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Archives for May 2022

What’s the difference between acceptance and letting go? 

May 31, 2022 by Nicole Urdang

While both acceptance and letting go are verbs, there is a qualitative difference between them. Acceptance feels more like allowing or surrendering, and letting go seems to be a more active process.

Depending on your history and personality, one may seem easier than the other. It’s interesting to play with your reactions to these different words to see what they evoke in you. Whichever one you choose, it allows you to be more fully engaged with life as it is rather than how you would like it to be.

Of course, when we speak of accepting and letting go, we’re almost always referring to things we find challenging to release. It’s easy to let go of something you don’t want, but it’s incredibly difficult to relinquish something you think you should have or you convinced yourself you can’t live without.

It might be a physical capacity, person, job, part of your identity, or even a yet unrealized dream of your future that is no longer possible. These can all be enormously difficult to navigate emotionally and cognitively, as it is incredibly hard to make peace with something you don’t want.

Yet, the alternative is even more torturous. As long as we resist reality, we suffer. That suffering can feel unrelenting and, even, unbearable. Thankfully, a feeling is not a fact. We can all bear what we don’t like.

For most people, it’s necessary to feel things fully before we can accept them or let them go. That process may happen quickly or it can take a lifetime. There’s no right way to process things, and pressuring yourself to get over something before you’re fully ready, before you have fully grieved its loss, can feel like an act of violence towards yourself.

The hardest part of moving towards acceptance and letting go is allowing life to have its way with you while understanding you have choices in how you respond. Giving yourself permission to feel deep disappointment and grief over not having what you wish you could, or what you may have fantasized about for years, opens the door to eventual acceptance. It takes a lot of work to actively let go of preconceived notions, especially if you thought a particular outcome was essential to your happiness. This active process of reframing what you thought was necessary into something you think you might have merely preferred, requires true grit. It usually takes a long time. Thankfully, as you surrender to what is, you find pockets of relief and peace. Eventually, you realize you have mostly, or even completely, let go of a preconceived idea that was deeply entrenched in your body, mind, and spirit, and you can truly allow life to be as it is. This opens you up to a new realm of self-acceptance and joy.

Almost everything worth changing requires patience and practice. Accepting and letting go are two of the hardest tasks we humans face. Why? Because we so passionately want what we want. But, as the Buddha said, craving and aversion are sure paths to suffering. Continuing to want what may not be possible and torturing ourselves by fruitlessly fighting reality, are often necessary experiences, at least for most people. In time, we can let go, accept and enjoy the emotional freedom that comes from surrendering to what is.

If you try to skip the unpleasant step of railing against what you don’t want because you don’t think it’s spiritually evolved, or you think you’re not acting maturely, you only slow down the entire process. That’s the ego getting in the way of your adapting to life. The ego loves feeling in control.

The good news is that every time we go through the cycle of wanting what we want, fighting the reality of not always getting it, and coming to peace with life as it is, the more skillfully and quickly we can adapt in the future. It’s almost impossible to immediately embrace life on life‘s terms; especially, when it continues to throw you curveballs. Be kind to yourself and allow a period of adjustment when you go from your preconceived notions of how things were supposed to be to how they actually are. And, remember, it might take years to get there.

There are some things we take to the grave. It’s perfectionistic to think we can work through and accept everything life throws at us. As I like to say, no one dies with their inbox empty. There will always be things we haven’t been able to fully assimilate or work through. That’s just part of being human. Our job is to make it safe to be exactly how we are in this moment. 

Copyright Nicole S. Urdang

Filed Under: Life enhancers, Personal evolution, Relationships

Antidotes for five words that create stress and ruin relationships.

May 6, 2022 by Nicole Urdang

Many years ago, when I studied with Dr. Albert Ellis, I learned the five words that create stress, dissatisfaction, and ruined relationships. They are: NEED, MUST, SHOULDN’T, SHOULD and CAN’T.

These five words are like mental handcuffs. They keep you from feeling free, creatively exploring life, and, most of all, living with self-compassion. They create depression, anger, worthlessness, anxiety, panic, and grief. In addition, they catalyze procrastination, stress, and avoidance.

Some people think these words can be motivating, but that assumes the stick works better than the carrot. I have never found that to be the case. Kindness, patience, understanding, praise, appreciation, and gentleness are far more motivating.

These five words have incredible power to create stress in your body-mind. You might feel this consciously or unconsciously through various symptoms including: migraines, stomach issues, heart palpitations, hives, neck, shoulder and back pain, insomnia, and a host of annoying or painful conditions. You can also feel their effect emotionally through: anger, anxiety, depression, worthlessness, resentment, etc.

By habitually noticing the pervasiveness of these five words in your self-talk and conversations, you begin to recognize the incredible pressure they put on you and on everyone in your life, either directly or indirectly.

While it’s tempting to think you can simply replace them with their antidotes, it’s not so easy. The crucial first step is awareness.

How often do you tell yourself you need something you merely want?

Do you pepper your self-talk with musts? Can you see how this creates pressure?

What about all the shoulds and shouldn’ts constantly fighting for cranium space? Do you find yourself thinking or saying you, everyone, and everything in your life should be different from how you, they, or it are?

Does your self-doubt appear as “I can’t?” If so, where is the evidence you can’t just because you think something is difficult?

The five ANTIDOTE words and phrases are: WANT, WISH, COULD, I WOULD PREFER IT IF…, IT MIGHT BE BETTER IF…, I DON’T WANT TO DO X, Y OR Z.

As usual, curiosity is your best friend here. Start by asking yourself these questions:

Must I have what I merely want?

Do people have to do what I wish they would?

Do I truly need what I desire, or wish I had?

Are my real needs already being met?

Isn’t life, and everyone in it, exactly as it and they should be, whether it suits my wishes, or not?

All these words are different from demands on yourself, others, and society. Railing against the way things are is fruitless and creates misery. By changing your inner and spoken vocabulary you can actually change your brain. Your expectations of yourself and others relax a bit and life can feel a little easier.

Last but not least, this is self-compassion in action. If you find yourself having trouble accessing feelings of self-compassion, even if you’re using Kristen Neff’s wonderful website (https://self-compassion.org) or YouTube videos, try changing your words. It alerts you to how hard you can be on yourself while giving you concrete ways to change that inner narrative.

Copyright Nicole S. Urdang

Filed Under: Inner work, Relationships, Trauma Tagged With: Five words that can change your life.

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