How can you accept yourself?

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. At the BBC we go further so you see clearer. Through frontline reporting, global stories and local insights, we bring you closer to the world's news as it happens. And it starts with a subscription to bbc.com.

giving you unlimited articles and videos, ad-free podcasts, the BBC News Channel streaming live 24-7, plus hundreds of acclaimed documentaries. Subscribe to trusted, independent journalism and storytelling from the BBC. Find out more at bbc.org.

Hello and welcome. I'm Kimberley Wilson, I'm a psychologist and this is Complex. complex is the podcast that helps sift through all the content that's out there about our psychology and state of mind we are constantly being told what's wrong with us but there's so much that's right with us. And on that note, in this episode, I'm exploring self-acceptance. Is it just me? Or is it getting harder and harder to look at yourself in the mirror and say,

Yep, that's me. And you know what? I'm okay. Why is that? We do seem to like beating ourselves up. Whatever I am, it's not enough. And that leads to self-doubt. and to anguish it actually makes me feel really sad because i'll tell you now you absolutely are enough so why is it so difficult for so many people to believe this But now, take a moment as you're listening. I want you to imagine you're looking in that same mirror, but this time you smile kindly at yourself.

Maybe you're even pleased with what you see. You're suffused with self-love and a quiet confidence. How does that feel? Does it feel difficult? I imagine it does. But I hope my special guest today can help walk us towards that image. I've invited Zan van Tulleken, doctor and one half of the presenting duo of our sister podcast, What's Up Docs, to join me. He's agreed to come on because self-acceptance believe it or not is something that he grapples with every day.

So I hope we can be your joint guides through the mosh pit of misinformation to the smooth disco dance floor of understanding. Hello Zand! I don't mind a mosh pit. I'm sorry. I go so far as to say I love a mosh pit. And I think they're quite psychologically healthy. Anyway, it's lovely to be here. It's very nice to see you.

Thank you for joining me. And we do know each other a little bit. You know, you introduced me to the audience as the host of this podcast. I did. I really enjoyed giving you a bit of a grilling. I think it is really useful with the podcast.

learn a bit more about your host. That episode is in the feed on BBC Sound. So I would say that everyone should go and check it out. Thank you very much. And we also presented a podcast together called Made of Stronger Stuff. It's amazing, you know, people grab me in the street. And so I loved Made of Stronger Stuff. And then they say, I loved Kimberley on it. And then they tell me to send their love to Kimberley, which I do, right? I mean, I am reliable about giving you this feedback.

And we're here to talk about self acceptance in this episode. Normally, we have a story from a listener at this point, but this is a special episode tomorrow at New Year's Eve, and it is kind of like a live show. And you are bringing yourself to the conversation. So why don't we start with you telling me what self-acceptance means to you? Self-acceptance to me, I feel at the moment it does slightly elude me.

And I think that's because I really struggle with the idea of always wanting to be better. You know...

most of my life has been spent kind of looking over the horizon going, oh, there's something there that I need to sort of be good enough to get to and I need to improve and learn more and get better at what I'm doing. And I think I've never... managed to figure out the balance between wanting to be meet challenges and do a good job and then just berating myself when I when I don't and I think the other ingredient which I wanted to ask you about is

almost a superstition that self-acceptance to me feels at the moment like complacency and i think it's like resting on my laurels it's self-congratulatory it's looking in the mirror and going aren't i great i'm amazing And I feel like the day I do that, my whole life will come tumbling down. Okay.

Your face really lit up when I said that. Is that what you as a psychologist wanted me to say? Well, I think you touch on so many important points. So one is this idea of... The story that we're told, which is we're always having to get better. But actually, no one's ever telling us what the clues are that we've reached our destination. We don't have any information about what it feels like to actually have achieved that. But the other thing he said was that...

you think that that necessarily requires some self-criticism, which I would disagree with, and we can get into that. And then the third part, which is that self-acceptance is synonymous with complacency. which I would also disagree with. There's a really common belief that if I've achieved anything, it's because I've been horrible to myself and hard on myself and I've pushed myself. And if I take the risk of being kinder to myself, I'll lose my edge.

