Learning & Practicing the Gentle Art of Acceptance

We realize this idea of acceptance sounds good in theory, but you’re probably wondering, "What do I do? How can I accept myself and my circumstances when I’m so totally miserable?" These are legitimate questions, and we’ll answer them below.

To illustrate, let’s return to Christy. Remember how she was so relentless in her negative comments about herself? After I’d explained the concept of acceptance, I told her it was time to get practical. There were concrete steps she could take to begin changing the way she felt about herself and her problems. Her face brightened, and she seemed eager to learn more.

Step 1: Recognize the non-affirming thought. The first step, I explained to Christy, is to become aware of the constant stream of “self-talk” that runs through your mind. “Everyone talks to themselves. It’s perfectly normal,” I reassured her. “While some of this self-talk may be positive or neutral, you’ll probably be shocked at the sheer volume of negative, self-critical thoughts you also have. If you make the effort to monitor this negative self-talk, you’ll get a better idea about why you often feel overwhelmed and hopeless.”

We went over a few examples. I had plenty of notes from my initial session with her, and I read back some of the things she’d said about herself:  “I’m worthless” and “I’m a nobody.” Christy looked a little startled when she heard someone else say the words. I asked Christy to carry a small notebook in her purse for a few days and to jot down any negative thoughts she had about herself. I encouraged her to write her thoughts immediately after she noticed them. “If you wait, you’re likely to forget,” I said. 

But we don’t really forget, do we? On a deeper level these messages stay with us, wearing us down and eroding our feelings of self-esteem.

Step 2: Apologize to yourself. Next, I instructed Christy to apologize to herself immediately after she noticed she’d made a negative comment about herself. I acknowledged that this might seem a bit awkward at first, but I stressed how important it is to do.

“Do you ever speak as cruelly to other people as you do to yourself?” I asked her. 

"No. Just the opposite," Christy answered. "I’m always trying to make sure I don’t hurt other people’s feelings. If I accidentally say something hurtful, I’m quick to apologize. I probably say ‘I’m sorry’ too much."

"So why not tell yourself, ‘I’m sorry?’ Explain to yourself that you’re just learning about the damaging effects of this critical self-talk, and that you’re going to work at being kinder and more understanding. It won’t happen overnight, but it’s important to start somewhere."

Step 3: Question the validity of the thought. The next step, I told Christy, is to examine the negative statement you’ve made about yourself and ask these questions:

• What is the evidence that this statement is true?
• Who says it’s true?
• What gives him or her the right to decide it’s true?
• So what if it’s true? Does it matter?

I explained to Christy that she doesn’t have to firmly believe the answers she comes up with at this time. Just going through the process of answering them will yield important insights and help loosen the grip of the thought. If possible, she could write out the answers to these questions at the same time she made note of the thought. Otherwise, she could wait until later in the day to go through this questioning process. I asked her to initially write the answers on paper. Later, these steps would come more naturally and she wouldn’t have to write everything down.

Step 4: Replace the thought with an affirmation. Finally, Christy and I discussed the next step in dealing with critical self-talk: replacing the negative thought with a more positive, self-accepting one. Some people call these affirmations. Some examples you might consider using include:

• I accept myself as I am today.
• I am OK just as I am.
• We need quiet, thoughtful people in the world.
• I have many gifts to offer the world.
• My anxiety causes me much pain, but part of this pain comes from not accepting who I am.
• I choose today to stop berating myself for my social anxiety. I will remember that everyone has problems. That’s part of what makes us human.
• If I accept myself, it won’t matter so much what other people think.

Many people have a favorite affirmation or two that they write on an index card and refer to routinely. Others like to post a few of these in places they see often, such as on the bathroom mirror or the refrigerator door.

Christy really liked the idea of having something she could do outside of the session. Eager to begin, we set up another appointment.         

When we met again, Christy looked prepared and ready to get to work. She’d brought her journal in - a small, spiral notebook she could carry discretely in her apron at work. We talked generally at first about how the experience had been for her. She said she felt a little uncomfortable sharing what she’d written, that it was probably "silly." I told her she didn’t have to share it, and that I understood. I reassured her that it was great that she’d taken the time to write her thoughts down; many people don’t follow through like she did. Before I could say anything else, she handed me the notebook. She didn’t think she could read it out loud without feeling self-conscious, but she said that I could.

Christy had included a lot of helpful detail in her journal, noting the time and the setting. Let’s look at her first entry.

Christy’s Journal

Mean Things I Say To Myself

Monday morning, 8:05 a.m.: I’m at work. Standing at a counter cutting vegetables for the salad bar. Everyone is talking about their weekends. My head starts to shake. My hand shakes too. I can hardly keep the knife from cutting myself. I think everyone must think I’m so strange. I’m just a strange person who whispers and shakes.

Questions:

What is the evidence? I do shake, and I do whisper. That part is true. I guess I shouldn’t say I’m strange though.

Who says it’s true? I do, I guess. No one’s really said anything to me. I guess I don’t know that they think I’m strange. Maybe they think I have some kind of disease or something.

What gives them the right to decide? Who’s to say what "strange" is? Maybe I’m different than the people who usually work here. Maybe I’m not what they’re used to. Does that mean I’m strange?

So what if it’s true? What if I am strange? My husband still loves me. After all, being strange is better than being an ax murderer or something.

Affirmation/Accepting Thought: I’m a worthwhile person even if I have this anxiety problem. Everyone has something they have to deal with.

