Quotes About Self-acceptance

Healthy striving is self-focused: How can I improve? Perfectionism is other-focused: What will people think? Perfectionism is a hustle.

I didn't realize it then, but looking back, those permission slips to myself were actually an attempt to belong to myself and to no one else.

In 2010, two years after that event, I wrote The Gifts of Imperfection, a book that introduced my research on the ten guideposts for wholeheartedness.

As a shame researcher, I've learned that wherever perfectionism is driving us, shame is riding shotgun.

Wholehearted living is about engaging in our lives from a place of worthiness.

Sacrificing who we are for the sake of what other people think just isn't worth it.

Perfectionism is the belief that if we live perfect, look perfect, and act perfect, we can minimize or avoid the pain of blame, judgment, and shame. It's a shield.

We hustle for our worthiness by slipping on the emotional and behavioral straitjacket of cool and posturing as the tragically hip and the terminally "better than." Being "in control" isn't always about the desire to manipulate situations, but often it's about the need to manage perception. We want to be able to control what other people think about us so that we can feel good enough.

Cuando nos pasamos la vida esperando ser perfectos o inmunes antes de salir al ruedo, sacrificamos relaciones y oportunidades que quizá sean irrecuperables, derrochamos nuestro valioso tiempo y tal vez le damos la espalda a nuestras aptitudes, a esas contribuciones únicas que sólo nosotros podemos hacer.

Your level of belonging, in fact, can never be greater than your level of self-acceptance.

Owning our story can be difficult but not nearly as difficult as spending our lives running from it.

Those who feel lovable, who love, and who experience belonging, simply believe they are worthy of love and belonging.

fitting in is one of the greatest barriers to belonging. Fitting in is about assessing a situation and becoming who you need to be in order to be accepted. Belonging, on the other hand, doesn't require us to change who we are; it requires us to be who we are.

Human approval is one of our most treasured idols, and the offering we must lay at its hungry feet is keeping others comfortable.

When we choose growth over perfection, we immediately increase our shame resilience. Improvement is a far more realistic goal than perfection. Merely letting go of unattainable goals makes us less susceptible to shame. When we believe "we must be this" we ignore who or what we actually are, our capacity and our limitations. We start from the image of perfection, and of course, from perfection there is nowhere to go but down.

Authenticity is the daily practice of letting go of who we think we're supposed to be and embracing who we are. Choosing authenticity means cultivating the courage to be imperfect, to set boundaries, and to allow ourselves to be vulnerable; exercising the compassion that comes from knowing that we are all made of strength and struggle; and nurturing the connection and sense of belonging that can only happen when we believe that we are enough.

Shame resilience is key to embracing our vulnerability. We can't let ourselves be seen if we're terrified by what people might think. Often 'not being good at vulnerability' means that we're damn good at shame.

When we spend our lives waiting until we're perfect or bulletproof before we walk into the arena, we ultimately sacrifice relationships and opportunities that may not be recoverable, we squander our precious time, and we turn our backs on our gifts, those unique contributions that only we can make.

La autenticidad es la práctica diaria de librarnos de lo que creemos que deberíamos ser y abrazar en cambio lo que realmente somos.

over making other people comfortable. It was the hardest work I've ever done and continue to do.

Just as a reminder from Chapter 4, perfectionism is not teaching them how to strive for excellence or be their best selves. Perfectionism is teaching them to value what other people think over what they think or how they feel. It's teaching them to perform, please, and prove. Unfortunately, I have many examples from my own life.

Men and women who have a deep sense of love and belonging believe they are worthy of love and belonging.

We either own our stories (even the messy ones), or we stand outside of them—denying our vulnerabilities and imperfections, orphaning the parts of us that don't fit in with who/what we think we're supposed to be, and hustling for other people's approval of our worthiness.

The woman who emerged had to be eight feet tall. Her hair was every shade of purple, piled in buns and hanging in braids, and all of it sprinkled with gems like stars.