The anxiety does feel like it sort of fuels me in some way. I mean, I do... I would say, if I was more accepting of myself, maybe this is daft, but I genuinely think I might just sit in bed all day and watch telly. I know it sounds a bit irrational, but I... But I think it's a really common belief. And people, they'll come to see me or someone like me, and they'll be plagued with this kind of harsh, critical inner voice. But there's also a kind of resistance about, well, what am I without it?

You know, and I think there's a confrontation or contradiction in that about actually I'm living my life constantly kind of dealing with this critical bullying, but also I'm afraid to let it go. But I do have that resistance. I think, oh, but maybe that is whatever I'm managing to get done in a day is a result of the sort of very literal kind of voices in my head haranguing me.

I think a lot of the listeners who will, I think, objectively be looking at you and thinking, here's a successful guy, you know, he's got this great career. But it's really helpful, I think, for you to verbalise that there's this kind of inner turmoil. There's this really difficult internal conversation. I think you're sitting where a lot of the audience will also be sitting. So thank you for sharing that. I think that's really helpful.

and generous of you actually. And so I think it's about time that we really got into the topic. We can really unpick it. So let's get into that complexity. All right. So, you know, what we know is that this lack of self-acceptance

What your describing, Zand, is incredibly common. And according to an NHS website, 75% of young people acknowledge the experience of not feeling confident in themselves. But what's really interesting... about that is the inherent contradiction right because here we are me as an individual thinking

Everyone outside is really successful. They're doing things. They're posting things on socials. They are achieving. They are grinding. They are all of that. And I'm the only one feeling like I'm failing, like I'm not really up to scratch. But actually, the vast majority of people feel like that. So we are sharing the same experience by ourselves.

There's a famous idea of just sort of a harsh tutor of someone outside who sort of is demanding of you and that's how you achieve things. And I feel like if that person isn't in my life, that my brain will fill that gap. And I wonder whether we're conflating two things, which is a sense of satisfaction and happiness and peace or whatever, and success. Because... You are describing this kind of idea that I need to get better. And it's kind of like, at what? Because then I will feel better.

But then you don't actually believe that because if you feel better, then you won't strive to be more successful. There's an inherent contradiction in here. Okay, well, all right. Well, hang on a minute. You're sort of pointing your finger and nodding. What is it about yourself that you're not accepting? What is it that is stopping you from thinking, I'm enough, I've done well here? Well, it's a difficult question.

I mean, first of all, let me say, my life is, I don't want to be richer or more famous or any of those things. And so it's not that I have any sense of sort of, woe is me and oh, things are difficult.

So it is a good question then. So what is the thing that I'm not accepting? I mean, these, the endless, relentless failures to do the things I promised I would do. I don't call my... son who lives in canada enough i don't phone him enough i think about him all the time i talk about him all the time i'm not good at picking up the phone i don't see my parents enough i mean this is and i can i have a number of excuses for all these things

I think that I could be much more patient with my family. So there are these things where I sort of go, I wish I was more, I'm not very punctual. You know, today to get here, I was so excited to see you. I have huge respect for how busy you are. 10 minutes late after the time that you had already allowed.

Like, I was 40 minutes late, in fact. Like, if I have to leave to be somewhere in a day, it takes my entire brain capacity to be like, I mustn't miss this train, I mustn't be late. And yet, I'm frequently sprinting down the platform in a sweaty mess.

Those things just seem to be a sort of relentless set of just why am I not a better husband, father, brother, son, etc. And also... timing dates organization all those things i struggle with so those are sort of the things that are meant to make you an adult i'm pretty bad at i think so many of the things that you describe are things that we all want to improve at we all want to be better partners we all want to be better at getting back to people I now say to people

I think they're going to text me. If I don't respond, please hassle me. It's not because I don't care about you. It's just because I'm terrible at doing this. But this is the point. I think... These are really, really common concerns, but I think you're experiencing them as completely unique to you. And so you're looking at this thing that I want to get better at and criticising yourself for it. So you've got the original.

