A lot of this post is influenced by Arlin Cuncic’s excellent article about radical acceptance on verywellmind and SimplePractice’s article on practical steps of radical acceptance.
This is my last post in our ACT series, and what better way to wrap this up than talk about Radical Acceptance. This is also timely because I have really really had to work hard these past couple of weeks to radically accept a few things in my life. And I’m still working on it!
Just as a reminder, ACT stands for Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. WebMD defines it as “…a type of mindful psychotherapy that helps you stay focused on the present moment and accept thoughts and feelings without judgment. It aims to help you move forward through difficult emotions so you can put your energy into healing instead of dwelling on the negative.” ACT has six core processes in its hexaflex model: Values (we sort of combined Committed Action with this one), Contact with the Present Moment (mindfulness), Self as Context (psychological flexibility), [Cognitive] Defusion, and Acceptance (which we are delving into today). These core processes are interconnected and do not stand alone. So, for example, if you are practicing mindfulness, you are probably using cognitive defusion to distance you from negative, unhelpful thoughts which leaves room for you to then make committed actions in that moment.
MY FIRST REACTION TO RADICAL ACCEPTANCE
So, the first time I ever heard about radical acceptance from a therapist, I laughed in her face. Really. I wasn’t very nice. I’m even more embarrassed now because this was in front of a whole group of other patients. I had just put myself into residential care in November 2023 because of nearly constant suicidal ideation. Living in a locked-down house with 11 other patients and staff around the clock was an utter nightmare for me (I wrote about it here), so this was a last-ditch effort, truly, to save myself from something I didn’t quite understand. All I really knew was that I felt damned with unprocessed trauma, irreparably broken, desperate, defeated, and hopeless. I also felt the deepest despair and loathing towards myself that you could possibly feel. In other words, I felt terrible.
I was sitting in a circle with the other patients, and the therapist handed worksheets out to us that said, “Acceptance and Commitment Therapy”. I was a little zoned out, to be honest, and the first few minutes, I just caught snippets of what she was saying.
“…ACT is a type of cognitive behavioral therapy…” Ok, I thought, I know what that is…
“…ACT is a ‘third-wave’ behavioral therapy…” What the hell?
“Acceptance is a huge component of this therapy…” ya de da da
“You cannot move forward and heal without radically accepting everything in your life…” wait…what?!
My brain’s gears kicked in, trying to make sense of it, but then she started talking about ways that we can radically accept things. When she got to the part where she told us we had to “half-smile,” that’s when I laughed.
“Wait a second. Can we go back to the radical acceptance part because half smiling is just stupid, and good luck trying to get any of us to do that? Can you explain this some more?”
The therapist looked a little disconcerted. “Well, um, yeah, if you don’t want to suffer anymore, you’ll have to accept things the way they are.”
My facial expression probably did make me like a crazy person. “That doesn’t remotely make sense. How can I change anything if I just accept it? You’re telling me I JUST HAVE TO accept the fact that my dad hung himself? That I had to live through an abusive relationship? That I have a medical condition that has stolen away my love and livelihood of dancing and is debilitating, progressive, and incurable? That I have to live in pain every day? That I think my husband doesn’t love me anymore because I can’t work and we have so many medical bills? That the world is burning and we do nothing about it?” My momentum was just getting started, and I became more and more flabbergasted. I was interrupted when the therapist just shrugged. “Yeah, obviously these things are bad. But if you just accept them, you’ll be happier.”
Needless to say, I was already angry at life, and a therapist who couldn’t explain her own therapy just infuriated me even more. I got stuck on this for a long time until another therapist began slowly working with me on ACT, and thank goodness, she did actually know what she was talking about.
WHAT RADICAL ACCEPTANCE IS NOT
Right off the bat, let’s get a few things straight.
Radical acceptance
is NOT making light of or invalidating painful things.
is NOT approving or forgiving the terrible things people have done to you.
is NOT being passive.
is NOT blindly resisting change.
is NOT negating the trauma that has hurt you, shaped you, and nearly destroyed you.
WHAT RADICAL ACCEPTANCE IS
It IS radical! Meaning all the way, complete and total.
It IS nonjudgmental awareness.
It IS acceptance with your mind, heart, and body.
It IS when we stop fighting reality.
It IS when we stop throwing tantrums because reality isn’t the way we want it to be.
It IS when we let go of bitterness.
SO WHAT NEEDS TO BE ACCEPTED
The things that need to be accepted from me are going to be different from the things that you need to accept. The fact that I lived in perpetual anger and that I felt beaten and defeated are indisputable symptoms of me not radically accepting things. My thoughts ran in a hamster wheel:
Life is unfair.
