The reason why most people cannot accept themselves is because they mistakenly think that accepting themselves will make themselves lazy and self-reliant. In their opinion, the so-called "self-acceptance" means: believing that you are already well, so it will cause people to lose the opportunity to improve themselves, work hard, pursue achievements and make changes. But in fact, research shows that people who can accept and cherish themselves are less afraid of failure, and they are more likely to persevere and try again after failure, and are usually more confident (Neff et al., 2005).

"Self-acceptance" and "self-care" do not mean "not caring about the opinions of the outside world", nor do they mean that they should accept the failure when encountering difficulties, but rather love themselves without conditions. Sometimes this means you have to choose a more difficult road because that is the best for you, and it also means: when you are already on the ground, don't kick yourself again, or be addicted to your own evil spirits, but use every energy in your whole body to make yourself stand up again.

And when you do this, what you are in love and satisfaction, not fear and deprivation.

If we don't learn to accept ourselves, we may eventually need other people's affirmation, be trapped in work that we don't like, be with people who will harm us, or live a life of complaining about the world.

So, how should we learn to accept ourselves?

1. Understanding yourself

is simple to hear, but many people never observe their behavior patterns and the impact of these patterns on their life experiences. To accept yourself, you must first understand your own characteristics and understand what kind of person you want to be. To understand these, you need to conduct self-observation, and the method of self-observation is introspection. Whether writing a diary, looking for a psychological healer, or talking to friends, it can help us save ourselves and our life experience, allowing us to better understand what kind of person we are and why we will stop behave like that. To accept yourself, you must first listen to your needs and design methods to meet these needs. If you don't listen carefully, you will sometimes not be able to receive the signals from our hearts.

In the process of observing ourselves, on the one hand, we must reflect on what qualities we are proud of, and at the same time, we must also observe the parts that we may not want to think of, that is, those qualities that we do not like, and worry about, regret or want to change. However, when we reflect on this part, we must be like the audience and hold a kind and sympathetic attitude. Only in this way can we learn from middle school. If we think about the difficult situation in our lives, it will produce strong emotions and make it difficult to think clearly, we might as well find a healer to help.

2. Why do you accept yourself?

Suppose you start to accept your life without any conditions after you have put this book on it? What kind of situation will it be? What changes will your behavior change? What things will you accept? What other things cannot be accepted? What will you do more harder? What will you let go? How would you say to yourself? And how do you talk to others?

Please try to write down your answers to the above questions in detail and imagine in your brain how your behavior will change when you start to accept yourself? When you want to make changes, you must first change your behavior before you can change your feelings. Therefore, if you want to feel that you are a valuable person, you must practice day by day and never stop in order to accept yourself in your life without any conditions.

3. Accept all your own aspects

Although we have a certain self-consciousness that never changes, we will produce different emotions at different moments, and also play different roles in different situations, express different behaviors. Many people think these roles and behaviors are several different parts of themselves. We may be less able to accept certain parts of ourselves because of our early life experiences and the reactions of others to those emotions. For example, if you are in your growth period and you cannot allow your youth, you may find it difficult to accept and cherish your youthful self. In this way, whether you can accept yourself depends on how you felt at that time.

Try

You can try the following practice for "Irons & Beaumont, 2017) to see your reactions, practices and emotions to various different emotions, and see them with a kind and compassionate attitude.

Please take a moment to recall a recent incident that caused you to have several emotional events. It is best to start with something less painful so that you won't be able to bear it while practicing.

1. Write down some of your thoughts on that incident.

2. Write down some of the emotions it creates for you. For example: anxiety, sorrow, anxiety, etc.

3. Link with those emotions one by one, and think about how you would answer the following questions.

⑴Which part of your body do you feel that emotion? How did you find out?

⑵ Which emotion is caused by your thoughts? If it could speak, what would it say?

⑶What kind of impulse did you have under that emotion? If you really acted according to that kind of impulse, what would you do? (For example, anxiety may make you want to run, anger may make you want to yell at someone).