pain and then you've also got the additional pain of I'm angry at myself for not being good at that thing and also it hurts to not be good at that thing We call these metacognitions, your thoughts about your thoughts. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So when I get frustrated, I then have an additional layer of frustration on top of that, which actually can go on and on. You know, then I'm frustrated about my frustration, about my frustration. I mean, it's really daft what's going on.

in my brain and so i think what might be helpful

It's just knowing that, you know, we are constantly thinking about where we fit and where we sit in people's minds and wanting to make sure that we sit in a good place in people's minds. And that is just ground zero of being a human. It isn't.

unique to you it isn't something that you have conjured up all by yourself my first thought when you said that was like well how's that going to help like just because you've got problems you know you've got problems i've got problems but actually i suppose that the next thought was

I will worry about not texting my son or calling my son enough. And then when I speak to him, he's not worried about that at all. And I've brought it up with him many times. I'm not saying he never wishes that I'd phone more, but it's not...

a dominant issue in our interactions and in our relationship and i think it almost the sort of guilt and worry then actually stopped me at some point i'm like oh i can't send him a text now because i haven't texted for ages one of the difficulties of thinking it's just you

is imagining hostility on the other end. That person is thinking, why hasn't they got back to me? They don't care about me or they're so whatever the critical... version is and so you delay getting in touch because you don't want to be greeted with that hostility oh that's really good yes that is exactly true And so you don't want to remind them of your existence because it will remind them of the distance and the time. And then you'll imagine that you're in their bad books.

Whereas if you just assume that we're all slightly distracted and we're all doing different things and actually a message from you is a pleasure for that person, then there's less of a barrier to then sending that message. So how do I do it? Like, where does that, yeah, how do I do it? That's an excellent question. And I think to answer it properly, we need to really understand what the features, the component parts of self-acceptance really are.

Okay. Right. So the dictionary definition is a lot what it says on the tin, the ability to accept yourself as you are, including your faults. Ah, yeah, but even the word fault, fault does not imply, but fault is quite negative. But accept yourself as you are. So in your description, that's not what you're doing, right? You're already trying to improve, achieve, transform.

be somewhere else and then also including your faults or i suppose we would caveat that with what you perceive to be your faults because i guess from my perspective i would be thinking idiosyncrasies differences I actually got into a row with a friend of mine who's a psychologist. Not me. Not really. Very good friend and I was late for brunch. And this was brunch back in, you know, when none of us had children.

And I was five minutes late. And she said it's really disrespectful. And I said, but I was late to my medical school interviews. You know, I've been late for job interviews. I've been late for things that are terribly important. I just find punctuality really difficult. And she said, why can't you just change? And I said, well, why? We should all be better. Yeah. But being late is not good and it's annoying for people and people get irritated by it. Like, surely it would be better.

Well, you can't be saying it's just okay to be laser. I don't believe that's what you're saying, is it? What I'm saying I think might be a little bit more nuanced than that. So the first thing I would be saying is what you haven't done is to accept. that despite that this being something that you've done for at least 25 years that punctuality is an area that you struggle with you haven't accepted that

It shows up consistently enough in your life for it to be true, but you resist it as a fact. Well, that's true. So what would it be like? Take a deep breath, feet on the floor. What would it be like for you to say, I am not a punctual person? Well, people hate that. I'm not asking about other people. What would it feel like for you to say with 20 plus years of evidence, what I know about myself is that I struggle with punctuality. I'm not a punctual person.

