Radical Self-Acceptance
- Michelle Robert
- 5 days ago
- 5 min read
Radical Self-Acceptance. This is the current theme at the Higher Power Health Studio. The phrase might create a little discomfort. After all, the title is, well, radical.
But let’s just go ahead and sit with the discomfort for a bit.
Radical self-acceptance. This means without exception. Unrelenting. An uncompromising acceptance of exactly who you were created to be. In this moment, right now, you are exactly where and as you should be.
“Umm,” you might be saying. “I can name five things off the top of my head that I don’t want to accept, and I don’t think I should accept.
I don’t want this back pain right now.
I should be a better house keeper.
I wish I could lose 15 pounds.
I need to have more patience.
I have to stop staying up so late binging on Netflix!
Wow. That was easy, I could name five more in two seconds flat.”
Yes, I get it. We all can come up with a lengthy list of changes and improvements that would get us closer to our arrival point. That imaginary place where we cross the finish line, drop to our knees, lift our arms in victory and proclaim, “I made it! I’m exactly who I want to be!”
Are you chuckling? You are, because you know exactly what happens. For every one step closer to that finish line, we stretch the distance by two more. Every. Time.
This is what we do. Especially women. Especially in western cultures. We set our thermostat to ‘strive’, and forget that it can ever be adjusted.
Now, if you haven’t already, I highly encourage you to read the previous blog - The Rate Maze. It will give some deeper background as to why I’m at this crossroads and presenting this extreme position. The position that we need to drop the concept of a finish line (FYI - the finish line is the moment you die, so let’s not rush to get there.), and wholly accept ourselves where and as we are at this very moment.
BUT! It’s in this blog that I’ll begin to explain how we can put this concept in action. Not the blog where I give permission to kick back, eat bon-bons, and give up. I’m envisioning mama sitting on the couch in her bath robe, bag of chips in her lap and kids asking about dinner. “Sorry kids, dinner’s on your own. I’m radically self-accepting here.”
And as always, I’m going to offer up another metaphor. I can’t help it. Metaphors are how I relate to and make sense of this world. So naturally, I rely on them in my attempt to relay to you what’s rolling around in my head.
So this metaphor I’ve used many times with my clients, but I’m diving deeper today. Imagine a beautiful rose bush. It’s perfect. Vibrantly colored flowers in varying stages of bloom, deep green foliage, velvety petals, strong and healthy stems. It’s just perfect, and you wouldn’t change a thing!
Next day you go out to admire it, and another bud has opened. A stem has lengthened, a leaf has browned and fallen away. It’s perfect! You wouldn’t change a thing!
But wait. It was perfect yesterday, today it’s changed, and it’s perfect… again? still?
Yes, again and still. Still and again, it’s perfect. Just like you. Just like me. Even in our perfection at this moment, we have (and always will have) the gift of expansion and evolution and change and growth and even dying away - all while retaining the perfection of God’s creation.
So in a nutshell: We can relax in this moment knowing that we’re everything God intended us to be. We don’t have to change a thing. But because we are a part of nature, and nature is in a constant state of newness and change, we also can relax in knowing that our growth and change is perfect as well.
And here’s the best part - none of it has to be forced. The rose bush doesn’t will itself to bloom red flowers or pink or yellow or salmon. It doesn’t read manuals on how to have velvet petals or waxy leaves. And it certainly doesn’t exert mental energy convincing itself to dull the sharpness of its thorns. It just is as it is - beautiful and prickly, and what God meant it to be.
“Michelle! You’re confusing me! So do I just sit back and let natural consequences take their course? Do I not intervene at all? Why go to yoga class? Why pay attention to my diet? Why bite my tongue when I want to lash out?”
So at this point, I’ll reveal what little I know about rose bushes. They are at their best when they’re tended to. They thrive on a balanced fertilizer and regular pruning. They love being paid attention to and admired and cared for.
One might ask, “How is this tending to the rose bush different from my efforts at improving and changing myself? You know - those things you were telling me that I don’t have to do.”
Here’s the subtlety: Ask yourself, “When I set out to improve myself or change my habits, am I trying to change the essence of myself, or am seeking to support God’s original creation?
The rose bush doesn’t desire fertilizer and pruning so it can eventually turn into a cherry tree. But it does desire to be nourished, gently disciplined, and encouraged to flourish right where it’s planted.
I’ll remind you, these reflections are born out of my many years of trying to turn into a cherry tree. I tried to convince myself what I needed to do to be worthy, how I should feel (or most often not feel) in order to not make waves. The root of all this started with - ‘I need fixed’.
Instead, now I’m determined to start with radical self-acceptance. It's my platform from which I can step into supporting, nurturing, and even pruning thoughts and actions, but without the heavy companion of inadequacy.
There are many ways to put this into action. But I’ve noticed that words are one of the best places to start. Take a look at that hypothetical list of changes that ‘need to be made’. Find the commonality in each statement. Notice how your body responds to them.
Again, I’m dangerously close to losing your attention. So I’ll stop here, and let you wrestle with what’s been presented.
I always appreciate comments and questions. And I’d love for you to join us at the studio to practice some of these concepts. There are a variety of ways to do so.
Take care,
Michelle
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