The person we may find it hardest to be kind and sympathetic to is, surprisingly, ourselves. Yet being a friend to ourselves provides the only viable basis for living an emotionally fulfilled life.
“Polite people have it instilled in them from an early age that they should not talk too much about themselves. A few comments aside, they should – to prove appealing – always ask the other about their lives or stick to impersonal topics found in newspapers, lest they be accused of that heinous charge: self-absorption,”