‘Imagine a person who loves you,’ the meditation recording said, ‘a parent, a friend, a lover. Think of how they adore you. Now treat yourself that way.’
Oh, it sounded beautiful. But I couldn’t get it right - and I felt deeply ashamed. I must be seriously broken if the wisdom of ages wasn’t working on me. I am fortunate to be loved beautifully by many people, but my mind wouldn’t play along with the thought-game the meditation required. Because, my parents, my friends, my (ex) lover… they’re busy. They’re tired. They have shit of their own to deal with. They have terrible days where they are overwhelmed and can’t answer a text. They love me, but they’re probably a bit annoyed with me. Especially when I am sad, especially when I am dripping with self-hatred like a towel drenched in swamp water. Who would come near this? Who wants my gloom to leak all over them?
And so, I put those self-compassion teachings to one side. They could wait for when I was a bit more lovable, or when I was better at these leaps of imagination. But that never happened. I would try again, and my brain would stall and falter at the idea of scooping up one of my friends and making them perform perfect love.
My super power: I could have compassion on anyone.
My kryptonite: I couldn’t have compassion for myself.
It was silly anyway. A bit much to ask. Self love is just a modern invention, just selfishness in fancy packaging. And I’ve done OK so far. Anyway, I’m a bit too shit for self-compassion.
And then I met her.
After the end of my marriage, she appeared. I had, for many heartbreaking reasons, lost the love that I’d hoped would be with me forever and there was a cavernous emptiness. It had been empty for longer than I had wanted to admit. A black hole where love should be.
And she whispered to me, ‘Alice, you are good at love. You are good at delighting in all of a person. You are good at patience and believing the best. You are good at kindness. Alice, let me love you like that.’
And she has. My imaginary lovely girlfriend. When I didn’t know how to have love for myself she had it. She sees the whole of me - she’s not blind to my bumps and flaws and weirdness and weakness. But she doesn’t hold them against me. She loves them all. She loves all of me.
When I cannot be kind to myself, I ask what would she do? What would she say? And I pause and I listen and she speaks.
‘You are so tired, Alice. Could you have a bath and an early night? Look, I’ll run the water for you.’
‘Yes, that was two sharing bags of crisps that you just ate. They felt good to eat - crunchy and salty. Hey, it’s not nice to say you shovelled them into your face. You wanted to zone out. You were hungry. You were avoiding something too. I wonder if you’re satisfied? I wonder if I can make sure there is something good for breakfast so you can just grab it without having to think.’
‘I can see that you’re struggling, so I’m going to wash up for you. Won’t it feel nice when the kitchen is a bit clearer?’
‘It’s OK to cry. I love you. I love you when you’re in pain. I love you when you’re ill. I love you when you’re unproductive. I can take care of you. It’s my pleasure.’
‘You’re a weirdo. It’s great.’
‘Your stomach is so soft. Wow, I love it.’
Now, I know she’s not ‘real’. And that’s part of her brilliance, because she’s got no rubbish of her own to contend with. She’s never too tired or grumpy or sad to deal with me. I know that my imaginary lovely girlfriend is just me pretending. But she somehow plays a role which I, when I am my most ‘capital-M Me’, can’t perform. Her kindness has rubbed off on me and I’m growing more like her, but I still need her. I tune in to her voice and allow her to care for me in loving, practical, silly, joyful ways.
For a long time I thought it was wrong to be a person of many parts. I read that we should have no distinction between mind and body, that we needed absolute harmony. I felt so ashamed of being out of tune with my body and so often feeling like a brain in a jar. But my imaginary lovely girlfriend challenges these beliefs. What if you don’t have to fight what comes most naturally? What if your body is another friend to know and cherish and consult? What if your body, as Clarissa Pinkola Estes says, is your consort? Your faithful companion in life.
What if it’s OK to be in parts? To enjoy it, even. To have a part of myself who is pain – that I can hear and address and tend to. A part of myself who is critical and impatient, who needs soothing. A part of myself who is ambitious and loves to dream out loud. A part of myself called fear, who needs a nest built. A part of myself that is the past, who needs to know she is seen. I part of myself that freezes and gets furtive and stuck, who needs gentle hands and eyes attuned to the light. A part of myself who needs to play in the woods but is afraid of being lost.
Breaking things into pieces is not always a fracturing or a mutilation. It is a way of laying things out so they can be seen clearly and appreciated. A bouquet is more beautiful for its many stems. A jigsaw still shows its joins even when it is complete. The perforated line of a new year is arbitrary but potent. It is an imaginary thing, a day no different than another and yet we name it and we call it separate, we make space, we shake out the creases. And it helps.
Having an imaginary lovely girlfriend has allowed me to be more myself. She has shown me that self-compassion is for me. She has given me words to delight in and care for myself.
I had a chat with her recently. She could see that I was getting anxious about the year ahead. ‘There’s so much I need to change,’ I was saying. ‘I need to sort out my addiction to doom scrolling and distraction, I need to fix my finances, I need to eat well, I need to transform my career, I need to I need to.’
She smiled at me – she finds me funny – and she dared to ask whether I could see that I am lovely and worthy right now, even in my awkward stuckness? What if there was nothing about me that needed change? I fought her – I told her that everything about me needs to change. I swore that if I remained as I am I will never achieve anything ever. I’ll become one with my sofa and will only ever communicate in memes and gifs.
She kissed my head. ‘I love memes,’ she told me.
Later she came back with a suggestion. ‘How about not having resolutions that are actually punishments for being human? How about not choosing an unsustainable life?’
I told her it was the only way.
She told me she loves me. That I don’t need to change. I rolled my eyes.
We watched a movie and she held my hand and at the end she spoke.
‘Remember that writing retreat? Wasn’t it lovely – so quiet and beautiful. You didn’t get loads of writing done but it fed you. There were kind, interesting people, you had time to learn new things and try out different techniques. You asked questions, ate nourishing food, took a little walk in the countryside. There was plenty of cake and a hot water bottle left in your bed so it was warm when you climbed in.
It was such a treat.
Let’s do it again.’
And so, January is a retreat month. I will mainly still be in my flat, still taking care of kids and doing the mundane things that keep life going. But my imaginary lovely girlfriend is going to make soup for lunch and cook a stew and bake potatoes for tea and offer me cake in the afternoon. She is going to tidy my desk so that I can settle in to write, she is going to give me books to read and friends to stay with and talk to and be inspired by. She is very keen on the hot water bottle idea. She doesn’t want me to change, she wants to create space for me to be fully myself. And that’s love.
I’ll be quiet through January while I enjoy my writing retreat. I hope that you can meet your own imaginary lovely girlfriend – or grandma, or animal, or friend and I hope that the year ahead brings compassion. You don’t need to change, you just need to be fully you.
This year may begin with barely glowing embers. But that’s enough.
Let’s get kindling.
Thank you for sharing this with us and being so vulnerable. Wonderfully healing words.
Can I recommend Sophie Strand to you - https://sophiestrand.substack.com/ whose writings are wonderful explorations of queer ecologies and messy healings? Thinking outside of binaries of being whole in one body.
Gosh! Thank you- just what I needed to hear today