This article is adapted from an episode of Live Well Be Well, the podcast from Polsen Ambassador Sarah Ann Macklin. Sarah sits down with Professor Paul Gilbert OBE, the clinical psychologist who founded compassion focused therapy, to explore why we’re so much harder on ourselves than on others, and what that inner critic is actually doing to our body. Prefer to watch? The full conversation is just below.
What’s the first thing you say to yourself after you get something wrong? If it sounds closer to a disappointed manager than a supportive friend, you’re not alone.
Most of us are far kinder to others than to ourselves. We assume the harsh voice keeps us sharp, and that going easy would make us weak.
Your body sees it differently. Self-criticism and self-compassion affect your heart, and the way your body responds, very differently. Here’s what’s really going on, and how to practise a kinder approach.
What Compassion Actually Is (and Isn’t)
Ask someone to describe compassion and you’ll probably hear words like soft, sweet or kind-hearted. Rarely will you hear brave.
Clinical psychologist Paul Gilbert, who founded compassion focused therapy (CFT), defines it very differently. In his widely used definition, compassion has two parts: noticing suffering, in yourself and in others, and committing to do something about it.
That second part is the one people miss. Noticing pain isn’t enough on its own; compassion is what you do next. In an interview with The Psychologist, Gilbert described kindness as more of a sentiment, while compassion means turning towards difficulty rather than away from it. And that takes courage.
Think of the friend who drops everything to be with you after bad news, or the colleague who speaks up when someone’s being treated unfairly. Neither is being “nice”, exactly. Both are noticing suffering and stepping towards it.
Self-compassion works the same way, only turned inwards. It isn’t self-pity, or letting yourself off the hook. It’s closer to how a good coach treats an athlete after a bad race: honest about what went wrong, firmly on their side, and focused on what happens next.
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Why Your Brain Holds On to the One Bad Thing
There’s a reason that harsh voice is so loud. A widely cited 2001 review pulled together decades of research and found the same pattern almost everywhere psychologists looked: bad experiences, bad feedback and bad impressions carry more weight than good ones, and the brain processes them more thoroughly.
The authors’ explanation is evolutionary. For our ancestors, jumping at a harmless noise only cost a moment of fright, but ignoring real danger could cost their life. So the brain learned to play it safe, and it still pays more attention to the bad than the good.
Gilbert builds on this with what’s often called the three systems model of emotion:
Threat: spots danger and gets you ready to protect yourself
Drive: pushes you to chase goals, rewards and achievements
Soothing: helps you rest, connect and feel safe
We need all three. The trouble is that modern life gives the first two plenty to do (inboxes, deadlines, notifications) and the third very little.
And here’s the twist: when you criticise yourself, your body doesn’t seem to file it under “useful feedback”. It responds as if your inner critic were just another threat.
What Your Inner Critic Does to Your Heart
In a 2019 study from the Universities of Exeter and Oxford, 135 students each listened to an 11-minute recording. Some were guided to be kind to themselves, through a calm body scan or soothing thoughts. Others replayed something that went wrong in a harsh inner voice, gave themselves a competitive pep talk, or simply imagined a trip to the shops.
What they found:
Self-compassion: heart rate slowed by two to three beats per minute compared with the self-critical group, and heart rate variability (HRV) rose
Self-criticism: a faster heart rate and more sweating, the classic signs of threat
The surprise? The students who gave themselves a competitive pep talk also said they felt kinder towards themselves afterwards, but their bodies didn’t show it. Feeling good about yourself isn’t the same as being kind to yourself.
These were healthy volunteers doing one-off exercises, but the message is clear: how you speak to yourself shows up in your body.
Compassion Is a Skill, Not a Personality Type
Compassion isn’t a fixed trait; it’s something you can develop and train. Like learning a language or an instrument, it takes practice, and the more you practise it on yourself, the more naturally it extends to others.
Here are three ways to start. Little and often works better than one big effort:
Swap the voice: when your inner critic pipes up, ask what you’d say to a friend in the same situation, then say it to yourself.
Slow your breath: breathe in gently and let each out-breath run a little longer, until your breathing feels unhurried.
Turn outwards: send one message to someone who’s having a hard time. Not advice, just a sign you’ve noticed.
Kindness That Lasts Longer Than a Day
Kindness often gets its moment on a special day, but your body works on a much more everyday schedule. It responds to how you speak to yourself on an ordinary Tuesday, after a tricky meeting, or late at night when your inner critic gets going.
That’s where noticing helps. The Reactivity Monitor™ on your Polsen watch shows how often your reactivity rises above your baseline (stress frequency) and how quickly you return to it (stress recovery), while night HRV reflects how well your body restores itself overnight. Over a few weeks, patterns start to emerge, including the days you were hardest on yourself.
And when you feel pressure building, the Intentions tab in your Polsen Health app has short sessions to help, from CBT-based exercises to guided breathing, or an unguided session where you can watch your HRV respond in real time (currently on iOS).
Kindness towards others matters. But it’s worth starting with the one person you’ll spend every day of your life with: you.
