When the Language of Self-Love Turns Us Off

Regional dialect 

I grew up in Yorkshire in the nineties, in a culture that valued pragmatism, grit, and getting on with things. Words like “self-love,” “self-care,” and “self-compassion” weren’t part of my vocabulary. If anything, they were viewed with suspicion. It was language associated with being spoiled, mollycoddled, being a bit needy. Which is to say, it meant not being reliable or capable. I wouldn’t have been able to verbalise this - it sort of just was. And because I had never talked about it, it had gone unchecked, and therefore believed for a long time.

Some years later when I began to understand my own inner critic and how harsh it was, part of me really resisted changing it. For two reasons. First, I like being pragmatic, having grit and getting on with things. I assumed that having self-love or self-compassion or indulging in self-care would mean I’d lose these parts of myself. Second, being hard on myself did actually feel productive. I worried if I stopped being harsh, I’d become lazy. Even when I began to see self-compassion more like ‘being kinder to myself’ rather than being spoiled. I thought that self-compassion was the equivalent to letting myself off the hook. What I’ve come to understand, both personally and through my work with clients, is that I had both these things completely wrong.

There’s space for more than one or the other.

The idea that I was losing something by becoming self-compassionate was a fallacy. I will never lose or unlearn pragmatism and grit. It’s like my mother tongue. Becoming self-compassionate was like learning a new language or adding more strings to my bow. It helped me see I had a choice. I didn’t have to do something just because I could grit my way through it. Choosing to pass on some things actually increased my motivation to take on different and more rewarding challenges.

Seeing ourselves clearly

Self-compassion isn’t about telling ourselves we’re perfect, blanket-forgiving mistakes, or avoiding accountability. It’s about seeing ourselves clearly and in context. When we look at ourselves with self-criticism, we’re looking through a narrow and short-sighted lens. We see the mistake, the flaw, the failure and we stop there. Self-compassion widens that lens. It doesn’t erase the mistake; it puts it in perspective and gives us feedback. When we’re just criticised, it not only makes us feel rubbish, it doesn’t provide any room for learning or growth.

Our best teachers

Thinking back to school, I remember classes with harsh teachers vividly. These were my worst subjects, probably not entirely because I lacked ability, but because I was scared of making mistakes. That fear shut down my curiosity, my willingness to try, my ability to ask for help. I aimed to avoid attention and hope the class passed as uneventfully for me as possible.

The subjects I did well in were the ones where I had the best teachers. Teachers who supported learning, who created an environment where you could put your hand up and say “I don’t understand this” without humiliation. Teachers who assessed your work accurately - if you got a good grade, it was because you’d done well. If you got a bad grade, it wasn’t a punishment. They’d offer time to talk about it and provide constructive feedback.

Whenever I talk with clients about this it’s usually the same. The best learning experience comes from the fair and supportive teacher, not the harsh one. And the same seems true of the best bosses and leaders - those who have a clear vision, are trustworthy and empathetic – they get the best out of us.

It works this way in the relationship we have with ourselves. When our inner voice is punishing and critical, we stop taking risks. We stop asking for help. We hide our confusion and pretend we’ve got it together, because the cost of admitting otherwise feels too high. But when our inner voice is more like the good leader - honest, fair, encouraging - we’re more willing to try, to fail, to learn, and to keep building.

Yeah, but the words still don’t sit right

If you find yourself wincing at the sound of “self-love” or “self-care,” you’re really not alone. And it’s perhaps not entirely surprising that the people who could benefit most from the idea are often the ones most put off by the language. I’ve heard everything from “it sounds childish” to “it sounds erotic.” The words really do seem to get in the way. Self-care is often conflated with being selfish, or self-indulgent and marketing would have us believe it something we can just buy, and keep buying.

What I’ve found far more useful when working with self-criticism is the phrase self-respect. This language is aligned with an intention that is often behind our self-criticism. Often our inner critic shouts at us, not because it hates us, but because it wants us to achieve things, be better versions of ourselves, not coast along or miss out. It wants us to have respect for ourselves. But speaking to ourselves with respect sounds very different to speaking to ourselves with criticism.

Self-respect sounds like:

“You made a simple mistake there. You’re not stupid so this is a sign something is up. You’ve been busy for hours now you haven’t realised how tired you are – the mistake is a sign it’s time to stop.”

“This was harder than expected. It looks like you don’t have the skills for this yet, and that’s okay — let’s investigate what we can do about that.”

“You keep pursuing something you don’t enjoy and aren’t drawn to — is it possible you’re allowed to choose something else?”

And crucially, it sometimes sounds like: “Actually, that wasn’t your fault. Nothing else to do here.”

This kind of inner voice isn’t soft or mollycoddling. It’s honest and, crucially, supportive. It offers clear, constructive feedback rather than criticism. For many people I’ve worked with, and for myself,  finding language that is palatable and relatable can be the gateway to accessing the well-researched benefits of self-compassion. Not as self-indulgence, but as something honest and grounded: a genuine attempt to see ourselves clearly. And when that shift happens, things begin to change. We see new ways of doing things and things that felt stuck begin to move. Respect to that.