I can't work out if it feels like a relief to say that or whether it feels... It does feel a little bit like I'm saying I'm not a good person or I'm not someone who respects other people's time. I suppose it does feel like admitting... to a minor but not insignificant moral failing i suppose that's how it feels so you're not taking it as a kind of fact about your

who you are as a person or your personality the way you're built there's a judgment on it it's something you are failing to do something you're unable to do incapable of doing and it's really interesting isn't it that this is something as you said talking to your friend. I was late for my own medical school interviews. There's something that is really difficult for you about being there on time, but it is so difficult for you to look at that evidence and kind of accept it.

let it sink in let it be an aspect of of how you present in the world it's really hard i can see how hard it is oh god it's such a good example the thing about the punctuality which i'm struggling with is that it's like i don't understand why i can't be on time but i suppose it feels very hard to just go

All right, I'm stuck with, I don't know, it's just admitting a failing. Yeah, we're calling it a failing, but I'm going to suggest two things. So, on part one, the fact that you refuse to accept that you struggle with punctuality. means that you keep promising people that you'll be on time. You keep saying, next time I'll be punctual and then you don't manage that and then you feel like you failed and then you've let them down and they're disappointed and so it compounds the issue.

And two, it means that these things that we find difficult, we imagine we have to do by ourselves. And it prevents you from being able to lean on or ask for help from other people. Whereas if you'd been able to say, listen, everyone, I really struggle with punctuality. And so what I'm doing is if you just tell me a time that's 30 minutes different from the actual time, then... people can accommodate, but also you stop setting yourself up to fail. Oh, it's so interesting, yeah.

And it doesn't mean you don't keep trying to work on it. There are lots and lots of practical strategies that we can utilise, but you can't use them until you accept that there's a problem that needs to be addressed. Okay, so let me see if I've got it. I'm not trying to win an argument with you, but I really felt almost sorry for you that I was bringing you this defective aspect of my personality and you were going to have to kind of spin it into some...

you know, potentially good thing. When I think everyone could agree that punctuality is just like important and respectful and polite and fairly easy. And it's just a sort of... crappiness on my part that i can't do it and what you're saying is all that interpretation of punctuality is completely irrelevant it's something i struggle with i've struggled with it for my entire life

And so as long as I expect to change, every time I go, sorry, sorry, sorry, I'm late, the implication is I promise I won't be late again. Okay. And once we know what is... We can deal with what is. But whilst you're resisting what is, we don't have any tools. We can't get a grip of it. But I have to acknowledge the reality of my limitations because it's only from accepting reality that I can change things.

Okay, so saying I'm not a punctual person, whatever I think about that being a kind of admission of failure and guilt and ridiculousness allows everyone else to manage. expectations and their timings and all the logistics and practical stuff And it allows me to stop having this relentless cycle of going, oh, sorry, sorry, sorry, and I'll do better next time. And the endless chastisement of myself going, oh, come on, you can be on time, you can be on time.

I'm glad that kind of landed because really what we're talking about, whatever the issue is, whatever aspect of ourselves we're struggling to accept is the power of integration. So not trying to split off this.

undesirable part of ourselves and hide it and cover it over and pretend it doesn't exist and then cause a distraction over here and only show our shiny bright perfect parts of ourselves and it's only by bringing these things together that I can look at it and think okay now what am I going to do with it what am I going to do with this part of myself which isn't perfect it isn't how I would love to be for the rest of my life but it is this is honestly who I am

And I think the secondary benefit of that is that when we bring our whole selves to the world, people know who we are fully and accept us rather than only accepting the... perfect persona that we present there's a real power in that that's really nice i got very lucky with my wife that she had got to know me figured out who i was seen me at a bit of a low ebb

before we kind of got together romantically. And so, although I think actually I would have concealed... loads of stuff not like in a sinister way but I just would have tried to portray some version of myself that I thought was more attractive by the time we got together she'd seen she knew it all she'd seen it all i wish i was a better dancer she is sometimes if we dance together i do have a bit of like oh god she's gonna get the ick from this

But overall, what you're saying just chimes with me so strongly because I do have that relationship with my wife where she gets everything. And so I can be just my... authentic self my truth like i just not trying to conceal anything and that makes it much easier this is it isn't it that actually what you have seen in practice but you didn't realize in theory is that self-acceptance is the core of

safe relationships and feeling good about yourself and being able to go into the world with that little bit of confidence.

So what are some practical steps that we can use? to get to this point of integration. And I say this knowing that it's much easier said than done. I'm going to suggest two things that I think will be helpful for you and for everybody listening. The first thing that we want to think about is trying to recognise yourself, your perceived faults, your idiosyncrasies, however you want to call them. But try to recognise them without judgement.

