Self-Acceptance, a Key for Change
October 26, 2021
There are two main self’s spoken of in the personal development sphere. The first is Self-Affirmation, the second is Self-Acceptance. What do these two things mean though?
Let’s check out the definitions of each:
Self-Affirmation: the recognition and assertion of the existence and value of one’s individual self.
Self-Acceptance: an individual’s satisfaction or happiness with oneself.
What “self” is the more valuable to oneself? A great question to consider.
Here is my answer. According to the book, The Courage to be Disliked, it is not self-affirmation that we should be most concerned with, it is self-acceptance.
There is a clear difference in the two.
Self-affirmation is making suggestions to oneself, such as “I can do” or “I am strong”. Suggestions that simply can go beyond ones ability, it becomes a notion that can bring about a superiority complex, and may even be termed a way of living in which ones lies to oneself.
With Self-acceptance, if one cannot do something, one is simply accepting “one’s incapable self” as is, and moving forward so that one can do whatever one can. It is not a way of lying to oneself.
In the book (The Courage to be Disliked) this example is used; In a test you received a score of 60%, however you tell yourself, “I just happened to get unlucky this time around, the real me is 100%”, this is self-affirmation. By contrast, if one accepts the score and thinks to themselves “If this is where I am at in this present time how should I go about getting closer to 100%? this is self-acceptance.
Self-acceptance is simply focusing on what one can change, rather than what one cannot. Controlling what is in your control.
This is all very similar to what author Kurt Vonnegut wrote in his novel ‘Slaughterhouse-Five’, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom always to tell the difference”.
The word courage is the interesting word in this quote, having courage to change. We do not lack ability, we lack courage, acceptance and change comes down to courage. The courage to try knowing that challenges (and possibly even failure) will be inevitable at some stage. If we have the courage to fail and have self-acceptance of this failures then success will likely follow if that courage stays constant and we change the things we can change.
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Self-Acceptance, a Key for Change
October 26, 2021
There are two main self’s spoken of in the personal development sphere. The first is Self-Affirmation, the second is Self-Acceptance. What do these two things mean though?
Let’s check out the definitions of each:
Self-Affirmation: the recognition and assertion of the existence and value of one’s individual self.
Self-Acceptance: an individual’s satisfaction or happiness with oneself.
What “self” is the more valuable to oneself? A great question to consider.
Here is my answer. According to the book, The Courage to be Disliked, it is not self-affirmation that we should be most concerned with, it is self-acceptance.
There is a clear difference in the two.
Self-affirmation is making suggestions to oneself, such as “I can do” or “I am strong”. Suggestions that simply can go beyond ones ability, it becomes a notion that can bring about a superiority complex, and may even be termed a way of living in which ones lies to oneself.
With Self-acceptance, if one cannot do something, one is simply accepting “one’s incapable self” as is, and moving forward so that one can do whatever one can. It is not a way of lying to oneself.
In the book (The Courage to be Disliked) this example is used; In a test you received a score of 60%, however you tell yourself, “I just happened to get unlucky this time around, the real me is 100%”, this is self-affirmation. By contrast, if one accepts the score and thinks to themselves “If this is where I am at in this present time how should I go about getting closer to 100%? this is self-acceptance.
Self-acceptance is simply focusing on what one can change, rather than what one cannot. Controlling what is in your control.
This is all very similar to what author Kurt Vonnegut wrote in his novel ‘Slaughterhouse-Five’, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom always to tell the difference”.
The word courage is the interesting word in this quote, having courage to change. We do not lack ability, we lack courage, acceptance and change comes down to courage. The courage to try knowing that challenges (and possibly even failure) will be inevitable at some stage. If we have the courage to fail and have self-acceptance of this failures then success will likely follow if that courage stays constant and we change the things we can change.
