143 Self-Acceptance Quotes: Think, Journal and Change Your Life

If you struggle with confidence, negative self-comparisons, or self-criticism, you may lack a healthy level of self-acceptance. Embrace every part of yourself, including the qualities you perceive as flaws—it’s easier than spending a lifetime trying to change them!

This article provides inspirational self-acceptance quotes across categories like body acceptance, radical self-acceptance, self-love and self-esteem.

Discover the power of self-acceptance with this collection of 143 empowering quotes. Self-acceptance is the ultimate gift we can give ourselves—embracing who you are without conditions or limitations!

(By the way, throughout this brew of quotes, I’ve added splashes of colour to some of my personal favourite quotes—enjoy!)

Self-Acceptance Quotes

2. “Friendship with oneself is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.”―Eleanor Roosevelt

3. “I want to be the best version of myself for anyone who is going to someday walk into my life and need someone to love them beyond reason.”―Jennifer Elisabeth

4. “Peace comes from within.  Do not seek it without.”―Siddhārtha Gautama

5. “To say “I love you” one must know first how to say the ‘I’.”―Ayn Rand

6. “’You have peace,’ the old woman said, ‘when you make it with yourself.’”―Mitch Albom

7. “We can never obtain peace in the outer world until we make peace with ourselves.”―Dalai Lama XIV

9. “I think that young men and women are so caught by the way they see themselves. Now mind you. When a larger society sees them as unattractive, as threats, as too black or too white or too poor or too fat or too thin or too sexual or too asexual, that’s rough. But you can overcome that. The real difficulty is to overcome how you think about yourself. If we don’t have that we never grow, we never learn, and sure as hell we should never teach.”―Maya Angelou

10. “Generally, self-acceptance is conceptualized as an affirmation or acceptance of self in spite of weaknesses or deficiencies.”—Michael Bernard

11. “It is important to recognize that it’s not unjust to let go of those who show no concern for you.”—Vex King

12. “Loving yourself isn’t vanity. It’s sanity.”—André Gide

13. “The desire for others’ approval and reassurance creates sensitivity to real or imagined signs of rejection.”—Jennifer Crocker & Lora Park

14. “Continually feeding our need for positive self-evaluation is a bit like stuffing ourselves with candy. We get a brief sugar high, then a crash.”—Kristin Neff

16. “It is very important for every human being to forgive herself or himself because if you live, you will make mistakes- it is inevitable. But once you do and you see the mistake, then you forgive yourself and say, ‘Well, if I’d known better I’d have done better,’ that’s all. So you say to people who you think you may have injured, ‘I’m sorry,’ and then you say to yourself, ‘I’m sorry.’”―Maya Angelou

17. “It is not worth the while to let our imperfections disturb us always.”―Henry David Thoreau

18. “There is a magnificent, beautiful, wonderful painting in front of you! It is intricate, detailed, a painstaking labor of devotion and love! The colors are like no other, they swim and leap, they trickle and embellish! And yet you choose to fixate your eyes on the small fly which has landed on it! Why do you do such a thing?”―C. JoyBell C.

19. “self-acceptance is truly a heroic act.”—Nathaniel Branden

20. “If you truly loved yourself, you could never hurt another.”—Buddha

22. “When you learn to accept fear, you cease making a catastrophe of it. Then it ceases to be your master.”—Nathaniel Branden

23. “[With unconditional self-acceptance]… you always – yes, always – accept and respect yourself, your personhood, your being, whether or not you perform well and whether or not other people approve of you and your behaviors.”—Albert Ellis

24. “I don’t know if I continue, even today, always liking myself. But what I learned to do many years ago was to forgive myself.”―Maya Angelou

25. “You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”―Sharon Salzberg

27. “Being different is a revolving door in your life where secure people enter and insecure exit.”―Shannon L. Alder

28. “Because one believes in oneself, one doesn’t try to convince others. Because one is content with oneself, one doesn’t need others’ approval. Because one accepts oneself, the whole world accepts him or her.”―Lao Tzu

29. “It’s all about falling in love with yourself and sharing that love with someone who appreciates you, rather than looking for love to compensate for a self-love deficit.”—Eartha Kitt

