Granite, I kind of agree with you about "self-compassion" feeling selfish, or at least kind of icky.
My FOO certainly didn't give me any reason to believe I deserved any kind of positive regard, so how could I possibly look at myself that way? And if I did somehow, it would have to be bad--because that's who I was in my head.

What changed it for me--and thankfully, my T never used that sort of what to me sounds like New Age-y language--was my relationship with him. It took a long time for me to be willing to accept that he valued me because I was a good person. And it was often one step forward, two steps back. It wasn't something I did for myself: my only task was to allow space for the possibility that his beliefs about me could be true. Slowly, I realized bit by bit that I either had to believe him, or decide that he was an inauthentic idiot. I couldn't cherry pick and accept only the ideas that fit with my self-hate. But it wasn't just about words he said; it was his actions, his many demonstrations of positive regard that made the difference. The transference allowed me to more easily trust and value him, and that, in turn, upped the ante: his words and actions held more weight for me.

Once I had to admit that these positive attributes existed, then my job was to work on incorporating them into my consciousness, even when I didn't believe in them. I had to allow for the possibility, then act differently.