Radical Acceptance: The formula for being able to change by accepting yourself as you are
If you can achieve Radical Acceptance, becomes a huge part of your Personal growth. Throughout our lives, we strive to be a better version of ourselves, go through change and transformation, and attend many different pieces of training and seminars that we think will contribute to our personal development; We try to feed our minds and souls by watching inspiring books, documentaries and movies. The ultimate goal of all of us is to lead a happier life and strive to become better people in line with this goal.
If you are reading this article, we are sure you are experiencing similar processes and finding yourself in similar pursuits. In addition to all this effort for change, we must accept ourselves, love ourselves independently of our shortcomings and failures, and be aware of ourselves.
While being swept away in the winds of change, we can feel stuck in the dilemma of seeing ourselves as valuable as we are and changing to be more useful when we distance ourselves from ourselves and our essence. To get to the core of the dilemma of personal development and self-acceptance and to better understand the indecision in our minds, we have shared with you the contributions of these two concepts to our lives and what they have taken away from us. The radical acceptance approach offers a solution to this paradox and provides excellent explanations for sustaining change while accepting yourself.
What is Radical Acceptance?
The founder of Dialectical Behavior Therapy first introduced the concept of radical acceptance; Dr Marsha Linehan developed it to offer an alternative therapeutic approach to borderline personality disorder. In its simplest form, radical acceptance consists of letting go of the illusions and dysfunctional thought patterns that we can control everything in life and recognizing and accepting things as they are right now, without judgment.
Radical Acceptance Mainly Consists of Three Main Steps
- Seeing the Truth
- Accepting the Truth
- Progress.
If you focus on personal development, build all your goals on growth and change, and think that everything in the world is constantly changing, without exception, these three main components of radical acceptance may have given you a passive and stagnant impression at first glance. However, we can say that your perspective will change when you understand that radical acceptance is the first step of change.
Radical Acceptance and the Tetris Metaphor
You must have played or heard of the Tetris game at some point in your life, in which you bring various shapes side by side without leaving any gaps. Let’s say you’re playing Tetris. Tetris is a fun game that lets you stay in the moment. However, especially in the later stages, situations where parts that will not fit any gap overlap can sometimes cause our stress level to increase.
When unsuitable parts are constantly coming, you may complain, ‘I wish this piece had come’, and you may get stressed after each inappropriate part. You may lose the game because of the useless pieces you accumulated on the side while persistently waiting for the most suitable selection.
On the other hand, if you have a more accepting perspective, you can watch the incoming pieces flow down without any complaints about how they are placed and still lose the game. If you adopt radical acceptance, you can try to put the work in the most appropriate place possible, realizing that the item you received is not the best possible item and that you cannot return it or replace it.
- Seeing the Truth: “Right now, the game has sent me a zigzag piece.”
- Accepting the Truth: “This zigzag piece is not a piece that can fill the gap in the order I created, and that upsets me.”
- Progress: “However, I will place this shape in the most appropriate place possible in the layout I created.”
You can’t send it back, change its shape or remove any piece that has fallen on the screen. In such a case, complaining by saying, “why did this piece come” or passively watching the report settle where will not be effective methods to help you find a solution. The correct thing to do is to place the piece in your hand in the most appropriate place possible.
Radical acceptance is an approach that facilitates change, just like in this case. When faced with a situation you cannot control, the sooner you recognize and accept it, the sooner you can decide how to deal with it and what to do.
How Can You Apply Radical Acceptance in Your Life?
Now, let’s examine radical acceptance through a more realistic and real-life scenario. Let’s say you want to increase your self-confidence and feel more competent.
If you have a personality that focuses on personal development, believes that you can change everything around you, and dedicates your life to change, you will probably take people with higher self-confidence as role models. You would concentrate on the features you want to change with your thoughts.
On the other hand, if you have an over-accepting mindset, you would probably not find it necessary to take steps for change; even though you are aware of what improving your self-confidence can bring to your life, you would ignore the truth, avoid trying with the belief that you will fail, and eventually continue with your life as you are with a passive and accepting attitude.
When you adopt radical acceptance, a scenario like this will probably await you. You will be aware that millions of people in the world are more self-confident than you, but you will not criticize yourself by saying, “Why am I not the most self-confident person in the world?” You will be aware that many situations and events that you have experienced in the past and that are beyond your control are also at the root of your lack of self-confidence. And because you cannot change the past, you will try to improve yourself on this subject by evaluating the steps you can take to improve your self-confidence in the future, the factors you can control, and the elements you cannot control.
Accepting reality as it is and focusing on what you can control by stopping trying to change it and trying to improve your life in this way offers an incredibly empowering and nurturing perspective.
At this point, it is essential to note that there is a small but important distinction between accepting and affirming. In an acceptance-oriented mindset, you are also confirming what you accept. However, in radical acceptance, you are only accepting the present reality and making an effort to change it in the future without affirming the truth you accept. But let’s take a closer look at how you can do this step by step.
Step 1: Seeing the Truth
As a subject living in a world of objects, it is never possible for you to see the truth objectively as it is; To make your evaluations about any situation or event as realistic as possible, you can ask yourself the following questions:
What problem am I facing right now?
Can I evaluate the problem I am facing from an objective point of view?
How much of what I see is accurate, and how much is the product of my thoughts?
Is there anything I’m ignoring about this situation or refusing to see?
Step 2: Accepting the Truth
No matter how difficult the situation you face, try to take a step towards it instead of trying to walk away. How do I feel about this situation? What emotions did being confronted with this situation reveal in me? Give yourself space to experience all the emotions created by your problem, even for a short time. Sometimes letting your feelings stay with you, even for a short time, can make you realize that you don’t want to change anything.
Step 3: Progress
You saw the situation you were facing, evaluated how real it was, and made room for yourself and your emotions to accept it. After these two steps, if you have decided that a change is needed and do not want to continue your life this way, now is the time to take a step toward a change! After taking the first two steps, it may not be possible for you to say, ‘I will move forward now’ and suddenly become the most confident person in the world. But seeing and accepting can enable you to clearly see your shortcomings or what you can do to improve yourself, draw a roadmap to reach your goal, and move forward step by step by solving your self-confidence problems, even if you are not the ‘most confident person in the world’.
