If there are any buzzwords used more often than “accept yourself,” there aren’t many. We hear it everywhere. Everyone says that once you learn how to do it, your life does a 180, and you become the happiest person to ever walk this planet. You suddenly pause your procrastination, heal from depression, and get a partner of your dreams (of course, it’s not that easy). While it’s not a magic pill, it is a great act that transforms you.
Accepting yourself isn’t a result that turns your life into a fairy tale in the Disney style of transforming the castle after the Beast is finally loved. It’s just a beginning — for what? Stick around, and we’ll show you why this famous phrase matters.
What Does It Mean?
Accepting yourself stems from the concept of total acceptance, which suggests that you acknowledge and respect yourself in your entirety, even if you aren’t perfect. It’s understanding that you are exactly who you are, and you don’t have to change that to love yourself already. Because self-worth isn’t earned, it is given.
Perhaps one of the most significant aspects of accepting yourself is the “when.” We tend to think that we will live better WHEN we become someone else, that we will love ourselves WHEN we are smarter, more attractive, less sad, and so on. But appreciating your value switches the time to now. The distant, unpredictable future, then, starts today.
Baby Steps: Challenging Your Mindset
The world often beats us down until we don’t know how to accept ourselves. Some of us suffered from a lack of attention, bullying, the absence of proper communication, or high levels of self-criticism. No matter what the first triggering factor was, we have to break down numerous walls built over the years, akin to a house with hundreds of rooms.
Start with compassion. Remind yourself that you are a human being. If you are critical of yourself, consider whether you’d do the same to your friend, parent, or partner. Most likely than not, we don’t forgive ourselves anything but are more forgiving of others. Speak to yourself, aloud even, the moment you want to turn on yourself again, like you would to someone else. If it helps, imagine yourself as a child; does the little you deserve this treatment?
Learn to catch the moment your negative thoughts try to sneak into your mind and affect your emotions. Our automatic negative thoughts represent our ingrained beliefs about ourselves; we usually have quite a few. So, if you notice that, when struggling with a task, you suddenly think to yourself, “I’ll never be good enough” or “I’m a failure,” these are those thoughts. They aren’t real — they just represent the deep convictions you once adopted. Time to let them go. Reframe your thinking. Think, “It’s hard for me to do it on the first try, but that’s the point of growing better. I want to become better, and I like trying.”
Journaling and meditations can be helpful tools for self-exploration, so you may try them. If you prefer digital texts, use your phone or computer app to jot down a few thoughts. The key is to go deeper and not let the previously held concepts of yourself control your narrative now. Meditation, particularly paired with deep breathing (any type you prefer), is a good way to check in with your body. If you are struggling with body image issues or your health, focusing on the now can gently change your perceptions. Think about how nice it is to breathe and feel yourself grounded, a part of the place that can remind you that you are more than a combination of your parts.
Why This Isn’t the End
Accepting yourself isn’t the end point of your journey.
There, you’ve read it. Surprised? Happy? Disappointed? We hope you’re fine with that.
You aren’t a thing, and your existence isn’t static. There will be moments when you take a few steps back. Then, a leap ahead.
Even when you are finally in harmony with yourself, your life doesn’t magically get perfect. But where’s the fun in that? Perfection means stagnation of progress and fascination with the world. But when you finally acknowledge yourself as a whole, you get the power and desire to go ahead and do something else. Something more.
Free to Do What We Love
Once you love and respect yourself, you can do so much. Imagine: before, you were restricted by what you thought you could do, not what was real. For instance, you may have avoided skiing because you believed you were clumsy. Now you know that it just takes patience. Or, you never dared to buy a perfect item from the nearest shop's vintage section because you thought you could wear it if you achieved a particular shape. Now you can wear it.
When almost nothing is impossible, you stop viewing the world in restrictions and barriers; you get to see the opportunities, gaps, and chances. Sure, there are things that you cannot do: most of us won’t become astronauts or fight the wild bears (actually, let’s actively not touch those poor creatures — they deserve peace). But other than that, your self-acceptance can fuel artistic projects, trips, and new relationships you never thought possible. That’s why it’s not an end: it’s the start of everything new. Why refuse yourself this chance for a new era?
Showing Up
Just because you learn to accept yourself, the world hasn’t transformed. You might still struggle with some skills and meet mean people. However, you now have something no one can take from you: your worth. When the world causes you to stumble, you don’t let yourself lie on the ground and accept it. Instead, you can gently nudge yourself up and try again.