The image I always use for this is that you're lying on a riverbank. It's a sunny day. And there's a slow winding river next to you. And all of your thoughts. Your criticisms, your judgments, why was I late for that? I haven't messaged somebody back. I just leave on the surface of the river and they're just flowing away. So you can see them, you can read them.

But you don't pick them up, you're not gathering them up from the river, you're just letting them flow. And this is a task that helps to break down what we call cognitive fusion, which is the idea that we fuse with our thoughts and we believe that our thoughts...

are real and true and facts and us and it helps just create a little bit of distance between that thought whatever that thought might be I'm a terrible person and someone's really angry with me it's just a thought that I can look at and I can observe

and that can just start to kind of take off the edge of some of that inner critic that inner harshness which doesn't actually do anything good for us it takes a lot of energy it makes us feel bad about ourselves it makes us smaller it makes us procrastinate

And so that would be my first step, recognizing yourself without judgment. And then if you can do that and if you can get into the practice of doing that, I would suggest doing that for a couple of minutes a day in the beginning just to get a sense of it. The next thing that I often say to my clients.

especially if I'm working with people who have issues with body, is about allowing other people to be separate from you. So for example, what I mean is reminding themselves that... other people's bodies are none of my business right we often compare our bodies compare ourselves we look at somebody else and then think about ourselves and actually it's a really good practice to be able to say that person's hair weight shape of their legs

It's none of my business. And when you can allow other people to have their own bodies, it creates more space for you to be more accepting of yourself. I'm trying to imagine doing that. Yes, none of your business. If I bumped into someone I hadn't seen for a long time and their body had changed, they'd put on weight and I might catch myself thinking, oh, you've put on weight. My thought to myself would be, their body's none of my business.

Their body's none of my business. There's nothing there for me. That's good. Sometimes I do that with the news. I think, I don't need to have an opinion about this. I'm quite good at that, actually. And so you can apply that to whatever issue that you're struggling with. So if you've got a friend who's always on time and you look at them, you think they're always punctual. How they manage their time is fantastic, but it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with me.

And I might want their punctuality. Maybe I wouldn't want their, I don't know, smoking habit or... liver problems or whatever else right i might want their long beautiful legs but i wouldn't want their kidneys is that there's a little bit of that of going you don't have the whole picture you can actually put the whole idea down that issue doesn't need to play out it won't help

It's not interesting. It's quite boring. I mean, I'm quite bored by my own thoughts about this stuff a lot of the time. It's true. No one's more bored than my therapist. That's exhausted. Oh, my God. No, it's the rumination part. You constantly talking about how terrible you are isn't making you a better person. It's keeping you thinking about how terrible you are. Yes. When you can accept...

whatever that thing is, then you can say, okay, now that my feet are on the solid ground of reality, what is my next step? That's a good trick to just go, none of my business. That's... Would you say that's a mantra? I think it's a, yes, it's a really good practice. And I mean practice because none of this stuff comes easy. You know, we're invited to critique and criticize and judge and compare. And so it's real work to try to separate yourself.

from that. But if you're thinking about, actually, the less I'm thinking about somebody else, the more I have space to think about what I want for myself and the people around me. It's just about freeing up mental space. So let the faults flow on by on the river. Don't go fishing in the river. Just sit on the riverbank. Oh, that's an interesting thought. Okay. Well, there's another one. And none of your business applying to other people and all their perfections. Yeah.

and then the final piece because this isn't easy stuff is you can really this is one of the times where I think you really can benefit from therapy you can really benefit from having an objective person sit down and help you interrogate these things about yourself because these psychological habits are so well they're so habitual they're so innate it's really hard to extricate yourself from them by yourself and it's just not the way we're made

We are social beings. We are born into networks. And we depend on other people to have a sense of who we are and for additional support. We borrow other people's... belief in us and their encouragement and their point of view and their energy and their patience and we do that in exchange self-improvement is actually a joint venture if someone is listening thinking

