Acceptance

For after all, the best thing one can do when it is raining, is to let it rain.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Acceptance is a wonderful word.  No matter how you interpret it, acceptance is a good thing.  Being accepted by your peers, friends and family in all your imperfect glory brings great joy.  Accepting your faults and weaknesses brings peace and accepting forgiveness enables you to let go of pain.  In tough times, some people will tell you in a wise tone that a situation ‘Is what it is’.  Whilst this may be the case with most circumstances, what this pithy little saying misunderstands is that true acceptance isn’t something that just happens.  It takes work and it is within your control.  Acceptance does not mean giving up, rather an acknowledgement that things are the way that they are. Acceptance of pain, permanent injury, loss of relationship or indeed any imperfection, emotional or physical, once accepted, can be the beginnings of a new and more pleasant road.

Time… the obvious key ingredient

Acceptance of a major change in your life takes time.  Anything that is significant to you in any way, is part of a routine, part of a habit.  This means that while acceptance doesn’t come straight away, given time, it eventually does.  Once the situations that surround you have changed, you inevitably adjust to them and acceptance ensues.  Take grief as an example.  Initially, the pain of loss is immense, almost unbearable in many cases.  Over time though, we learn to adjust, change our routines and eventually acceptance follows.  What started as a powerful insistence that you can’t bare to be without someone, ends up being the trigger for a melancholy smile of remembrance or the motivation to live according to the example they left you.

Time gives you the space to adjust your habits.  Time gives you space to let the truth sink in.  Not an initial, surface understanding of truth, but a deep, life changing understanding.  Whilst pithy statements and metaphors don’t always help, the notion that ‘most wounds will heal if we let the clean air at them’ really fits here.  If you want to accept something, be it painful or life altering, it will take time, so go a little easy on yourself.

Understanding 

Acceptance requires a true understanding of your situation and its consequences to develop.  This isn’t always easy, because we try, despite ourselves, to continue on the way we always have.  The momentum of the way we have done things, stays with us long after it is no longer useful.  I have, for instance, sat in Barber Shops, watching nearly completely bald old men, pay for haircuts they didn’t need.  

In time, if people live an examined life, they come to an understanding that they need to accept the changes that have occurred. They understand that they are wasting valuable resources and energy on an outmoded approach to life and begin to implement change.  Like a wardrobe full of clothes we no longer wear, we are loath to throw them out because they were important once.  When we eventually understand that we can replace these clothes with more appropriate, usable stuff, we begin to clear them out as we prepare for a new day.

Accepting yourself… warts and all

Many people go along in life with a vision of who they want to be.  Dreams of an idealised self persist in our minds, long after we have lost the skills and motivation to become that person… if we ever had them in the first place.  Added to this, many people have a realistic understanding of their strengths, whilst choosing to ignore their weaknesses.  This is of course understandable because realising that you are not the person you thought you were, hurts.  It is almost like we have a persistence of vision about ourselves.  In my mind, I am still thirty.

The classic place to look for examples of self acceptance, despite challenges, is of course the Paralympics.  Many of the athletes at these games have lost mobility, limbs and bodily function through horrific accidents and pain.  Yet despite such pain, they have embraced their limitations and developed a new passion.  

Now while some changes like these are so brutal and sudden, that we have no choice but to adjust, some are internal, subtle and well hidden.  These challenges to acceptance of yourself or your situation, whilst usually not as shocking as those we see at the Paralympics, are still resistant to change.  This is where a Psychologist is useful.  They can help us to see issues that we are a little blind to and provide appropriate guidance.  In many cases they can show people who have suffered that they are not to blame for their circumstances. Often this is a much better approach than asking a random friend for an unqualified opinion. 

Five tips on acceptance

Change, both good and bad, is inevitable.  So too is the fact that we will disappoint ourselves at some time in our lives.  No matter the situation, understanding and acceptance are always the first steps towards adapting and overcoming. We are each in control of that for ourselves.

Firstly, learn to like yourself.  Figure out what your values are and live accordingly.  It is easier to accept yourself if you like yourself in the first place.  Free yourself from the unrealistic expectations of others.

Next, be kind to yourself. When you go through change, good or bad, it is exhausting.  You are responsible for making yourself happy, so treat yourself in the tougher times. You are more likely to accept yourself if you value yourself.

Thirdly, get help.  If you need a Psychologist, get a referral.  If you need a Physiotherapist, book in.  Unsure? Book in to see your Doctor first.

Fourthly, work out what is really important to you personally and professionally and whether or not it is achievable.

Finally, don’t ever compare yourself to anyone else.  This will only lead to disappointment.  Better to compare yourself to who you want to be and who you once were.

Acceptance is all about understanding what has happened and adjusting accordingly.  Significant change will always take time to accept, but it is worth it.  When you have consciously embraced acceptance of who you are and what has happened to you, you will be well on your way to a better, more appropriate place.

Useful stuff

Five ways to be kinder to yourself » The Good The Bad and The Unrelated

Honesty and acceptance » The Good The Bad and The Unrelated

Acceptance – Mindfulness Principle – Jon Kabat-Zinn – Attitudes of Mindfulness. – YouTube