30. “When you start loving yourself, life starts loving you, too. By keeping your vibration high, you’ll attract more opportunities and blessings into your life.”—Vex King

31. “You are beautiful because of your unrelenting insistence on being utterly, uncompromisingly, completely you.”—Jeanette LeBlanc

33. “To accept ourselves is to accept the fact that what we think, feel, and do are all expressions of the self at the time they occur.”—Nathaniel Branden

34. “You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve love and affection.”—Buddha

35. “Self-love is the balance between accepting yourself as you are while knowing you deserve better, then working towards it.”—Vex King

Body Acceptance Quotes

43. “Self-love has very little to do with how you feel about your outer self. It’s about accepting all of yourself.” ―Tyra Banks

44. “When we’re self-accepting, we’re able to embrace all facets of ourselves—not just the positive, more “esteem-able” parts.” —Leon F. Seltzer

46. “When you stop living your life based on what others think of you, real life begins. At that moment, you will finally see the door of self-acceptance opened.” ―Shannon L. Alder

47. “Be confident at any size.”—Unknown

49. “To me, beauty is about being comfortable in your own skin. It’s about knowing and accepting who you are.”—Ellen DeGeneres

50. “When I accept myself as a fallible human being capable of being liked and disliked, I will be concerned but not anxious if there is a possibility that new people may dislike me.”—Windy Dryden

52. “Shoutout to all the girls working on loving themselves, because that shit’s hard, and I’m proud of you.”—Unknown

53. “Briefly, unconditional acceptance means liking yourself, others, and the world when you are not getting what you want and in spite of your getting what you don’t want.”—Albert Ellis

55. “The more I bathe in the experience of loving and being loved, the more accessible it becomes in daily life.”—Tara Brach

56. “If we make self-love or body acceptance conditional, the truth is, we will never be happy with ourselves. The reality is that our bodies are constantly changing, and they will never remain exactly the same. If we base our self-worth on something as ever-changing as our bodies, we will forever be on the emotional rollercoaster of body obsession and shame.”—Chrissy King

58. “We do whatever we can to avoid the raw pain of feeling unworthy… we hold back and play it safe rather than risking failure.”—Tara Brach

59. “You don’t exist solely to lose weight and be pretty.”—Unknown

61. “To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself.”—Thich Nhat Hahn

62. “Entangled in the trance of unworthiness, we grow accustomed to caging ourselves in with self-judgment and anxiety, with restlessness and dissatisfaction.”—Tara Brach

64. “Let go of who you are supposed to be and who you are.”—Brene Brown

68. “I bask in the glory of my most magnificent self.”—Debbie Ford

Deep Self-Acceptance Quotes

76. “The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.”—Carl Jung

77. “Self-forgiveness is a process that enables us to release guilt, while self-acceptance is a process that enables us to process our shame.”—Colin Tipping

78. “When you learn to accept instead of expect, you’ll have fewer disappointments.”—Unknown

79. “A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval.”—Mark Twain

80. “Acceptance isn’t about giving up or settling, throwing in the towel. No. Accepting yourself is about having your own back and never abandoning yourself.”—Kris Carr

82. “Happiness and self-acceptance go hand in hand. In fact, your level of self-acceptance determines your level of happiness. The more self-acceptance you have, the more happiness you’ll allow yourself to accept, receive and enjoy.”—Robert Holden

Radical Self-Acceptance Quotes

83. “Radical Acceptance is the willingness to experience ourselves and our life as it is. A moment of Radical Acceptance is a moment of genuine freedom.”—Tara Brach

84. “The happiest people in life are able to be themselves. But you cannot be yourself until you accept yourself.”—Jeff Moore

86. “Just be yourself. Let people see the real, imperfect, flawed, quirky, weird, beautiful, and magical person that you are.”—Unknown

87. “Loving yourself is the greatest revolution.”—Unknown

89. “I assure you there is [no blanket that’s] richer, thicker, cozier [than self-acceptance] to carry through the world. There is a realm infinitely more mind-blowing. It’s called radical self-love.”—Sonya Renee Taylor

90. “We are at our most powerful the moment we no longer need to be powerful.”―Eric Micha’el Leventhal