Christy did a great job, especially since this was her first time keeping any type of journal. We laughed at the part about not being an ax murderer. I was starting to see a spark in Christy; she had a sense of humor.

As we went through several other entries, Christy became more adept at questioning her negative self-statements and developing helpful affirmations. Toward the end of the session, she wrote out this affirmation on an index card and vowed to repeat it to herself often: “I accept my shaking and my whisper-like voice as a part of my life today. This doesn’t mean I like it, but I can tolerate it, learn from it, grow from it.”  On the back of the card, I wrote down the Serenity Prayer: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

Christy found the most difficult part of this whole exercise was apologizing to herself.  “I still believe the negative things I’m saying to myself, so it seems fake to apologize. I’m just going through the motions,” she explained.

This was to be expected; the process of self-acceptance is just that, a process. "It’s not something you simply figure out once, and then ‘just do it’ like the Nike commercials tell us to," I told her. "You’ve been beating yourself over the head with your critical words for a long, long time. I know it’s hard, but try to be patient."

Christy kept her journal for several months, and little by little she began accepting herself more. She even noticed a big improvement in her shaking. She still felt stuck, though, in that her voice remained a whisper. "No matter how hard I try, I can’t speak at a normal volume," she lamented.

I agreed it must be frustrating and perhaps even frightening for her to not have her voice back. She might be disappointed that our sessions hadn’t "cured" her. I would probably feel that way, too, if I were her. I suggested we try a visualization exercise to see if we couldn’t find another way of looking at her situation.

I first learned about this visualization exercise from psychologists Jane Hirshmann and Carol Hunter, authors of When Women Stop Hating Their Bodies. In working with women who were obsessed with losing weight, they asked them to imagine what would happen if they knew there was absolutely no way they could ever lose weight. It was a physical impossibility. We’ve used a variation of their idea to address acceptance of other situations.

I asked Christy to form an image in her mind of what she wants to change, what she’s having difficulty accepting. She wanted to stop whispering and start speaking in a "normal' volume and tone of voice. Next, I asked her to imagine that some freak accident of nature has released a harmless but potent gas into the atmosphere. This gas makes it impossible for the very thing you want - getting your voice back - to occur. You realize the gas has been released and there’s no way to reverse its effects. This means you will whisper for the rest of your life.

I gave Christy some time to immerse herself in this imagery. Next, I asked her to consider these questions:

• Now that you know you will always whisper, how will you choose to live your life? Would you do anything differently?
• Will you continue to berate yourself for the way you talk? Remember, it’s not your fault that this gas was released, preventing any change from taking place.
• Will you find a way to handle the situation? To tolerate it?
• How can you cope more effectively? How can you take better care of yourself?
• If you weren’t worrying so much about your voice, how else would you expend your energy?

This was a powerful exercise for Christy, but the answers didn’t come to her all at once. She thought about these questions many times after our session.

When we next met, Christy appeared perkier than I’d ever seen her, almost bubbly. She told me that she had wanted to volunteer at the Humane Society for a long time. She’d gotten up her courage once before, prior to losing her voice. Something came up, though, and she wasn’t able to follow through. Then, after she’d lost her voice, she decided there was no way she could attempt volunteer work. Would they even want someone who couldn’t speak normally?

After our last session, Christy realized she couldn’t put her life on hold waiting for her voice to return. She went to the Humane Society and asked about the possibility of volunteer work. The director was apparently quite receptive and invited Christy to attend an upcoming board meeting. She said they desperately needed a secretary for the meetings. Could Christy take notes? she asked. Christy was thrilled, and agreed.

Christy and I worked together for several years. This was quite a commitment on her part, especially given the distance she traveled to my office. During our sessions, we worked on many of the methods for mastering anxiety that you will learn in the coming chapters. Christy learned to better manage the physical symptoms of her anxiety. She didn’t shake quite as often, and when she did, it didn’t bother her so much. She gradually exposed herself to new social situations. For example, she started attending the adult Sunday School class at her church, something she’d previously been too afraid to do. She continued to serve as secretary for the Humane Society board, and she helped care for the animals. She especially loved working with the animals, she told me, because they didn’t care if she whispered.

As Christy became more comfortable with herself and more content with her life, we needed to see each other less and less. Also during this time period, Greg and I made the decision to move from St. Louis to Jefferson City to be closer to family. This increased the distance between us and made the drive completely out of the question for Christy, so we ended our formal treatment. It was sad to say good-bye to Christy; I had grown quite fond of her. She promised to keep in touch, though, and true to her word, I did receive several letters from her.

One day, a few years after I’d moved, I received a phone call. A pleasant but unfamiliar voice on the other end of the phone said, "Barb, do you know who this is?" I had no idea as to the caller’s identity; it was a complete mystery. Then she said, 'This is Christy. I got my voice back." Now I was the one who was speechless!

When I regained my composure, we talked for a while. Of course, the scientist part of me wanted to know what had happened. How did she regain the ability to speak above a whisper? Being a deeply religious person, Christy thought it was a miracle, and she was probably right. Miracles happen, but I also believe that this was a miracle bathed in acceptance. Although Christy’s therapy contained many components, and certainly her faith played a huge role in her ultimate recovery, I believe developing an attitude of acceptance was key and something that couldn’t be bypassed.

Equally miraculous, though, Christy told me that by the time her voice returned, it didn’t matter as much. More important than being able to speak, she said, was finally realizing she had something important to say.

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