Ep #262: Accepting Being a Human

Hello! Today I’m talking about accepting being a human because too often when I’m coaching people, they’re either thinking they shouldn’t be human or are annoyed, frustrated, or defeated by their humanness.

I’m going to give you some examples of what I mean by that and I’ll first start with the one that comes up most often.

Being perfect.

So many of us expect ourselves to be perfect.

We expect ourselves to eat perfectly, to think perfectly, to feel perfectly, to do perfectly.

But that’s not human. That’s not how humans are.

All of us humans are imperfect, we make mistakes, we think thoughts that aren’t useful, we feel uncomfortable emotions, and we don’t always make and follow through on decisions that align with who we want to be, our goals, and what’s best for ourselves.

When we think we shouldn’t be that way, and essentially shouldn’t be human, it causes us so much frustration when we are that way, are human, and are exactly as we’re supposed to be.

And we are all going to be that way. All of us will. Even when we know better.

There’s no avoiding it.

I know better and still don’t do what I know to do sometimes.

Because I’m human, and I’m imperfect.

And when we accept this, it’s going to create a much better human experience and more peace, than when we argue with it, think we should be different, and get annoyed with ourselves.

Now, I’ve said this before and it bears repeating.

Accepting is not condoning or excusing.

It’s taking responsibility and agreeing with what is.

So if you make a mistake, you don’t have to blame it on your humanness, or use being a human as an excuse to remove responsibility from yourself.

You don’t want to fall into the trap of not putting in effort ahead of time because if you’re a human you’re not going to be perfect anyway so you justify not trying.

Or the trap of giving up when you’re not perfect and falling into all-or-nothing.

Not being perfect doesn’t mean you should give up or that it’s not worth trying anymore.

Not being perfect is how it’s supposed to be and you can still do amazing things when you’re not perfect and are doing good enough.

If something does happen, if you do feel a certain way or do do something imperfectly or not at all, then you take responsibility for what you did or didn’t do, and you accept that it happened.

You simply agree with the fact that it happened and agree with the fact that you are an imperfect human.

And instead of beating yourself up about it, or thinking you’re a screw up or are broken or are a lost cause, you accept that you’re a human who makes mistakes and isn’t perfect and you get to work on doing better.

So yes, you are human, and you’re not going to be perfect, but don’t let that stop you from doing good enough.

Do the best you can.

Get back to work after a mistake.

And any time that you or what you do or how you feel isn’t perfect, I highly recommend you accept this instead of getting annoyed by it or thinking it shouldn’t be this way.

It should be this way because it is this way.

It is happening, therefore it’s supposed to be happening.

You can argue with this but, you’ll lose because reality and what is will always win.

So, you are human, you will be human, and here’s some more of what that entails.

You are going to feel uncomfortable, negative emotions sometimes.

Humans don’t always feel happy, comfortable, and positive.

We are supposed to feel a spectrum of emotions so if you’re feeling a negative, uncomfortable emotion, you’re supposed to be because you’re human.

You are going to feel tired sometimes.

Even when you follow the sleep hygiene recommendations to a T, even when you sleep for 8 hours, there might be times when you feel tired during the day.

And there are going to be times when you go to bed too late or wake up too early or wake up in them middle of the night or just don’t get good sleep and you’re going to be tired.

Humans feel tired during the day sometimes, not just when it’s time to go to sleep.

We all experience this sometimes and it’s part of being a human.

You are going to feel hungry and feel full, even when you don’t want to or don’t think you should be.

Humans themselves don’t control their hunger and fullness, our bodies do. Our hormones do.

And sometimes it might not makes sense to us that we’re hungry or full but, we are.

You are a human with a human body and sometimes our bodies are not going to do what we think they should. It’s happens to all of us and is normal.

You are going to think thoughts that aren’t true, that cause you to feel badly, or that are unuseful.

Human brains do that. All of our brains do that, even when we know the truth, even though we want to feel good, and even though it’s not a useful way to think.

Some of us do it more than others, some of us are better at managing our thoughts but, all of us experience these kinds of thoughts.

It’s human to not have positive, useful, good feeling thoughts all the time.

You aren’t going to get everything done that you want to get done in the time you want to get it done.

Sometimes of course you will but not always.

Humans sometimes take longer to do things than they think it will take, or they get interrupted or distracted.

It’s normal. Us humans are not going to be perfect at getting all the things done.

You are going to seek pleasure.

Humans are designed to seek pleasure because pleasurable things have kept us alive throughout history both personally and as a species, so we seek pleasures like eating food, sex, warming or cooling our bodies, connection with other people, things like that.

So when you’re wanting to eat just because it sounds fun, you think you’ll feel good, or it will taste good, it’s normal.

You’re a normal human that wants pleasure.

You’re going to avoid pain.

Same thing, humans are designed to avoid pain, again, because avoiding pain keeps us alive. To our brains, pain basically equals death.

Now, of course in our modern world, most of the pain we experience does not equal death but our brains don’t know that. So we end up going out of our way to avoid so many painful things that are not life-threatening and we end up doing things, like eating too much food, in order to avoid them.

So if you’re avoiding pain, usually emotional pain for most of us, you’re being a human.

You can have compassion and understanding for yourself about this. You’re not abnormal, you’re human.

And just a side note here, a big issue we face with being a human in this modern world is that we’ve made it far too easy for us to get pleasure and avoid pain and that’s why so may of us have experienced struggles with this part of being a human. Both are too accessible and that’s why so many of us have become over consumers with food and other pleasures and under feelers with our feelings.

It’s too easy which makes it hard not to.

Especially because of something else that you’re going to do because you’re human.

You’re going to want to do what’s easy.

This is also a survival mechanism.

Way back a long long time ago, fuel for our bodies and brains wasn’t as plentiful and easy to obtain as it is now. So we had to conserve our energy.

So our brain would desire and default to wanting to do what’s easiest that would use the least amount of energy physically, mentally, and emotionally.

And we are still created this way today.

So if you’re wanting to do what’s easy, you’re human. We all do.

Now, I say all of this not to get you down about being a human and I don’t want you to think that being a human makes life harder.

Being a human just is how we are.

When we can accept this, we can be more at peace with the work we need to do in order to thrive and not just survive, be more at peace with how we naturally respond to things, how our brains naturally work, how we feel, how we think, and why we do what we do.

And being in a place of acceptance and at peace is going to make it so much easier for you to be the human person you want to be rather than if you were constantly annoyed, frustrated, or felt defeated by your humanness.

Your humanness is what it is but, that doesn’t mean you can’t consciously work with it and against it to create the life you want and be person you want to be.

And when you set your expectations at a level that aligns with what humans are capable of, which means you’re not setting your expectations at being perfect, thinking and doing perfectly, feeling good all the time, etc, then it will be so much easier for you to meet your expectations.

So accept what it means to be a human.

Accept that you are a human.

Be at peace with it.

And when you are being a human, don’t beat yourself up about it.

Understand it and get to work on doing better and on doing good enough.

Alright human, that’s all I have for you today. Bye bye.