92. “Celebrate who you are in your deepest heart. Love yourself, and the world will love you.”―Amy Leigh Mercree

93. “Why are you trying so hard to fit in when you were born to stand out?” —Ian Wallace

95. “I decided that the most subversive, revolutionary thing I could do was to show up for my life and not be ashamed.”—Anne Lamott

97. “The medicine for shame is radical compassion, the loving presence that helps us trust our belonging and essential goodness.”—Tara Brach

Inspiring Self-Love and Growth Quotes

98. “Laugh at yourself, not with ridicule but with objectivity and acceptance of self.”—C. W. Metcalf

99. “Love for others without the foundation of love for ourselves becomes a loss of boundaries, codependency, and a painful and fruitless search for intimacy. But when we contact, through meditation, our true nature, we can allow others to also find theirs.”—Sharon Salzberg

101. “The secret is—not changing yourself in order to fit in, but instead loving, accepting and embracing all parts of yourself.”—Nara Lee

102. “Respect yourself, love yourself, because there has never been a person like you and there never will be again.”—Osho

104. “Self-love is complete forgiveness, acceptance, and respect for who you are deep down—all your beautiful and hideous parts included.”—Aletheia Luna

105. “Sometimes your soulmate is yourself. You have to be the love of your life until you discover that type of love in someone else.”—R.H. Sin

107. “In order to love who you are, you can’t hate the experiences that shaped you.”—Andrea Dykstra

108. “May I accept myself as I am today. May I learn to love and accept myself unconditionally. I’m here, I’m home.”—Laurasia Mattingly

110. “If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete.”—Buddha

111. “Accept yourself, love yourself, and keep moving forward.”―Roy Bennett

114. “Let us therefore teach our children and our therapy clients to have unconditional self-acceptance – that is, to fully accept themselves as valuable and enjoyable humans whether or not they are self-efficacious and whether or not others approve of or love them.”—Albert Ellis

115. “If you have the ability to love, love yourself first.”―Charles Bukowski

117. “if we want our children to love and accept who they are, our job is to love and accept who we are.”—Brené Brown

119. “To find the good life, you must accept yourself.”—Dr. Bill Jackson

Short Self-Esteem Quotes

121. “Rather, we think of boosts to self-esteem as analogous to sugar: tasty but not nutritious.”—Jennifer Crocker & Katherine Knight

122. “The moment you accept yourself, you become beautiful.” —Osho

123. “The greatest success is successful self-acceptance.”—Ben Sweet

125. “Every step of our life we need to accept ourselves all over again.”—Jeff Moore

126. “Happiness can only exist in acceptance.”—George Orwell

127. “The real difficulty is to overcome how you think about yourself.”—Maya Angelou

129. “It’s only when we stop judging ourselves that we can secure a more positive sense of who we are.”—Leon F. Seltzer

130. “No amount of self-improvement can make up for any lack of self-acceptance.”—Robert Holden

131. “Within yourself, you must come to a total sense of acceptance of everything.”—Sadhguru

133. “Self-esteem is perhaps the greatest emotional sickness known to humans.”—Albert Ellis

134. “Basing self-esteem on external contingencies of self-worth, such as appearance or others’ approval, requires continual validation from others.”—Jennifer Crocker & Katherine Knight

135. “Pursuing self-esteem can be motivating, but other sources of motivation, such as goals that are good for the self and others, can provide the same motivation without the costs.”—Jennifer Crocker & Lora Park

137. “Rather, we think of boosts to self-esteem as analogous to sugar: tasty but not nutritious.”—Jennifer Crocker & Katherine Knight

138. “The short-term emotional benefits of pursuing self-esteem are often outweighed by long-term costs.”—Jennifer Crocker & Lora Park

139. “The pursuit of self-esteem sacrifices autonomy.”—Jennifer Crocker & Lora Park

141. “Unconditional, non-egoistic self-acceptance is actually more in line with self-compassion than [self-esteem], suggesting that self-compassion may be a better candidate for predicting healthy relationship interactions.”—Kristin Neff & Natasha Beretvas

142. People with high self-esteem have a stronger tendency than those with low self-esteem to judge and treat their own groups more favorably than out-groups.”—Roy Baumeister et al.

love,

emily