As one of Britain's most insightful psychologists, Gilbert illuminates the power of compassion in our lives.'

The Compassionate Mind by Prof Paul Gilbert | Waterstones

When the Dalai Lama first came to the West, he was stunned by the levels of self-dissatisfaction, self-disappointment, self-criticism and self-dislike he encountered. For all our technology and comforts, he found us a people in conflict with ourselves.” We believe that one of the greatest challenges facing humanity is how to stimulate compassionate ways of thinking and problem solving for the benefit of all. The cooperative mentality can orient us to be egalitarian in our ways of thinking. Recent evidence suggests that egalitarian attitudes produce more healthy responses when people are confronted with stressful social encounters than biased, competitive and non-egalitarian attitudes.13 There’s also growing evidence that fostering cooperative attitudes and behaviours in children and adolescents (in contrast to competitive and individualistic ones) promotes positive relationships, improved mental and physical health and higher achievements.14 In addition, it’s increasingly thought that cooperative groups will out-compete competitive/individualistic ones in the long term. In fact, business is finding out that the internet is a good source for problem-solving because people simply like to share their thoughts and ideas for free! It’s sad that, in the face of this, governments continue to buy into the business model that competition creates efficiency. Within the NHS, for example, we’re increasingly split into small competing groups called ‘business units’. Fostering high levels of cooperation would be far better.” develop different abilities (and vice versa). For example, with more compassionate attention and thinking, we might increase our feelings and motivations to be caring; or practising compassionate attention and thinking might increase our empathy and reduce our condemning tendencies.”

Our Mission and Aim To promote wellbeing through the scientific understanding and application of compassion via: This ability to have empathy for difference, to be open to diversity, to work hard at thinking about how other people may differ from you is a key step on the road to compassion – and it’s not always easy.” We can live life in the ‘if only’ lane or make the best of it and appreciate where we are right now. So the question for me was not ‘How can I have 20 years’ experience on Day 1?’ because that wasn’t possible. Everyone has to walk exactly the same road as I was walking, from being inexperienced to experienced. There is no other way. Rather the question she wanted me to ask myself was ‘How can I be the best young, inexperienced therapist I can be, given my limitations?’ Because that was all there was for these individuals – there was no one else. It was a harsh lesson in some ways but it helped me confront the reality of my limitations: I could only be what I could be.” Supporting research and teaching of the evolution informed compassion focused approach to human difficulties. Now archetypes are no more than ‘rules of thumb’, ideas that are linked to the innate aspects of our minds. Personas, shadows, hero archetypes and so on are just ways of describing and thinking about different aspects of ourselves. In fact, psychologists are constantly debating and researching how best to describe and understand the interactions of what is innate in us and how our innate potential turns into lived experiences. The point here is to think about the ways that archetypal processes live in all of us and can be harnessed, often without our full awareness.”

The Compassionate Mind (Compassion Focused Therapy) The Compassionate Mind (Compassion Focused Therapy)

In societies that encourage us to compete with each other, compassion is often seen as a weakness. Striving to get ahead, self-criticism, fear, and hostility towards others seem to come more naturally to us. That for me is a key to compassion – recognizing that we have not been designed, that we all just find ourselves here, not because we (or some other power) chose for us to be here.” According to Aristotle and ancient Greek tradition, the only people deserving of compassion are those who do not deserve their suffering, and that sentiment, which is alien to Buddhist compassion, has continued to ripple through Western thought.” The definition of compassion used by the Compassionate Mind Foundation is "...a sensitivity to suffering in self and others with a commitment to try to alleviate and prevent it." So can we practise deliberately choosing to refocus our reasoning helpfully – to ask ourselves the question: ‘What’s a helpful way for me to think about this problem, situation or difficulty?’ Imagine reasoning it through with a friend, or having a dialogue with someone else who is compassionate”We provide workshops, conferences, and a number of different resources for clinicians and individuals to support their work and personal practice, and facilitate the open discussion on how to promote compassionate motives and behaviours across all domains. The Compassionate Mind Foundation promotes an evolutionary and bio-psycho-social informed approach to compassion which now forms the basis of a psychotherapy ( CFT) and Compassionate Mind Training. Facilitating open discussion on how to further promote a compassionate focus in many domains of human activity.

About - Paul Gilbert

when we give up blaming and condemning ourselves (and others) for things then we are freer to genuinely set sail towards developing the insight, knowledge and understanding we need to take responsibility for ourselves and our actions. Learning and practising compassion will help us feel more content and at peace with ourselves and also more concerned for others.” It’s compassionate because, although taking what might seem an easier path in the short term (e.g. avoiding doing anything) might give us temporary relief, it doesn’t take us anywhere” We can learn to be open and even amused by some of what goes on in our minds once we are honest about it. However, acting out some of our fantasies, being taken over by some of our desires, wants, fears or vengeful feelings, can cause problems – so as we’ll see, we can learn to develop a way of becoming aware and honest but equally more in control of some of our feelings and urges. Our actions have consequences, and we as a species can understand that and (sometimes) foresee them. Life is about learning when to act and when not to act on our desires and emotions. This takes us to the heart of compassionate behaviour because it isn’t just about acting in kind, warm and friendly ways. It’s also about protecting ourselves and others from our own destructive desires and actions; it’s about being assertive, tolerating discomfort and developing courage”We do not become greedy by seeking the ugly; we do not seek power to make things ugly. Books comprising myths can thus prevent us from seeing that it is our own greed for nice things that can be, for others, a source of injustice and vengeance. By constantly creating these false good/beautiful, bad/ugly distinctions, we are able to turn a blind eye to our own destructiveness, because we think that we are pursuing the pleasant, the beautiful and the good. The compassionate point is to focus on what is common to all of us – which is the struggle we have within our own evolved brains and minds with so many competing urges and feelings. We can open our eyes to the ease with which we can become deluded and not see the realities we are creating around us – through no fault of our own.”

The Compassionate Mind Quotes by Paul A. Gilbert - Goodreads The Compassionate Mind Quotes by Paul A. Gilbert - Goodreads

Receiving kindness, gentleness, warmth and compassion tells the brain that the world is safe and other people are helpful rather than harmful. Receiving kindness, gentleness, warmth and compassion improves our immune system and reduces the levels of stress hormones. Receiving kindness, gentleness, warmth and compassion helps us to feel soothed and settled and is conducive to good sleep. Kindness, gentleness, warmth and compassion are like basic vitamins for our minds.”The Compassionate Mind Foundation supports research and teaching of an evolution and contemplative informed compassion focused approach to human difficulties. We can also become more aware of how our societies may be stimulating the selfish ‘me first’ part of ourselves with unrealistic fantasies and desires and setting us up to want more and more and, at the same time, to feel more disappointed and personal failures” The Compassionate Mind explains the evolutionary and social reasons why our brains react so readily to threats - and reveals how our brains are also hardwired to respond to kindness and compassion.