“I wish YOU loved you as much as I love you!”
I was yelling at my best friend.
I shouldn’t have been yelling. But it was so frustrating to see her struggle with ending a relationship with a man who didn’t deserve to be in her life.
For whatever reason, She loved him. He was a cheating, lying loser and she was settling for much less than she deserved.
We have all been there. Well, at least most of us.
And if you found your Prince Charming without kissing any frogs, I am sure you know someone who stays with a partner because they don’t want to be single no matter how many of their boundaries their partner drives a truck through over and over again.
I have certainly been there. So I knew what my friend was going through, but I was trying to help her see the light. Unfortunately, no one can force someone else to face reality and really see what they are sacrificing to be with someone who treats them badly.
My friend’s problem wasn’t the loser she was dating.
It was her lack of self acceptance and self esteem. If she didn’t learn to accept and love herself, her preference for dating losers would continue. Different faces, same issues over and over.
What is Self Acceptance?
According to Harvard’s Health Blog, self-acceptance is defined as “an individual’s acceptance of all of his/her attributes, positive or negative.” It includes body acceptance, self-protection from negative criticism, and believing in one’s capacities.
Therapist Russell Grieger believes unconditional self-acceptance is understanding that you are not your actions or your qualities. You accept you have made mistakes and you have flaws, but you do not let them define you.
“You accept that, as a fallible human being, you are less than perfect. You will often perform well, but you will also err at times… You always and unconditionally accept yourself without judgment” (Grieger, 2013).
When you practice unconditional self-acceptance, you can begin to love and embrace your authentic self, and you can begin to work on improving your less-than-desirable traits and qualities.
The key is to release all your judgement and to quit beating yourself up for your mistakes and attributes you feel are negative. However, it is important to mention that just because you fully accept yourself and all of your flaws and mistakes does not mean that you condone any bad behavior or accept and embrace unhealthy or harmful actions.
You accept your misgivings and intend on learning and growing from your mistakes.
How Important is Self Acceptance?
Some experts believe that low or no self acceptance can lead to much bigger issues and even mental illness. However, low self acceptance can also be a side effect of having a mental illness.
When you feel negatively about yourself, the brain regions that help you control emotions and stress have less gray matter than someone with a greater degree of self-acceptance.
This lack of gray matter may also appear in regions of the brainstem that process stress and anxiety. Stress signals from these regions disrupt the emotional control regions.
Poor self-acceptance may disrupt emotional control in two ways:
by disrupting the brain regions that control it
by increasing stress signals in your brain that subsequently disrupt these regions.
Harvard Dr. Srini Pillay warns, “The lack of self-acceptance can be deeply unconscious — that is, it can exist at a level beyond our conscious control. Also, when you do not accept or forgive yourself, “you” are still split from “yourself” — you do not feel “together.” Both of these parts — the one that needs to forgive, and the one that needs to be forgiven — are at odds with each other.”
How Can We Be More Self Accepting?
Unfortunately, there is no recipe to become more self accepting. And what works for one individual may not work for another person.
Some suggestions for learning to accept your whole self without judgement are:
Building the ability to forgive yourself & self awareness-
The process of forgiveness in psychotherapy involves both letting go of resentment toward the offender (or yourself) and replacing the resentment with mindful awareness and empathy. By re conceptualizing past transgressions with a kinder, more equivocal outlook, clients attain a shift in perspective that is spiritual and cognitive in nature, thereby reducing symptomology and enhancing their quality of life.
Mindfulness Meditation/Transcendental Meditation
Transcendental meditation is another potential tool to consider for self-acceptance. It decreases cortisol and reduces your stress response. During meditation, mindful attention to emotions involves not “judging,” but observing your emotions when they arise. This can lower your brain’s emotional response to anxiety and distress. It effectively “calms down” your amygdala.
Creating more compassion toward yourself appears to be helpful in increasing self-acceptance.
My friend finally did dump her loser boyfriend. She also joined a support group for women with low self esteem and found a good therapist to address her mental health issues.
She tells me she loves herself now (on most days-- hey we all have bad days) and doesn’t need a man to be around to feel good about herself. (Yea!)
The most important thing to take away is that if you see yourself doing things that are good for you, like having shitty boyfriends, or beating yourself up for your mistakes over and over, or making choices that may put you in danger, you should seek the help of a professional.
We all need help sometimes. Hell, I need help MOST of the time and I am totally okay with that.
No amount of self-improvement can make up for any lack of self-acceptance.
-Robert Holden
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