Things should be different.
Why do things have to be so hard?
I have no control over my life.
Why do good people suffer?
And the very mention of radical acceptance from that one therapist sent me into a volatile tailspin at the injustice of it all. But what she failed to explain and I failed to understand was that instead of accepting everything in your life, radical acceptance is about accepting the things that are merely outside of your control, the things that you cannot change. It leaves room for us to do things, change things, fight for things that are within our control.
LET’S GET DEEP
What I’ve learned since then (and in seemingly every possible way) is that pain is an inevitable part of life. Everyone experiences it, and we would not be human without it. However, when we do not acknowledge this pain or accept it for the reality that it is, our pain then morphs into suffering. In her article about radical acceptance, Arlin Cuncic goes even further and states that suffering doesn’t come directly from pain, but from our attachment to pain.
Ahhhh….this sounds a lot like Buddhist principles and my old therapist, Jon.
If we are attached to something, we remain in it’s cycle. Our thoughts influence our feelings, which shape our behaviors, which transform our beliefs, which then feed into our thoughts…and feelings…and behavior. If we are attached to our pain, we can’t let it go, which just perpetuates suffering and more pain.
(Jon always told me that I needed to get this tattooed somewhere on my body so I could easily see it every day.)
Noom
If you’re into Robert Jordan’s series, The Wheel of Time, this cycle harkens to the idea of the wheel, of destiny and predetermination, spitting people out again and again to reincarnate their influence upon the world. Unlike how the Wheel weaves and the Wheel wills though, we do have a chance of taking back control of our lives and reducing our suffering.
It's called radical acceptance.
THE TRUTH OF THE MATTER IS
Reality can suck. Pain often can’t be avoided. We cannot change the reality of what has already happened to us. But we can change our response to that reality.
The reality is that when we refuse to accept reality, it only leads to more suffering. Bitterness, sadness, shame, unhappiness, hopelessness, helplessness…these only increase. The other problem with not choosing radical acceptance is that when we focus on the pain (as we will inevitably do), we are also choosing not to feel joy or happiness. Rejecting reality keeps us from moving forward, keeps us defeated in that loop of bad things happen to me, which shape my beliefs, which affect my thoughts, which make me feel bad, which encourage me to engage in behaviors that result in bad things happening to me again, and so on.
HOW CAN I RADICALLY ACCEPT THINGS THAT ARE PAINFUL?
HOW CAN I ACCEPT THE THINGS THAT I CANNOT CHANGE?
HOW CAN I CHOOSE TO RESPOND DIFFERENTLY WHEN IT FEELS SO RIGHT TO BE ANGRY AT THE INJUSTICE AND UNFAIRNESS IN LIFE?
Ask yourself: Am I questioning or fighting reality?
Currently, I am really struggling with the reality that I am on my own now that I am fully divorced and single again. I am fighting the reality that I have to live with my mom because I don’t have the means to live on my own. I am wrestling with the reality that if I do want to be independent, I will need to work full-time again, even though I know it is not sustainable for my physical and mental health. So many people seem to just have life so much easier for them. Hell, YES, I AM FIGHTING MY REALITY. I hate all the things about me that make it harder just to survive. Life is unfair. I wish things were different. I am angry and frustrated and depressed and anxious because I am not accepting my reality.
Acknowledge your reality.
My old therapist, Jon, would remind me that we all have an LOC…a Locus of Control that is both external and internal.
The external LOC are things that we cannot control, while the internal LOC are those things that we can. We need to pinpoint what we cannot control and we cannot change. For me, I cannot control my ex-husband’s feelings for me or his unwillingness to show patience and compassion or his refusal to accept the reality that I couldn’t go backwards in time and “be the old Rachel.” I cannot control the fact that I have Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. I cannot control the plethora of bad/hard things that have happened to me. I cannot control the fact that I am disabled and should not be working a full-time traditional job. These are just the facts.
The Past Is in the Past.
I cannot change it. I need to acknowledge it and understand how it has affected me, but then I need to let it go. Holding on to the hate and the anger only causes me more suffering.While I can’t change the past, I can change my response to the past, I can change/alter the things that have not yet happened.
Allow yourself to feel disappointment, sadness, or grief.
