Self-Acceptance & Confidence

Author ~ Suzanne Fetting

Absolute Confidence Founder & Confidence Coach

Self-acceptance is very powerful and a very important component in having self-confidence. But before you can start to experience how great it feels to have confidence you have to learn to accept yourself unconditionally. That means that you embrace yourself and your body as you are, right now regardless of your past experiences, mistakes or your weaknesses. It also means that you understand who you are and accept your faults. It doesn’t necessarily mean loving yourself, but that will come later with self-love. One of the biggest misconceptions that people have about self-acceptance, is that self-acceptance means liking everything about yourself. This is not true! You don’t have to like everything that you accept. Acceptance also doesn’t mean approval. For example, accepting the fact that there is discrimination in the world doesn’t mean you approve of discrimination.

 

Acceptance also doesn’t mean you’re giving up. For example, accepting a doctor’s diagnosis of cancer doesn’t mean you would refuse treatment and give up on becoming healthy again. Acceptance is an attitude. Acceptance is way of looking at ourselves and the world around us. It implies a willingness and an openness to see things as they truly are, without judgment. For example, if you’re feeling insecure, you’re feeling insecure. That’s all. It doesn’t mean it’s horrible or permanent. It doesn’t mean the insecurity will last forever. It doesn’t mean you won’t be able to handle it. It doesn’t mean anything, except that you’re feeling insecure at that time.

Acceptance is powerful, because it alleviates unnecessary suffering. I’m not implying that you won’t feel any more pain, because you will. But true self-acceptance can bring you a sense of tranquility and understanding throughout the pain.

 

We are now living in a society that is all about instant gratification and being as perfect as possible. It is important to realize that it is impossible to be perfect and to live up to unrealistic expectations. Therefore it is also really important to avoid being self-critical. Self-criticism (being hard on yourself, putting yourself down and picking yourself apart) only chips away at your confidence. In order to accept yourself, you must be able to recognize that you are a unique individual and accept the level and pace of your growth.

Self-acceptance means that you are able to separate WHO you are from WHAT you have done. You understand that everyone makes mistakes, and making mistakes is actually a good thing because that’s how we learn! Facing our mistakes and learning from them are always valuable lessons. If you are willing to experience and embrace whatever you think, feel or do, even if you don’t always like it, you will begin to accept yourself and begin to change and grow into the person you want to become.

A lack of self-acceptance happens for a couple of reasons:

• Not being accepted or loved unconditionally as a child. People who have had to experience that pain, will go through life being internally motivated to compensate for that lack of acceptance by seeking it in their relationships with other people.
• If the most important people in your life do not accept you as you are, or they are trying to change you this will greatly impact your level of self-acceptance.

The following tips will help increase your self-acceptance:

• Remind yourself of your unique talents and abilities.
• Be aware of your image and the way you appear to people.
• Accept compliments from others and trust that they are true.
• Take complete responsibility for your life.

• Give yourself permission to fail.