5 Things Everyone Should Know About Acceptance

The first person to pose the idea of "acceptance" to me was my first therapist. We were discussing my relationship with my dad (cliché, I know), and she suggested I "accept" that I might never have the relationship with him I desired. I was appalled.

Excuse me? You're my therapist. Aren't you supposed to have the answers to how I can fix this?

No one is suggesting you like, want, or support whatever it is that you're accepting. But by struggling against the pain—by resisting and rejecting it—we create undue suffering. It doesn't mean that you've chosen or endorse what you're accepting. It doesn't mean you like your anxiety, want your chronic pain, would choose your body, or support an injustice that's happened to you or someone else.

Remember that accept is a verb. It's an active process, one that must be practiced consciously. It's rare that we one day choose to accept our emotional or physical pain, our bodies, our difficult relationships, or our pasts, and never think about it again.

It can require effort at times (or most of the time, at least initially). It can be frustrating at times. But, like creating a clearing in a grass field by walking the same path many times, every time you practice acceptance toward something, you create and strengthen neural pathways in your brain, facilitating ease in the future.

A decade later, the relationship I now have with my dad is galaxies different from what it used to be. I wouldn't say that's due entirely to acceptance, but it does show that acceptance doesn't always mean whatever you're accepting will be that way forever.

Try to focus your acceptance on the present, alongside an open and realistic gaze at the future. Focusing too much on the present can be counterproductive, as a large part of acceptance involves letting go of the desire that things will change—detaching from hope that, in some cases, creates suffering.

Acceptance can be practiced in all areas of your life: You can exercise it toward your current experience or reality, others' beliefs or ideas, your appearance, your emotions, your health, your past, your thoughts, or other individuals.

Again, this doesn't mean you necessarily endorse whatever it is that you're accepting in these realms; rather, you recognize that you can't change the current nature of this exact moment, and accepting manages anxiety and helps calm.