These emotions are not bad, but they can cause us to inaccurately assess a situation. Remind yourself of times you have felt these things before and overcome them. I DO feel disappointment and sadness and grief, immensely. I’ve had so much loss in my life, and it is ok and good to grieve them. Right now, it is ok for me to mourn my marriage, the loss of my cats who I loved very much, the loss of my home, the loss of my independence, the loss of my body’s ability to do “normal” things, the loss of yet another romantic relationship and the companionship my friend provided. It truly is ok for me to grieve.
Check your thoughts.
Are they truthful? Are they helpful? I may think many unkind, unhelpful thoughts about myself and my inability to cope with stress, uncertainty, and insecurity. But I can reframe these thoughts to mirror a more accurate reality.
Acknowledge that life can be worth living even when there is pain.
Wow. This is very powerful for me. I’ve had SO MUCH PAIN. But over and over again, life proves that it is worth living despite the pain that comes with it. I confess, sometimes I have to write a list for myself so I can visually remind myself of the reasons life is worth living. Do what you must to keep on going.
Practice radical acceptance with your mind.
Many therapists suggest choosing a couple of mantras that you can tell yourself over and over. Mantras like:
It is what it is.
Whatever I am feeling right now is temporary.
I can accept things the way they are right now.
I can’t change the past.
I can’t predict the future.
I can’t control other people (or ____________), but I can control how I respond.
I choose to focus on the present moment.
I cannot change __________; so move on, friend.
I don’t have to like reality to accept reality.
Let it go.
You can certainly make up your own mantra instead!
For me, I tend to have a mini conversation with myself. I ask, “Is this outside of my control?” If it is, I sigh and breathe out, “Let it go.” If it isn’t, I ask, “What then do I have control over? What can I do to change it?”
For those of you who like to logically work through things and write them out, here is a list of excellent radical acceptance worksheets:
This can be a deep breathing exercise or progressive muscle relaxation. It can be the physical act of extending your arms with your hands open as a gesture of acceptance, which therapists call the “Willing Hands” posture.
There’s also the “Half-smiling” technique that I was so condescending of that I mentioned earlier. It honestly is just relaxing your face and then purposely upturning the corners of your mouth. Not a full smile, but half of one. It falls under the premise that if you go at least part of the way, the rest of you will naturally catch up. This doesn’t seem to help me, but it might be beneficial for you!
9. Practice radical acceptance with your heart/spirit.
If you are a spiritual person, or you adhere to a certain religion, prayer and surrendering your life to a higher power can be extremely comforting. You can read or recite the famous serenity prayer, "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.”Or, of course, you can pray whatever is on your heart, even if it’s just, “Please help me, God!”
If you do not feel like you’re a spiritual person and don’t identify with a specific faith, showing compassion to yourself can help you practice radical acceptance in your heart.
10. If you still find yourself resisting radical acceptance, perhaps create a pros and cons list of the benefits that will occur if you radically accept something versus the consequences that will happen if you don’t. Radical acceptance is HARD. It’s ok if you don’t get it right away. Sometimes it takes practicing it to make it actually sink in. And you may be able to accept something one day and then really struggle with accepting it the next. Keep on practicing.
THOUGHTS TO WRAP IT UP
It takes COURAGE to radically accept things that are outside of our control. All those things that I am struggling to radically accept right now? My divorce, my ended relationship, my loss of home and pets and family, my EDS, my loss of independence…in some ways it’s easier to just give in to being bitter about them. To give up and just hate the hand that life has dealt me. To drown in depression.
But then I miss out on joy. And contentment. And goodness. And gratefulness. And what the present moment has to offer me NOW.
So, for at least today, for right now, I can’t control any of those things that have happened in the past to me or the reality of my current situation. I don’t have to like or condone any of them. What CAN I control? Right now, I think the only thing I can control is trying to find a job. Something that my body and mind can handle. I might have to give up the hope and need I have for disability benefits. But for right now? I can do this. I can update that resume and apply to at least one job today. I can accept that that is one thing I can do today.
SOME MORE FINAL THOUGHTS
The more I understand about ACT, the more I appreciate it for what it offers. Thank you for letting me learn with you. Pathfinder offers a really great summary of all the six components of ACT which you can find here.
Please remember that I am not a therapist. These thoughts are my own, a conglomeration based on what I’ve researched and experienced in my own therapy. Radical acceptance specifically is not appropriate in situations where your physical, emotional, or mental health are at risk (such as being in an abusive relationship). In such cases, radical acceptance may prevent you from making the needed changes to keep you safe.
Keep on keeping on, friends.
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It was an informative read. I especially enjoyed the locus of control. Weather is one item I haven't mastered to accept radically!