attempting to square the circle. This is where self-compassion and self-acceptance step in and do the trick: they keep me stay motivated and guard me from devastating self-destruction.

[Iris Wu]

I’d like to pay tributes to the host for the well-thought-out and provocative questions that simulate thoughts!

As humans, we are blessed with both motivational power and self-care capacity. Motivational power normally drives us forward, but sometimes it “overworks” and drags us too forcefully and harshly. When our “fragile mind” gets hurt by our motivational power, our self-care skills come to rescue. We get some relief from the dark side of excessive self-criticism.

For most people, though with struggles, the two forces can work themselves out. But in psychology and personal development arena, many theories were developed, and terminologies were coined, such as self-concept, self-improvement, self-criticism, self-judgment, self-indulgence, self-kindness, mindfulness, etc., to address these subconscious self-worth issues. Sometimes, we got more confused with these “mental deficiency symptoms” and became paralyzed in action due to the over-analysis.

Many of these concepts have a very fine line in between, for example, self-compassion and self-motivation. I suppose what we need is the wisdom and the advice that help us navigate through the unsettling moments for how to embrace both of them while walking the thin line, not so much on siding with either one, because neither one completes us by itself.

[Michael-liu]

1. What a coincidence! Last week Jerry introduced us a book called "Negative energy" and hoped someone in our club could translate some sentences into English. And now Andy provides a website link about thoese translations. (If my memory serves me right, Andy, you did not attend the meeting last weekend, did you? ^.^)

2. I think the second topic is also related to "self-improvement". Haha......
If we have some inmature behaviors, we need to fix them and make improvement.

The problem is, as some of us discussed at the dinner last week after meeting, we can be mature to our friends or our colleagues, but we always have hard time to do that to our loved ones, especially our life partner.

The other day I heard a NTU philosophy professor 苑舉正, whom I admire, said this in an interview "Human beings are animal of emotions, not animal of ration. Aristotle is wrong!"

I feel relieved that even this professor I admire says that. Haha......
When we have emotions, it is hard for us to maintain "mature".

Our life partner or famliy members will shout at us, but our friends or colleagues will never do that. (only your boss will)

When you are being shouted at, you probably can not keep "calm" or "peaceful", then immaturity kicks in.

So, in order to achieve maturity, I must always remind myself that "treat my life partner as a friend", "treat my life partner as a friend" , "treat my life partner as a friend".............

(Again, easier said than done, haha)

[Kooper]

Like Iris, I am in over my head when it comes to psychological terminology. We came across particularly many in this and last meetings, like it or not. Psychological terms are more or less like synonyms of a foreign language. Synonyms, by definition, are words of similar meanings. They can be used interchangeably often but there are always exceptions. And we, as a second language learner, often have a hard time getting our heads around the subtle differences.

To save me headaches, I would rather simplify the seemingly endless list of self- terms and just focus on two: self-acceptance and self-improvement. Self-compassion, through my simplification, is just another name of self-acceptance. It is accepting who we are as it is and “marrying” ourselves, as Tracy McMillan advised in the Ted Talk “The person you really need to marry.” Self-improvement, or self-motivation, is the process of bettering oneself. The seemingly conflicting mindsets actually co-exist. It is through years and even decades of trial and error as well as countless runs of finding oneself that we learn how to walk a fine line between them. To me, self-pity, self-indulgence, self-criticism, excuse making and other forms of problems are mostly symptoms of losing balance among the two mindsets.

Bear with me if my oversimplified views of psychology make you roll eyes

[Andy]

2. I think the second topic is also related to "self-improvement". Haha......
If we have some inmature behaviors, we need to fix them and make improvement.

The problem is, as some of us discussed at the dinner last week after meeting, we can be mature to our friends or our colleagues, but we always have hard time to do that to our loved ones, especially our life partner.

The other day I heard a NTU philosophy professor 苑舉正, whom I admire, said this in an interview "Human beings are animal of emotions, not animal of ration. Aristotle is wrong!"

If people around me always said "you are matured" to me, honestly I don't feel happy and I may contemplate if i should act immature some time.

10 Good Reasons To Never Become A Mature Person
https://www.mtlblog.com/opinions/10-goo ... ure-person

7 Ways Immaturity Can Make You Happier and More Successful
https://www.wisebread.com/7-ways-immatu ... successful

P.S. According to Wikipedia,it is said that maturity in psychology is the ability to respond to the environment being aware of the correct time and location to behave and knowing when to act, according to the circumstances and the culture of the society one lives in.

[Kooper]

So, in order to achieve maturity, I must always remind myself that "treat my life partner as a friend", "treat my life partner as a friend" , "treat my life partner as a friend".............

(Again, easier said than done, haha)

It's super insightful advice. I have taken note. Thanks Michael~

[Andy]

1. What a coincidence! Last week Jerry introduced us a book called "Negative energy" and hoped someone in our club could translate some sentences into English. And now Andy provides a website link about thoese translations. (If my memory serves me right, Andy, you did not attend the meeting last weekend, did you? ^.^)

I like some "negative energy" sentences, for example:

做個愛笑的人，其實更容易受傷，你總是笑，別人就覺得怎麼傷你都沒關係
以前覺得誠實是說出自己做過的事，長大才知道誠實是找不到證據反駁的事
有時候我們覺得別人誤會自己，但其實是我們誤會了自己
許多成功的經驗，都只是還沒失敗而已
現在很多人都說著要勇敢的夢，結果都只剩下做夢的勇氣，而沒有夢醒的勇氣

It is merely excerpted from the book below, it is non-commercial advertising.
https://www.books.com.tw/products/0010708664

[Andy]

Thank you for coming on such a rainy day. I enjoyed the meeting very much.

The idea that thinking with the "lower body" or "upper body" will influence whether we are mature is interesting.

Attendees (16): Andy Liu, Debby, Jason, Alice, Shirley, Edward, Kat, Jeff, Morris, Gloria, Julia, David, Kooper, Julian, Ramesh, Lewis

For dinner: Jerry, Tashi