ABSTRACT
This chapter talks about the suffering of self-aversion and the need for self-compassion. To bring a quality of healing presence to the suffering of unworthiness, the chapter considers a practice based on the acronym RAIN: recognizing what is going on, allowing the experience to be there, just as it is, investigating with interest and care, and nourishing with self-compassion. Research shows that if someone grows up in a situation with a lot of violence, it literally changes their biochemistry so that they get locked into stress mode—where there's a feeling of impending danger and a potential for violent reactivity. So despite different surface appearances, the trance of unworthiness—of feeling deficient and unlovable—is one of the most common and pervasive forms of trance we fall into. We need to de-condition our sense of unworthiness and badness, over and over, by recognizing, allowing, investigating, and nourishing with compassion.
