Many therapists discover self-compassion through their own personal or professional development. They experience its transformative power and naturally want to offer it to their clients.

Yet something unexpected often happens.

The exercises that felt so helpful for one client seem ineffective—or even overwhelming—for another. Some clients respond with warmth and relief. Others become more self-critical, emotionally flooded, or disconnected.

It is tempting to conclude that these clients “aren’t ready” for self-compassion.

In my experience, something else is usually happening.

Self-compassion is not a one-size-fits-all intervention. Like every effective psychotherapy approach, it needs to be grounded in an understanding of the individual sitting in front of us. Their attachment history, trauma, capacity for reflection, nervous system, and current therapeutic relationship all matter.

Over the years of using self-compassion as a clinical psychologist, I’ve found that asking myself a few simple questions before introducing self-compassion can make all the difference. Share these questions and your reflections with your colleagues.

1. Why might self-compassion help this particular client?

Rather than asking, “Which self-compassion exercise should I use?”, start by asking: How does greater self-compassion fit within my overall case formulation and treatment plan? Self-compassion is not the goal. It is a pathway that supports other therapeutic goals, whether reducing shame, increasing emotional regulation, strengthening secure attachment from the inside out, or helping clients relate differently to difficult parts of themselves.

2. What attachment experiences does this client bring into therapy?

For many people, experiences of care were also experiences of danger.

If compassion was inconsistent, controlling, rejecting, or abusive, then inviting someone to “be kind to yourself” may simply bring up those traumatic attachment experiences. Why is that? Because our attachment past determines our compassion present to a large extent.

All self-compassion exercises tap into our attachment or care system to create that soothing feeling of being safe, held, loved and worthy. If our attachment system largely holds memories of being shamed, betrayed, humiliated, abandoned or worse, then this is what gets activated inadvertently.

The first step is for you to understand your client’s attachment history to help you tailor self-compassion exercises in ways that feel safe rather than threatening.

3. Where has this client already experienced safety?

Instead of focusing only on painful experiences, become curious about moments of genuine safety.

Perhaps the client felt accepted and cared for by a grandparent, a teacher, a pet, in nature, through music, or in spiritual practice.

These islands of safety often provide the most effective foundations for personalised self-compassion practices.

4. Can this client imagine compassionate relating—or are we creating that experience together?

Some clients already carry an inner template of compassionate relationships.

Others do not.

For them, the therapeutic relationship may become the first experience of consistently feeling understood, respected and emotionally safe.

In these moments, our own way of being becomes more important than any exercise we could teach.

Sometimes compassion is taught long before it is consciously practised.

5. Does this client currently have the capacity for inner compassionate dialogue?

Many self-compassion exercises ask clients to reflect on their thoughts, emotions and internal experiences.

For some clients this is entirely appropriate.

For others—particularly those with significant developmental trauma—it may simply be too much.

Rather than encouraging them to move inward too quickly, we can begin by making compassion concrete and relational. Compassion can first be experienced between people before it gradually becomes available within the person. Learn more in my book chapter in group therapy.

6. Am I choosing interventions because they fit my client—or because they fit me?

Every therapist naturally develops favourite exercises.

The challenge is remaining flexible.

An exercise that transformed your own relationship with yourself may not be the intervention this client needs today.

Compassion-led therapy asks us to remain flexible rather than attached to any particular technique.

7. What is happening inside me as I sit with this client?

Perhaps the most important question is not about the client at all.

What do you notice in yourself?

Are you feeling open, grounded and caring?

Or is a part of you trying to fix or to rescue your client? Or is a part of you feeling powerless and overwhelmed? Or is a part of you not feeling at all and intellectualising from a distance instead?

These moments are not signs that we are failing as therapists. They are signs that we are human beings doing challenging work.

We can use them as invitations to turn towards ourselves with the same compassion we hope to cultivate in our clients.

Our own self-compassion is not separate from our clinical work—it is one of its foundations.

8. Why do I want to introduce self-compassion now?

Finally, it is worth asking ourselves one gentle but courageous question.

Why do I want to bring self-compassion into therapy with this client right now?

Sometimes we notice that a part of us longs for the client to heal something we ourselves still find difficult to tolerate in another or within ourselves.

This isn’t something to judge.

It is simply something to notice with honesty and kindness.

The more aware we are of our own inner world, the more freely we can respond to the person in front of us, rather than unconsciously asking them to meet our own unmet needs.

Self-Compassion Is More Than a Set of Exercises

When self-compassion is introduced thoughtfully, it can profoundly transform therapy.

Not because clients learn to repeat kind phrases to themselves.

But because they gradually experience a new way of relating—to difficult emotions, painful memories, vulnerable parts of themselves and, ultimately, to their own humanity.

This requires more than learning a collection of practices.

It requires an embodied understanding when, why and how self-compassion can support healing—and when another therapeutic pathway may be needed first.

Deepen Your Clinical Practice

If you’d like to integrate self-compassion into psychotherapy in a way that is trauma-informed, attachment-informed and tailored to each individual client, I’d love to support you.

In my Self-Compassion in Clinical Practice course, you’ll learn how to move beyond generic exercises and confidently integrate self-compassion into your therapeutic work across a wide range of clinical presentations.

You’ll discover how to adapt practices to different attachment patterns, work compassionately with trauma and shame, understand common obstacles to self-compassion, and embody the compassionate therapeutic presence that helps clients feel truly seen and safe.

👉 Explore the Self-Compassion in Clinical Practice course and discover how self-compassion can become an integral part of your clinical work—not simply another intervention in your toolbox.