Active Acceptance Metaphors

The metaphor of the annoying neighbor in the community meeting

To illustrate the attitude of disposition, we can use a variation of the guest metaphor.

Imagine that you are the president of your community of neighbors and you have organized a party to improve coexistence.

Suddenly, that neighbor from the fifth who always complains, smells of stale tobacco and tells boring stories shows up. You don't like him and you didn't want him to come.

You have two options: the first is to throw him out or spend the whole party watching him with tension, trying to keep him from talking to anyone and making your evening miserable (control agenda).

The second option is active acceptance: you let him in, greet him politely ("Hi, come in, there's food on the table") and then go about enjoying the party with the other neighbors, letting him wander around the room. You don't have to love him, or laugh at his jokes, or be glued to him.

You are simply willing for him to be in the same room as you so that the party can continue.

In this metaphor, the neighbor is your anxiety or chronic pain, and the party is your life. If you are not willing to have the neighbor in the room, you will have to cancel the party. Acceptance is the toll we pay in order to celebrate life.

The metaphor of the earth and the well: transforming burden into support

Another powerful narrative to explain how acceptance transforms adversity is the story of the trapped animal. Imagine an old mule that falls to the bottom of a deep, dry well.

The farmer, upon seeing it, decides it is not worth the effort to pull it out and chooses to bury it right there to plug the hole. He begins shoveling dirt over the animal. At first, the mule is terrified and cries (clean pain).

But when the dirt falls on him, instead of letting it bury him, he does something instinctive: he shakes the dirt off his back and steps up, stepping on the dirt that has just fallen.

The more dirt that is thrown at it (more adversity, more negative thoughts, more pain), the more it shakes it off and the higher it rises.

That which was meant to bury him becomes, through his action of acceptance and utilization, the platform that allows him to climb out of the pit.

In therapy, this teaches that we should not fight against the "earth" that falls on us (the difficult emotions), nor let it crush us.

We should accept it ("shake it off") and use it as a basis for taking the next step toward our values.

The energy of anxiety can be used to better prepare; the pain of loss can be used to connect more deeply with others.

Summary

We use the metaphor of the annoying neighbor at a party to explain readiness: we allow the anxiety (the neighbor) to be present so that we don't have to cancel our life (the party).

Acceptance is the necessary toll to live; if we kick the neighbor out, the party ends. It does not imply that we like their presence, but that we are willing to coexist in order to continue celebrating.

Another powerful metaphor is that of the mule in the well: instead of letting himself be buried by the earth (adversity), he shakes it and uses it as a base to climb up and out.