Be kind to your mind: Self-compassion for Irish dancers

How many times a day do you find yourself:

• Being super hard on yourself 
• Telling yourself off inside your own mind
• Putting yourself down
• Talking to yourself using unkind language
• Overworking yourself
• Not taking enough rest each week 

If you find that you do this multiple times a day - whether that be inside or outside of the Irish dancing world - then you need to work on your self-compassion. Simply, self-compassion is how kind you are to yourself, whether that be through your words and/or your actions. We find, at MWM, that dancers often come to us with low levels of self-compassion, which they sometimes can’t even recognise themselves. 

If you are someone who has spoken to themselves unkindly inside their head or overworked themselves for a long time, then this can be a hard routine or habit to break - but it is possible. We KNOW that it is, because we have done it ourselves. And it still creeps in every now and then if we’re not too careful. 

Why is self-compassion important for my Irish dancing?

Self-compassion is important for Irish dancing because it drastically impacts our confidence, self-belief and ultimately how you dance on the stage. If you have spent the last few weeks, months, years telling yourself that you are not good enough, not worthy enough or not strong enough to compete at the standard you’re currently at, then you’re hardly going to walk on the stage with confidence and the desire to show off! Also, if you’ve spent a long time overworking and not getting enough rest, then you’re hardly going to feel great when you do take necessary rest days or find yourself injured as a result of overworking. By working on your self-compassion you’ll make your head a happier place to be, you’ll be more likely to work harder, master new moves, perform with confidence and believe in yourself. 

How do I improve my self-compassion?

There are multiple different ways to work on your self-compassion, but today I am going to highlight just two ways that I want you to try over the next month to see how they impact how you feel. The key, like everything else we talk about, is to be consistent and if you find that you miss a day then make sure you pick it back up on the following day - don’t let that one missed day become a missed week or month! 

Today I have….

This task is one that Annabelle is a big fan of, and she gives a longer version of this task to her 1:1 Mindset dancers who also struggle with self-compassion. At the end of the day, each night before you go to sleep, we want you to spend some time answering this question ‘What three things have I done well today?’ and you have to answer this question on your own. It can something as small as making a nice cup of tea or helping your mum cook dinner or it can be something much bigger like helping someone in school who was struggling or giving more effort in dance class than you normally do. By doing this every day you are teaching your brain to look out for the times when you have done something well and every single day you do many amazing things - you just don’t always see or recognise them. 

The best friend talk

We want you to imagine that you are talking to your best friend every time you talk to yourself. Would you tell your best friend that she was the worst Irish dancer in the world because she made a mistake at class or a feis? Would you tell your friend to do 3x fulls even though they were sick? NO! Of course you wouldn’t and if you did you probably wouldn’t have a best friend for much longer. So why do we feel like it is ok to talk to ourselves like this??

This week try to talk to yourself and about yourself like you would your very best friend in the world. Compliment yourself (yes, that’s a good thing to do!), give yourself comfort, manage your expectations, learn from mistakes, find the positives - just like you would to your friend. 

Give these tasks a try for the next month and see how it impacts how you feel and how you perform. We are confident that you’ll feel more confident and happier in your dancing journey, but you’ll also be more likely to try new things, increase the difficulty of your choreography, forgive yourself for mistakes, learn from errors, believe in yourself more, perform on stage, dance at the front of the stage or even achieve that big 2024 dream of yours! 

Happier dancers perform better than unhappy dancers - so make your head a happy place to live! 

If you’re looking for more mindset tasks to complete each week, then our MWM Gold Club has a weekly Mindset class with Annabelle each week and dancers are given homework to help them think in new ways and break down limiting beliefs. You can also sign up to work with Annabelle on a 1:1 basis here.