Acceptance
Our level of acceptance, the coping skills we have in a given situation to reduce stress, is our ability to accept the reality of a situation, recognizing often negative or uncomfortable feelings without attempting to deny the situation or change it. The key steps to acceptance are first denial, then anger, then depression and finally acceptance. Once you can be brutally honest with yourself and with the reality of your situation the burden of it lessens.
True acceptance is the key to happiness.
It takes a massive amount of strength and motivation to accept your reality, what is, especially when we don’t like it! And even more so when we cannot change things in the moment. But by working hard, being honest, facing the circumstances you find yourself in you can effectively heal and over time change what cannot always be changed immediately. Often, we don’t notice the positive things in our lives because we have become bogged down with the overpowering negatives. It takes five positive things to delete one negative, so mindfulness is key. Try slowing down a little, meditate and resonate with the positive moments, rather than rushing from one negative thought to the next.
When we slow down and stop listening to the negative voice in our minds, acknowledging and questioning that voice instead, we simply stop and look deeper to see all the goodness and beauty we have in our lives but are are missing in our minds, all the things we must be grateful for. No matter how difficult you believe your situation is, there is always something you can appreciate in your life, even the small things like fresh clean water, a hot bath, a walk in the park.
Accepting your dark side, your darkest thoughts and fears is the key to a healthy happy you but this is easier said than done. Our inner loneliness is what causes depression. For some reason we all prefer to bury resentment and anger instead of trading it for gratitude.
Acceptance of any negative situation or emotion is the only reliable route to regaining and maintaining peace within your mind body and soul. So we must begin an inner dialogue. Once we look closely at any given situation and map out the route, how we came to find ourselves here at this moment, understanding is followed by acceptance.
Emotional resilience, staying in touch with your feelings not trying to change overnight how you are feeling, is the main key to manifesting joy and happiness because eventually you will free your mind. Acceptance is the main ingredient for mindfulness and actively and consciously letting go.
Emotional resilience is all about having the ability to adapt to a stressful situation and coping better with life’s ups and downs, the rollercoaster ride of life we all experience, its not just you, you are not alone. Working on yourself to become more emotionally resilient will stop adversity defining who you are. You will be more capable of handling stress and life changes when they occur rather than allowing negative thoughts to punch you in the face and constantly knock you down.
I can confirm from my own experience of nurturing acceptance, those who feel gratitude feel less pain, less stress, suffer less sleepless nights, experience healthier relationships and generally feel more peaceful and happier. Overall acceptance of your true self and your reality as you are right now will boost your mental and physical health.(even if you are no where close to where you want to be)
What use is a life full of resentment, anger and bitterness? Life is very short, I know, so instead of hiding behind your denial, be brave, step up and forgive yourself and others for how you see your future. Your future can be whatever you want it to be once you accept all your problems are down to you, and you alone. There is no magic wand or magic pill that will suddenly erase your situation. Our circumstances and resentments come from making poor choices and poor choices end up becoming reality. If you have made poor choices which have led you to denial, understand right now we all make mistakes in this thing called life, there is no right or wrong way until you have wisdom and experience. Wisdom and experience come from making mistakes, so stop blaming others, take some personal responsibility and learn not to make the same mistakes in the future.
The path to unconditional self-acceptance is not an easy journey because it means having to look back and face often a car crash cycle of bad choices but the upside once we can recognise our weaknesses or limitations, we can begin to fully accept ourselves as we are.
Liking ourselves more is down to self-acceptance. It is only when we stop judging ourselves, we can secure a more positive sense of who we are deep down hidden under all the pain. When we look closely at how the human psyche works, it is almost impossible to not treat ourselves similarly to how we were treated by our caregivers as children. It is safe to say that most of us have arrived at adulthood afflicted by a negative bias. We tend to blame ourselves or see ourselves as defective and this creates severe self-doubt and self-doubt stops self-compassion, letting go of guilt and finding forgiveness for ourselves.
Accepting ourselves unconditionally as adults would have been totally possible if we had been nurtured with only positivity as children but life gets in the way and often, we end up screwed up. The key here is self compassion, we may have done it but we didn't know any better, we are not to blame and so we can forgive ourselves.
If we are ever to experience deep within us a normal, happy, peaceful state of just being, a true sense of personal fulfilment and peace of mind, we must take on the challenge of self-acceptance.
Photo by: frank mckenna Unsplash