Warts and all

Radical acceptance and the end of the world, I mean, year

Work really made me work for it this month so I’m feeling a little depleted, but I wanted to send out a quick note on something I’ve been practicing lately.

The end of the year always brings an interesting cocktail of emotions. It’s different for everyone but by the time January rolls around the thing I’m feeling most is typically exhaustion. I’ve been ping ponging between emotional highs and lows this year. There were a lot of big, exciting changes in my life and a lot of small, quiet moments of gratitude, but I also felt an overwhelming combination of fear, grief, anger, shame, and spite any time I checked the news or looked at social media (Substack included).

Exhibit A: I freak out all day at work and then look out my window at this and feel calm again

Earlier this year, as the election really kicked into gear, I became more aware of my little lab rat brain lighting up pretty much whenever I picked up my phone. Every week there was a new article or essay about the attention economy and phone addiction and I was feeling gross about it all. Millennials like to remind everyone that we’re the last generation old enough to remember a time before the internet. But like, who cares? What good does it do if we just complain about how things are worse now without doing anything about it?

I knew I wouldn’t die without the apps since I do indeed remember life before them, so I thought maybe it was time to quit or scale back. Instagram really is how I keep in touch with a lot of friends and family and my use of it feels very benign these days, plus I set a 30-minute screen time limit for it. It’s spared for now. I wasn’t fully addicted to TikTok yet so that was relatively easy to delete and my brain felt better immediately. Twitter took a few false starts, but I got there eventually. I hardly open Bluesky. Whenever I do I see something so annoying I close it again almost immediately, so I don’t feel at risk of forming a habit.¹

It helped. I became less beholden to my phone, to the mindless entertainment and the doomscrolling and the relentless stream of horrors. Which isn’t to advocate for ignorance, just that I don’t need to give myself the full Clockwork Orange treatment. Of course the relentless stream of horrors is still there, waiting. It’s been calling to me with renewed vigor since the election. And I often dip back in and despair. Now when I’m seeking abjection I resort to an old fallback: clicking “view comments” on news websites. But I’m able to step away more easily than I was with the endless scroll on social media.

me on twitter

This is helping me be less reactive, in general, which is a relief, and it’s made more space for something else I’ve been working on over the past 5 years or so: radical acceptance. (I’m gonna put my white lady yoga teacher hat on for a minute, sorry.)

Radical acceptance asks that we accept pain as it comes without wallowing in it and that we accept pleasure without clinging to it. When something in our lives feels out of whack, it asks that we take an honest inventory of our situation. It asks that we see ourselves (and others) as we truly are, and then — in spite of what we find, because of what we find — embrace ourselves, warts and all. It’s antithetical to guilt, shame, and denial. It helps show us how little control we have over things and asks us to accept that life is unfair — deeply, painfully unfair — but that we only hurt ourselves further when we fixate on that unfairness or how we wish thing were instead. It allows us to see more clearly what we do have control over and where we can effect change in our lives. It’s really an exercise in compassion, because without compassion there can be no true acceptance. It’s demanding and often challenging. It’s a call to action.

I first came across the idea of radical acceptance when I quit drinking, or at least that’s the first time it sunk in. It helped tremendously and opened up space for healing and grieving and forgiveness, which is ultimately what I needed to make it stick. I focused most of my efforts inward in those years and so, as I grew to hate myself less over time, it became less of a focus. But then…the election…and…just the state of the world in general. In rushed a renewed flood of spiteful, fearful anger. During the weeks following the election, the last thing I’ve been feeling is generous or understanding or accepting, even though I’d told myself I was prepared for this result.

But I guess after years of practice, some of this work has actually weaseled its way into my brain. This is exactly when I should be practicing radical acceptance, I thought on an anxiety-fueled speed walk that week, followed immediately by, fuck that and fuck all these people. And then several worry- and rumination-filled hours/days later, fine.

I couldn’t resist I’m sorry

It’s hard! It’s really hard. I’m not doing it very well, but I’m practicing. This is not to say the hurt is unjustified, the anger and fear unwarranted. For me it’s a practice of seeing things clearly, seeing things as they are and not as I wish they were. It’s a practice of dismantling my illusions and my old, disproven narratives. For me, that’s been a ground floor requirement for figuring out what comes next and where my energy is better spent.

It’s not being a doormat, it’s not giving in, it’s not throwing up your hands or washing them clean of the dirty work of living together in this broken world and our fractured communities. It’s not suffering needlessly or taking abuse. In many ways, it’s a practice of forgiveness, which is not the same as forgetting. It’s the deliberate act of turning toward a difficult truth, instead of away, in an effort to diminish the power it has over your life.

Learning to forgive myself and treat myself with compassion offered a way forward when I quit drinking, one grounded in equanimity instead of catastrophe. It helped me understand my shortcomings more clearly, less defensively or cruelly. I had to pull out all the things I’d tucked away because they were too difficult or hurtful or ugly and line them up, one by one. I had to really look at them, closely, and say, ok, this is what we’re working with, I accept this as my starting point. It helped me heal and grow, often in painful but necessary ways. When directed outward, toward those I love, it helped me love them better, more honestly. It helped me see them more clearly as they are and not just as I thought they were or wanted them to be.²

It’s much harder when directed at people I don’t already love. But I guess for me it’s an effort in understanding without expecting that effort to be reciprocated. It’s a practice I’m failing at and one I suspect I’ll be failing at for quite some time, but I still think it’s worth trying.

I’m not harboring the fantasy that my compassion and understanding will change the hearts and minds of those I feel diametrically opposed to on the fundamentals. I’m not particularly interested in building bridges with those whose beliefs and values I find reprehensible, to be honest. (I did say I’m failing at this practice, did I not?)

I’m practicing because I need to live in this world too and I can’t do that if I’m living in a total fantasy or carrying around rage and suspicion toward those around me. I’m quick to judgment, I’m susceptible to self-righteousness, I’m conflict avoidant. These are some of my known failings. I have to work against these instincts because I know they’re not productive, they’re not nourishing. They make my world small and callous. They close my heart and make me less useful to the people and things I care about.

In some ways, this practice of radical acceptance and compassion is selfish. It benefits me more than anyone I direct it at. Or maybe that’s just a cynical and very American way of viewing a rich spiritual practice, bankrupting it while paying it lip service. I guess that’s another reason why I’m practicing: so I can get past the point where I fail so obviously and clumsily, so I can get to the point where I fail better and more graciously.

Anyway. That’s what I’ve been working on. lol. I talked about this a little bit in class the other week and a few people said afterward how they needed to hear it going into the holidays, for one reason or another (family issues, politics, sobriety, etc.). So maybe there’s a kernel in here that’s helpful to you too.³

I hope whatever this holiday season brings you, you have time to relax with those you love and indulge a little. See you next week <3

1. I’d love to delete my account but I created a feed that’s getting a little traction and is helping Bucks Twitter find each other again now that they’re actually leaving Twitter and there doesn’t seem to be a way to transfer it to a different owner. But once there is…I’m out.

2. I realize I’m using the past tense but this is on ongoing, never ending process.

3. Jack Kornfield’s meditation on forgiveness was another hit for students this month and it complements this practice of radical acceptance well.