ACT Series Part 1: The Use of Acceptance in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

March 25, 2026

Dash Stewart

Dash (he/him) is a grounded, thoughtful therapist whose interest in mental health began with a meaningful experience in high school that sparked lasting curiosity about how people think and feel. After earning his psychology degree, he spent several years in marketing before returning to his passion for face-to-face connection. With a Master’s in Counseling Psychology and experience in community mental health, Dash brings warmth, humor, and flexibility to his work—often using metaphor, curiosity, and direct insight to help clients explore patterns and deepen self-understanding. His style is collaborative and adaptive, shifting between guide, mirror, or companion depending on what each client needs. He values honesty, emotional safety, and the small moments of discovery that lead to change. Outside of therapy, Dash recharges through mountain hikes, re-watching Fargo, cooking Tilapia Piccata, and finding joy in the everyday.

The Use of Acceptance in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

This is the first in a series of posts about the 6 Core Processes of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). I utilize ACT with many of my clients because I find it to be a helpful framework for getting to the root of 2 things: 1. What is really bothering someone, and 2, what can they do about it? It’s no secret that the acronym for Acceptance and Commitment therapy is the verb

ACT, because there is a strong belief that doing things is the way that a person gets to have a rich, full, and meaningful life, even if that life is at many times painful, frustrating, or disappointing. In this way, all of the 6 processes of act involve doing something (even if that doing is making a list, thinking carefully, or meditating). The first process (even though they aren’t generally written in a specific order that a client or therapist has to do them or arranged by importance) is Acceptance.

Acceptance in ACT is about the interior acceptance of our thoughts, feelings, urges, and sensations; not acceptance of external factors like having a job that you hate, feeling sick, or injustices in the world. This is sometimes called “experiential acceptance.” If you want to “do” Acceptance as a verb, it would be to instruct yourself to “Open Up.”

The opposite of acceptance is avoidance. Most people generally want to avoid pain, hardship, struggle, and discomfort. Unfortunately, frequent avoidance or unpleasant experiences often turns minor obstacles into suffering. If we accept that life will sometimes be painful, we can better prepare ourselves for it through acceptance. You might not always be able to avoid the car crash, but you can choose to put your seatbelt on first (many ACT therapists love to use a lot of metaphors).

The 4 A’s of Acceptance

Russ Harris, one of the most extensive writers and practitioners of ACT, breaks the act of acceptance down even further into the Four A’s:

Acknowledge – First notice and name the thoughts, sensations, or urges that are unpleasant
Allow – Let them be present. Don’t fight them or “push them away”.
Accommodate – Open up and make room for them.
Appreciate – Thank them for their help and guidance

At first, this probably seems counterproductive or maybe even impossible. The thought of sitting with an unpleasant thought is one thing, but inviting it in and thanking it for showing up? Why would you want to do that!? Well, one answer is that the unpleasant thought might actually be somewhat instructive, or it might turn out that by allowing the unpleasant thought to be heard and really sitting with it, it can become less distressing and even comforting, revealing, or amusing. For example, an unpleasant sensation of anxiety might lead you to study more for a test or rehearse a speech a few more times. Sadness and grief might make you take stock of important relationships. Anger might lead to reflecting on injustices and joining with your community in a protest or volunteering for a cause.

There is a common phrase that many ACT therapists and books use: “Your pain is your ally”. Many people automatically respond to their pain as an enemy or an obstacle to overcome, rather than a sign to pay attention to, listen to, and act accordingly. How might your life be different if you thought “what is this pain trying to teach me?” rather than “This really hurts. I want to stop hurting as soon as possible”?

Tolerance vs. Acceptance

Tolerating an unpleasant emotion or thought takes a lot of sustained effort, time, and energy. Tolerating and pushing away your social anxiety while also trying to talk to a new person will require you to split your attention between those two things, and cause you to miss out on the depth, fun, and interesting stories of the person you are talking to. This might leave you with a negative impression of social situations in general. Accepting that the social anxiety will be present actually takes less effort, which can free up part of your brain to be more present in the situation you are currently in.

The goal of acceptance is to remove the distress from internal experiences, even if those thoughts or feelings are still uncomfortable or unpleasant. Distress is a heightened and often extreme state of emotion that makes it harder to function. Conversely, discomfort is a manageable and temporary state that, while not pleasant, can still allow for learning and growth.

If you find yourself saying, “I don’t like this, but I can handle it”, you are probably on your way to practicing acceptance. Sometimes, avoiding minor discomforts can rob us of coping skills and tolerance, which makes those discomforts turn into major distress. Having a small pebble in your shoe isn’t a problem in itself, but going on a 5-mile hike with a pebble in your shoe is probably going to result in a painful blister. You’ve got to first accept that the pebble is in your shoe to begin with, to proceed with a solution that might even come with more minor discomfort; taking your shoe off and dumping out the pebble, before you find relief and get back to the fulfilling and rewarding walk.

Curiosity

One of my favorite parts of incorporating Acceptance work into therapy and into my own life is that it often leads to a state of curiosity. A lot of anxiety is your brain shortcutting to the end of a story with a bad ending, and then filling in all of the beats, details, and perceptions of the rest of that story with what it thinks will happen before it actually does. When we assume what will happen before it really plays out, we shortchange ourselves out of the chance to be observant and sometimes pleasantly surprised. If we can accept that we don’t actually know for sure that a situation will turn out poorly, it allows us to slow down, pay attention, and react with curiosity.

If you have been struggling with difficult thoughts, beating yourself up for past mistakes, or wrapped up in never-ending worries about the future, ACT work – and acceptance- might truly be useful. If you are thinking about beginning therapy and have questions about ACT (or just want to see if working together might click), you can schedule a consult call with me or another member of our team of therapists– we are here to help.

Sources:

Harris, R. (2019). ACT made simple: An easy-to-read primer on acceptance and commitment therapy (2nd ed.). New Harbinger Publications.

Harris, R (2021). The Four “A’s” of Acceptance.