RichThesaurus
lay it on thick
vs
pat oneself on the back
lay it on thick
verb
To exaggerate or overstate a feeling or emotion.
To flatter.
To guilt, guilt-trip.
pat oneself on the back
How often have the words
lay it on thick
and
pat oneself on the back
occurred in a corpus of books?
(source:
Google Ngram Viewer
)