Self-acceptance, and the body’s self-rejection

‘It seems to me that we can never be as much despised as we deserve’. (Montaigne)

O look, look in the mirror,

O look in your distress:

Life remains a blessing

Although you cannot bless.

O stand, stand at the window

As the tears scald and start;

You shall love your crooked neighbour

With your crooked heart’ (WH Auden: As I Walked Out One Evening)

One of the top ten searches on Google is ‘How can I accept myself?’ This yearning is addressed in a ghastly song called ‘Let it go’ from a very popular cartoon film called ‘Frozen’. A more macho approach is that old crooner’s classic, ‘I did it my way’. Anyway, we want to be at ease with who we are. Comfortable in our own skin. In a way it is all about growing up. Your youth is about change, experimentation, wondering who you are. Adulthood is about arriving at who you are.

Sounds good. But is it? Think of people who appear to be at ease with who they are. The Donald is an obvious candidate. Maybe you can think of people closer to home. They don’t appear to suffer from self-doubt. They’re the finished article. I mean, there’s a penumbra of less appealing characteristics that kick off from self-acceptance – self-sufficiency, complacency, narcissism.

Our discomfort with ourselves is the gap between the person we think we are and the person we want to be. We need this discomfort or itch. Much as we might like to replace the inner judgment with inner acceptance, maybe we are missing something.

The need for self-acceptance comes in my view from an inability to accept the frailties of others. It is the reflection of an intolerance of any view or attitude or behavior from others that we find challenging or just a bit thoughtless. If we were able to see clearly that we can sometimes be a bit unacceptable ourselves, then we would be a lot more relaxed about the fact that others are the same.

I remember as a budding Buddhist being told - with what is known in the Zen tradition as ‘grandmotherly kindness’ - ‘You know mate, you are just a hopeless wretch.’ At the time I didn’t get it – I thought the guy was being a bit of a berk. But as the years go by, the truth of what he said is clearer. As a Buddhist you develop the power and the freedom of being able to accept others, tolerate them, even to tolerate their judgments, whether these may be a bit narrow, or a bit close to the bone. And even to tolerate, in the light of the Dharma, your own self-judgment.

It is weirdly nice going into an NHS hospital when you are seriously ill. Being not-ok is accepted. There is a solidarity of the afflicted. There is kindness on tap. Your pain is important, it is understood. One thing you gradually realize is that no-one apart from your very dearest and nearest really wants to know about your medical stuff. Cancer is the ultimate failure of self-acceptance. Your very body is turning on yourself. Cancer is inner conflict going terminal. But in the hospital everyone is interested. Like a priest in the confessional is interested in your pain, and in healing that pain. You can see why the NHS is regarded as a kind of religion.

On Christmas Day 1919 Lenin ordered anyone who did not turn up for work that day to be shot. Well, like Sinatra, I guess he did it his way. If you thought things were looking bad at the end of the year, at least we can still wish each other Happy Christmas.