Extend unconditional acceptance to others

Apply the same anti-rating logic to other people — separating what they did from what they are.

Why it works

Ellis noted that people who globally rate themselves also globally damn others — both emerge from the same irrational habit of collapsing complex persons into single verdicts. Practicing unconditional other-acceptance reduces interpersonal anger and resentment, which in turn reduces the social threat signals that drive defensive self-protection and low confidence.

How to do it

1. When angry at a person, identify the specific act rather than characterizing the whole person ("she was thoughtless in that meeting" not "she is a thoughtless person").
2. Apply the fallibility frame to them: they are a complex, fallible human, as all humans are.
3. Separate your legitimate complaint about the behavior from a global verdict on their worth.
4. Communicate the behavior-level grievance rather than the person-level condemnation.

Evidence

Reducing global other-devaluation is a stated goal of REBT and is consistent with forgiveness research showing that reducing other-condemnation improves well-being. Direct trials on unconditional other-acceptance as an isolated technique are limited. (mechanistic)

The link from other-acceptance to personal confidence is theoretically coherent but has limited direct empirical support; it is principally practitioner-derived reasoning within the REBT framework.

Common mistake

Conflating other-acceptance with condoning harmful behavior — the logic parallels the self version: you can strongly object to the action while refusing to globally condemn the person.