⑷What does that part of yours need? What can we do to calm down that emotion?

Once you have practiced every emotion you have at that time, you can answer the above four questions for your compassionate self (the part that wants to love yourself without conditions and accept yourself).

When you do this exercise for each emotion, give yourself time to withdraw from one emotion and then move into the next emotion (if you have many different emotions). Such practice can enhance your ability to be calm and emotional, and allow you to understand them in depth without being overwhelmed by them.

Through this practice, we can see those emotions and see from it that even those emotions that we cannot accept themselves are just a normal feeling. Each emotion reflects a way we understand the current situation and decide what to do next.

If we can spend some time like this and observe our emotions from a transcendent perspective, we will be able to accept our negative emotions and thus cherish ourselves and not be too strict with ourselves.

4. Change the habit of criticizing yourself

●How do you criticize yourself? What words will be used?

●What is the focus of criticism?

●What things do you criticize yourself for? Is it appearance? Work performance? Personality traits? Or is it because I can't compare to others?

●Some forms of self-criticism may cause greater harm than others.

●If you think you are not good because you have not done things well, it is also a form of self-criticism.

●If you not only think that you are not good, but also hate yourself and hate yourself, this kind of self-criticism will have a greater impact on you and will make you feel more ashamed.

Test

This is a quick practice that can help us to distance ourselves from our critics and see its true nature.

After reflecting on the various ways you criticize yourself, please think of the inner critic as a person.

●What does he look like?

●What is the expression on his face when he talks to you? What does sound sound like?

●What emotion does he want to express?

●How do you feel when you see him? What do you think is his purpose?

●The reason why he criticized you is because he wanted to protect you, but he just used the wrong method?

●Do you want to be with someone like this? Can he help you live a happy life?

Finally, ask yourself:

●What impact will it have on you if you are with such people twenty-four hours a day?

5. Find out the side of your compassion

If your inner critic has followed you most of your life, you will not be able to take him away immediately. Because you often criticize yourself, the relevant remarks in your brain have become very clear, so you will hear the voice of that critic from time to time. What we have to do is: start practicing speaking to ourselves in a healthier and more beneficial way. Just like you heard the inner critic before, you can also invite your compassionate self to talk to you. It not only thinks about you, but also understands the harm caused by self-criticism. It's like your inner critic, hoping you can grow and achieve something, but it will feel love, not shame.

Please take a little time to imagine what this kind of compassionate self-talk is. Please remember, this is different from positive thinking. A compassionate person is intellect and harmonious. He will encourage and support you and think about you. Imagine: What words do you use when you express sympathy for others? What have you said before when someone else expressed sympathy to you? Please try to recall the scene where someone expressed sympathy for you before. How does his eyes look at you? What did he say? How did those words make you feel? If you can hear such words at any time, what would it be like?

Try to see

We must practice regularly to enhance our own compassionate side. Please try writing a letter to yourself to express your sympathy. There is no need to draft it, just write whatever you think, just like writing to a good friend who is suffering or who is desperately trying to change himself. How would you tell him that you will always support him and hope that he will not suffer this pain? You don't need to show this letter to anyone. But in the process of writing, you will be exposed to your compassionate self and think about the ways you can express that kind of compassion. This will help you exercise the relevant mental muscles so you can use them when you need them most.

If you have trouble feeling compassion for yourself, you can imagine that the person you wrote was someone you loved without conditions, or using what someone you loved in the past said to you.

How to accept Tip:

●Some people think that if we accept ourselves, we will become lazy, self-reliant, and lose power. But this is a misunderstanding.

●In fact, research shows that people who can accept and cherish themselves are less afraid of failure, and they are more willing to try again after failure.

●Self-acceptance is not an absolute acceptance of your own setbacks.

●If you care about yourself, you will often choose to take a path that is most beneficial to yourself, although it is difficult.

※This article is excerpted from the Far-Liu Publishing House "Why No One Telled Me"