Can accepting ourselves as we are help in achieving happiness?

Some people think that in order to be really happy all we need do is learn to love ourselves as we are. This all depends on what is meant by “being ourselves.” Is it being on a perpetual seesaw between satisfaction and displeasure, calm and excitability, enthusiasm and apathy? Resigning ourselves to this way of thinking while letting our impulses and tendencies run rampant is the easy way out, a compromise, even a kind of surrender.

Many formulas for happiness insist that by nature we are a blend of light and shadow and that we must learn to accept our faults along with our positive qualities. They claim that by giving up the fight against our own limitations we can resolve most of our inner conflicts and greet each day with confidence and ease. Setting our own natures free is the best way; muzzling them can only exacerbate our problems. If we have to choose, it is certainly better to live spontaneously than to spend our days champing at the bit, being bored to tears, or hating ourselves. But isn’t that just a way of wrapping our habits up in a pretty package?

It may be true that “expressing ourselves,” giving free rein to our “natural” impulses, gives us momentary relief from our inner tensions, but we remain trapped in the endless circle of our usual habits. Such a lax attitude doesn’t solve any serious problems, since in being ordinarily oneself, one remains ordinary.

We are very much like birds that have lived too long in a cage to which we return even when we get the chance to fly away. We have grown so accustomed to our faults that we can barely imagine what life would be like without them. The prospect of change makes us dizzy. And yet it’s not as if we lack energy. We’re constantly striving in any number of different directions, tackling countless projects. But if it does occur to us to think, “I should try to develop altruism, patience, humility,” we hesitate and tell ourselves that these qualities will come to us naturally in the long run, or that it’s not a big deal and that we’ve gotten along just fine without them up to now. Who without determined and methodic efforts could play Mozart? It certainly can’t be done by plunking away at the keyboard with two fingers. Happiness is a skill, a manner of being, but skills must be learned. As the Persian proverb has it: “Patience turns the mulberry leaf into satin.”

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