I can't afford a therapist and I don't have time for a therapist. Is it a sort of substitute to go, at least you could talk to someone who loves you and cares about you and say,

here are some things I'm struggling to accept and talk it through. Is that part of it or is it not quite the same? When it comes to self-acceptance specifically, actually, you can... take the risk with someone you love and you care about and who cares about you of saying I feel really bad about this thing about myself and I wish it was different but I don't know how to make it different And they will say,

I know you struggle with punctuality, but you're one of the kindest people I know. When you get there, it's great or something like that. Yeah, or I know I can always call you. You're really generous. This is one thing. This isn't all of you. And they can help to kind of reflect the broader. fuller story of you because we lose that when we're so focused on the parts of ourselves that we don't like and so okay that's really it is a funny magic trick you do that is interesting

Because I thought it would just be some incredible bit of mental gymnastics you'd have to do to explain this to me. I just didn't think you'd do it. Okay. I feel like my work here is done. What I really like about this conversation is that we didn't come with an agenda. We had a topic, but not an agenda. And that actually there are a few... relatively simple not easy but simple psychological skills that can really help transform the way you think about something and then

you can immediately feel better. And when you're feeling better, this is my argument against the idea that actually it's feeling bad that drives you. I actually think it's when you're feeling better that you have the energy, the motivation, the optimism and the willingness to make those.

changes i'm so impressed by that i hope anyone listening will have just thought of something that they think is rubbish about themselves that is a genuinely rubbish thing like being unpunctual or whatever that terrible thing that they're doing is and gone if i can accept that that will make it easier to fix easier for other people to live with and reframe it in the context of the rest of their lives that is good

Thank you. I'm really glad you found that helpful. Thank you, Dr. Zan Van Taleken, for coming on to the show. Thank you for being here. Thank you so much for having me on and thank you for listening. And this has been genuinely fascinating and useful.

And thank you to everyone who's listening. I hope you found this episode helpful and encouraging because that's what I want. I want Complex to be your trusted space, a place where you can learn how to take care of yourself better and with more kindness.

And please let me know what you want me to explore on the show and why. Email your questions to complex at bbc.co.uk. We might use what you tell us, but we'll make sure to do it anonymously. Please note also that I can't answer your questions personally. So if you have a concern about a medical or mental health issue, I strongly urge you to seek expert help.

And if you want details of further support with some of the issues raised in the podcast, you can find them at bbc.co.uk forward slash action line. And the link is also in the show notes on BBC Sounds. And don't forget to subscribe to Complex on BBC Sounds and make sure your push notifications are turned on so you don't miss out on a single episode.

And that's it. My thanks again to Zahn for coming. And of course, thank you to the lovely team at Loftus Media. Producer Kirsten Lass, assistant producer Katie Chandler-Clark, researcher Grace Revel, technical producer Ruben... Digital Editor Richard Berry, Science Editor Rami Zabar, Studio Engineer Felipe Rojas, Sound Engineer Ruth Rainey, and at BBC Sounds, Assistant Commissioner Izzy Lee Poulton and Commissioning Editor Rian Roberts.

Happy New Year's Eve. And if you're listening partway into the new year, then I hope you can move into the rest of the new year with some extra love and kindness for yourself. I'm Kimberly Wilson. Thank you for listening. Take care. and go gently. This is Anatomy of a Cancellation. I'm a symbol of a particular time and an extreme version of cancel culture.

Poet and teacher Kate Clanchy wrote a book about her 30-year teaching career, which was initially praised. It's a wonderful book. But later, others said it was racist and deeply problematic. The language in this book is so dehumanising. Unjustified cancellation? Long overdue reckoning? Subscribe to Shadow World. Anatomy of a cancellation on BBC Sounds.

We go further so you see clearer. With a subscription to bbc.com, you get unlimited articles and videos, ad-free podcasts. The BBC News Channel streaming live 24-7, plus hundreds of acclaimed documentaries. From less than a dollar a week for your first year, read, watch and listen to trusted independent journalism and storytelling. It all starts with a subscription to BBC.com. Find out more at bbc.com slash unlimited.