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mental health week 2024: compassion-focused therapy answers 'a call to be kind'
compassion-focused therapy was designed for those who experience poor mental health that revolves around shame, self-criticism, and low self-esteem.
compassion-focused therapy is gaining popularity for its ability to improve mood disorders.
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compassion-focused therapy (cft), otherwise known as compassion mind training (cmf), is the addition of compassion training techniques into psychotherapy.
the main goal of cft is to drive kinder thinking habits towards oneself and others, and the novel therapy was designed for those who experience poor mental health that revolves around shame, self-criticism, and low self-esteem.
the therapy technique is guided by the idea that a person’s happiness greatly depends on how compassionate they are towards themselves, others in their lives, and the world around them.
with “a call to be kind” and #compassionconnects as the themes for the canadian mental health association’s (cmha) mental health week from may 6-12 in canada, it’s more important than ever to highlight ways we can learn to be kinder to ourselves to improve our mental health.
the invention of compassion-focused therapy
psychologist and author paul gilbert founded and introduced cft into the psychotherapy world in 2000. gilbert utilized buddhist teachings and traditions to create cft, with the buddhist definition of compassion at the forefront of the practice.
the definition, “a sensitivity to suffering in self and others, with a commitment to try to alleviate and prevent it” is utilized in cft to encourage others to develop the skills needed to practice compassion and kindness through mindfulness-based techniques in a way that improves a person’s mental health scores.
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gilbert came up with the idea based on his work with individuals who responded poorly to therapy because of self-limiting internal talk and a lack of a supporting inner voice.
how compassion-focused therapy works
cft is similar to cognitive behavioural therapy (cbt), a therapeutic approach that involves training the mind to cope with mental health struggles and life stressors by improving a person’s thoughts, attitudes, and beliefs as they relate to how a person feels about themselves and their everyday actions.
there are different techniques used in cft, two of which are the most common: compassion images and compassion behaviour tasks. the exercises in the images technique are geared toward helping people understand their individual take on compassion by assessing their ideal depiction of what that would be through facial expression, tone of voice, and word association to images created based on their idea of compassion. the images technique may also call on those participating in the therapy to act out compassion using the same parameters.
the behaviour side of cft is an exposure therapy that puts people into situations that may spike negative feelings toward themselves or others and have them practice being kind and sensitive to themselves. while this technique is designed to help people learn how to speak and think more positively about themselves in negative situations, it is also intended to encourage the acceptance of positive emotions in people who tend to lean toward feelings of guilt, shame, or fear, when experiencing something positive.
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research has found that certain aspects of a person’s life, feelings, mental health, and personal history can all be improved using cft, including:
- feelings of shame, stress, fear, anger, low self-esteem, and poor body image
- mental health issues, including depression, anxiety, eating disorders, addiction, and personality disorders
- relationships with others
- thinking and behaviour patterns that stem from trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd)
the various components of cft revolve around different approaches and types of psychology, all combined to create a therapeutic program that changes a person’s natural emotion regulation system when skewed. the types of psychology used include:
- developmental
- evolutionary
- buddhist
- neuropsychology
by combing the different types, all of which look at the environmental, biological, and motivational factors that contribute to emotional and behavioural motives of people, it is easier to see precisely how these factors have a hold on human behaviour, emotion regulation, and the regard for others and oneself.
overall, the therapy utilized different psychotherapeutic avenues to pull focus to each part of the emotion regulation system in an effort to balance all three systems that play into emotion regulation for better mental health.
