Acceptance
Acceptance is a 'method' of recovering naturally. This work was first coined by the wonderful Dr Claire Weeks who was a General Practitioner and was the pioneer for modern anxiety treatment (see Resources for a list of her books and videos).
There are many other books and links on Resources too that all follow Acceptance. Understanding anxiety through the books and links is absolutely important before practising acceptance.
So what is acceptance? Acceptance is not a tool to make your symptoms all go away instantly. Acceptance is learning to live with your symptoms (for now). Acceptance is more of a mental shift in attitude - its allowing all those symptoms, whatever they are, to just be present, to come, to sweep over you ......... whilst you just carry on with your day. Sounds easy, but it is tough.
I never understood acceptance at first - I'd bemoan 'but the symptoms are still present, they've been present for years, but they don't go away'. That ... is not acceptance.
Yes the symptoms will be present, they will be uncomfortable, frightening, annoying, emotional as they always are, but the difference is your attitude towards them. Instead of going over and over them in your head, trying to fix the symptoms, trying to stop them, wondering when they'll go, how they got there etc etc, you should instead try not to 'head talk' (engage) with them, just allow everything to be present and just carry on with life. By not engaging will allow them to pass by.
Don’t separate each symptom. You don’t have 24 different symptoms. Just label them all as anxiety - put them all under the anxiety umbrella. You have 1 symptom - anxiety. Treat them all the same. Allow them all. Don’t engage.
What is NOT acceptance:
What is acceptance:
And as you live your life, you will find your focus naturally shifts from wanting less of 'bad things' to wanting more of 'good things', and all the symptoms you have will slide away naturally.
In a nutshell:
That’s it.
There are many other books and links on Resources too that all follow Acceptance. Understanding anxiety through the books and links is absolutely important before practising acceptance.
So what is acceptance? Acceptance is not a tool to make your symptoms all go away instantly. Acceptance is learning to live with your symptoms (for now). Acceptance is more of a mental shift in attitude - its allowing all those symptoms, whatever they are, to just be present, to come, to sweep over you ......... whilst you just carry on with your day. Sounds easy, but it is tough.
I never understood acceptance at first - I'd bemoan 'but the symptoms are still present, they've been present for years, but they don't go away'. That ... is not acceptance.
Yes the symptoms will be present, they will be uncomfortable, frightening, annoying, emotional as they always are, but the difference is your attitude towards them. Instead of going over and over them in your head, trying to fix the symptoms, trying to stop them, wondering when they'll go, how they got there etc etc, you should instead try not to 'head talk' (engage) with them, just allow everything to be present and just carry on with life. By not engaging will allow them to pass by.
Don’t separate each symptom. You don’t have 24 different symptoms. Just label them all as anxiety - put them all under the anxiety umbrella. You have 1 symptom - anxiety. Treat them all the same. Allow them all. Don’t engage.
What is NOT acceptance:
- If you're doing something to have less anxiety, you're not practicing acceptance.
- If you're doing something to have less of that physical symptom, you're not practicing acceptance.
- If you're doing something to have less of those weird thoughts, you're not practicing acceptance.
What is acceptance:
- Going and living your life IN SPITE of sensations that you chose to table as 'bad', is practicing acceptance.
- Removing the negative labels you have with these sensations, is practicing acceptance.
- Expecting the worse and choosing to continue anyway, is practicing acceptance.
- Being ok with ANY thought, feeling emotion or sensation, is practicing acceptance.
- Not engaging and worrying about ANY sensation you've labelled as bad, is practicing acceptance.
And as you live your life, you will find your focus naturally shifts from wanting less of 'bad things' to wanting more of 'good things', and all the symptoms you have will slide away naturally.
In a nutshell:
- Notice the symptom
- Acknowledge it
- Label it anxiety
- Refocus on whatever you’re doing
That’s it.