Acceptance: Seeing Life as It Is, Not as We Wish It Were

“Acceptance.” It sounds simple enough, right? But anyone who’s faced illness, loss, or just life not going as planned knows that it’s anything but simple.

Life throws us curveballs. Diagnoses, setbacks, or those unexpected moments that knock the wind out of us. And sometimes, the hardest thing to accept is that you don’t want to accept it at all.

“I think there’s a misconception that acceptance means giving up or pretending everything’s fine. But it’s not like that at all.”

Radical acceptance is about noticing reality without judgment. It’s not about approval or pretending things don’t hurt. It’s about saying, “This is what’s happening right now.”  That awareness alone can loosen the grip that pain and resistance have on us.

When You Don’t Want to Accept What Is

Lately, I’ve been struggling with this. After finishing cancer treatment, I’ve been dealing with long-term side effects from immunotherapy everything from lingering fatigue, pain, and a whole lot of other physical ailments. I’ve spent months trying to find the right doctors and answers, and most days, I don’t want to accept that this process just takes time. There’s a part of me that wants to resist, to fight, to say this isn’t fair. And that’s valid. Acceptance doesn’t mean liking what’s happening, it just means acknowledging it without pretending.

“I don’t like it. I don’t want to be in this situation. I’m not giving up. I don’t approve of what’s happening. But I’m fully acknowledging that this is my current reality.”

That’s what radical acceptance looks like. It’s not a one-time thing; it’s a daily (sometimes hourly) practice of coming back to what is, instead of what should be.

The Pressure to “Move On”

There’s an unspoken expectation after cancer that you should just “move on.” We’re told to be grateful, get back to normal, push through, and live our purpose because we're, “miracles”, cancer survivors!

But here’s the truth: it’s not that simple. When our bodies are still healing or when you’re living with chronic illness or metastatic cancer there’s no clear finish line. There’s only learning how to live with  the reality of what is.

“I refuse to just act like nothing is happening to me, because it very much is. And sometimes there isn’t just a moving on there’s a process that has to happen.”

And when we skip that process, when we rush to push through or sweep things under the rug, we add guilt on top of exhaustion. Then comes shame, then frustration and before we know it, we’re drowning in emotions we never gave ourselves permission to feel.

What Acceptance Looks Like in Real Life

Recently, I found myself at a breaking point. I was tired of advocating for myself, tired of chasing appointments, tired of trying to explain to people that being cancer-free doesn’t mean being fine.

There were days when I thought, maybe I should just stop. Stop fighting, stop searching for answers, stop acknowledging how hard it all is.

But every time I reached that place, I remembered something: before cancer, I ignored my body. I pushed through the fatigue, dismissed the pain, and kept going until I couldn’t anymore. And then I got cancer.

I’m not saying that’s why it happened, but it is what happened. And now, I can’t unlearn that lesson.

“Every time I want to give up, I remind myself where pushing through got me before and I owe it to myself to do better this time.”

I deserve answers.I deserve to feel better. And even though accepting this new reality is hard, it’s a way of caring for myself. In a weird way, acceptance is self-care.

Learning from Den’s Perspective

Den and I had this conversation on the podcast while both of us were in the thick of it. She recently went back to work after years of illness, and her body immediately started pushing back—migraines, exhaustion, symptoms.

As she said during our talk:

“It’s hard to accept that my body can’t do what my mind wants it to do. But when I finally let go of the frustration, even for a moment, I can feel my body relax. Like I can breathe again.”

Her words reminded me that acceptance doesn’t mean resignation—it’s not giving up. It’s giving in to the truth of what’s happening, without letting it define who we are.

Practicing (Not Perfecting) Acceptance

The truth is, acceptance isn’t a destination. It’s a practice. Some days it comes easily; other days it feels completely impossible.

Radical acceptance doesn’t mean loving your reality. It means seeing it clearly, without fighting it emotionally. That awareness alone can free up energy for the things we can influence.

“Acceptance isn’t a one-time achievement. It’s a practice—something we come back to, moment by moment.”

So if you’re in that place where you’re tired—of fighting, of pretending, of carrying it all—know that you’re not alone.We don’t have to like what’s happening.We just have to stop fighting what is. Sometimes, that’s where peace begins. Jes 💌