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the science behind compassion-focused therapy
there are three human affect regulation systems that cft works on to help improve the mental health status of individuals with varying degrees of mental unwellness: threat protection, seeking and acquiring, and contentment/soothing. these biological mechanisms are part of evolutionary biology and were meant to encourage healthy emotional regulation.
when looking at threat protection from an evolutionary standpoint, the human brain cannot distinguish between outward and inward threats, as both can have the same negative impacts on someone’s well-being. for example, someone being bullied by another will feel the same in the brain as if they were in the mirror saying those same things to themself. this system helps to establish fight, flight, or submission behaviours.
the seeking and acquiring system is related to a person’s attention toward gaining resources and motivation to seek out positive emotions through experiences. it helps to establish feelings of excitement, vitality, and reward. in the modern world, this system is often associated with sexual relationships, food, and success.
however, it can also drive certain mental health disorders, including addiction, as a person’s reward center is activated when they seek and find the substance of choice. in today’s world, the active ability to seek and acquire is hindered due to convenience and accessibility to those things that, in the past, required more drive and work. when the emotional drive is not stimulated due to easy access, it can malfunction.
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the contentment/soothing system is involved with the attachment/affiliation system. it helps to foster feelings of well-being, peacefulness, and essentially being content with what a person has in their life. it is connected to the rest and digest aspect of evolutionary neuroscience in the sense that, when a person is in the contentment/soothing state, their body is at rest because they have achieved all that they need to be content.
when this system is activated in emotional regulation, it taps into chemicals designed to drive positive emotions, such as oxytocin, endorphins, and opiates. it is the only system that “deactivates” a person, whereas threat protection and seeking and acquiring are designed to activate the bodily system to respond to a person’s environment.
compassion, as the driving force for the therapy, has been shown to activate specific areas of the brain as a response to emotional stimuli, including other’s suffering. when a person can feel compassion toward themselves and others through training techniques in cft, their ability to feel empathy and practice kindness increases, which initiates the self-soothing response, hindering the action of the threat and drive responses as a result until they are needed again.
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cft is designed to play on these systems, essentially resetting them so they are appropriately regulated within the body, improving a person’s mental health scores and thinking and behaviour patterns based on their feelings and actions.
benefits of compassion-focused therapy and the research behind them
emotional regulation and the balance of the systems that control it is a crucial aspect of mental health. when a person has healthy emotion regulation, they can:
- recognize and understand their emotional responses
- accept emotional responses, even if they are seemingly “negative”, such as anger or sadness
- access strategies to reduce intense negative emotions
- control impulsive behaviours that are driven by upset, anger, or fear
however, when the balance of these systems is off, a person may not be able to regulate any of the abovementioned instances. for example, if a person without balance in their emotion regulation systems receives enraging news, they may get into a physical altercation with another person or trash their home to cope with the news. these behaviours only perpetuate and strengthen internal negative self-views and feelings of shame, embarrassment, or fear.
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the regulation of these systems through cft is meant to improve a person’s reactions and coping skills in a way that prevents them from engaging in negative behaviours and the ensuing negative self-views that occur through the art of compassion for self and others.
research regarding compassion and its effects on mental and emotional states has found that when a person can adequately practice compassion, they are more likely to experience an enhanced quality of life due to better mental and physical health. other positive impacts of practicing compassion include:
- enabling positive thinking habits
- a reduction in overall stress levels and cortisol, the hormone that gets released during times of stress
- higher quality relationships with others
- a reduction in mood disorders
- a healthier immune response
- better maintenance of blood pressure
when gilbert was creating cft, he conducted a 12-week group therapy session study using the technique to help patients establish a kinder and more compassionate inner voice in a way that offers self-soothing capabilities in the face of adversities.
over the 12 weeks, he saw the patients improve in various aspects of mental health, including drastic improvements in their ability to practice self-compassion, leading to less self-criticism and shame.
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participants were also more self-assured following the therapy, with decreases in both anxiety and depression symptoms taking place as well. the participants also improved their ability to self-soothe and practiced less submission-based behaviours.
future directions for compassion-focused therapy
while the novel therapy is relatively new on the scene, the current scientific evidence is painting a positive picture of a viable and effective therapeutic option for people who are not yet able to live life from an emotionally regulated state.
that said, more research is continuously being conducted to investigate the therapy and how it can impact specific conditions as they relate to negative feelings towards oneself or others. the evidence continues to mount toward cft being a mainstay therapy for various mental health issues that people of the modern world continue to contend with.
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