enough; they've done bad things in the past, and so they carry a deep sense of personal shame or
feeling of ‘basic unlovability’. As one patient said “I always felt that when God made me he'd run
out of the nice bits.” It is very moving when people begin to see the unchosen nature of so much of
what goes on in our minds, soften around the self-blaming and self-hating and realise that in reality
our potentials for anger, rage, anxiety, fear, paranoia, depression, delusions, are not our fault at all
but are part of brain evolution and social shaping. This insight sets us free from personal blaming
but also places a huge responsibility on our shoulders because we are the only species that can
have this insight, that can wake up to this mind, in this physical reality, and start to make genuine
choices about what kind of self we want to become and bring into the world. While we have many
dark potentials, we also have the potential for deep compassion and for creating a more joyous
experience of our reality when we are open to compassion toward ourselves and others (see
in this volume).
The Evolutionary Approach
The evolutionary approach looks into the nature of the flow of life, from the emergence of the first
single cell organisms, with their need for membranes that sets up the sense of physical
separateness from their environment (the beginning of ‘the separate self’), through to complicated
organisms, like early trilobites and fish and on to mammals and eventually humans. Although it is
sometimes said that feelings of being a separate self are an illusion, without a separate physical
self there is no biological form, there can be no evolution and no evolution of mind as such.
Evolution is a process of change via adaptation according to the impact of challenges that exists
upon individuals. What has gone before, effects what can come later. So species like ours emerge
from per-existing ones (we had a common ancestor with chimpanzees about 6 million years ago)
and carry forward basic features for physical bodies and minds with emotions and motives.
The Evolution of Basic Designs
Once we place ourselves within the flow of life, we can see that our minds and bodies have the
forms and shapes they do because of evolution. Our basic Skeleton, with ribcage and spine began
in the sea. Most mammals have four limbs and two ears and eyes respiratory, cardiovascular,
lymphatic, and digestive systems. Most mammals give birth in the same way and care for their
young for a certain time. Our basic hormones of testosterone and oestrogen operate similarly in us
as other animals. Most of our neurotransmitters like dopamine and serotonin we share with other
animals (see also
in this volume).
Basic Motives
As with bodies, so too with motives. Understanding what our basic motivational systems are up to
and how they can capture and regulate the mind is important for compassion. Many of our basic
motive systems are very old, and serviced gene replication very well in earlier environments. So
we share with other mammals many basic motives and desires. Like them we desire to stay safe,
to find lunch rather than be lunch, to find sexual partners with whom to engage and reproduce, to
develop attachments to our offspring, to privilege our offspring over those of others, to compete for
status and position within our social groups and avoid marginalisation and rejection; and we can be
very tribal and aggressive to out-group individuals (see also
in this volume).
In CFT, motives that are focused on social relationships and provide guides for creating different
types of relationships (e.g., sexual, competitive, cooperative, caring), are called social mentalities
A social mentality organises attention cognition, behaviour and feeling. Think how all
these will be different if one is approaching another living being as a potential sexual partner, an
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