When we come into therapy, instead of pursuing some ideal, we may be trying to escape some part of ourselves. Our anger. Our depression. Our sexuality. Then we think that therapy may be some kind fo mental surgery, cutting out all those disagreeable aspects of the mind and leaving behind only what is calm or compassionate. But neither therapy or… [meditation] practice works that way. The mind cannot escape itself – that would be like riding a donkey fleeing a donkey.

The only way out of that struggle is to leave our mind alone,   to fully accept the mind that we have, anger, delusions, and all. And when we no longer judge ourselves or try to emotionally neuter ourselves, the internal tensions and conflicts gradually begin to quiet down. We might say that this is the most basic psychological insight: I can’t escape myself, so I must come to terms with the mind that I have. I call this a “psychological” insight,  because the basic task of all …practice is re-owning the split-off and denied or dissociated aspects of the mind

Barry Magid, Ending the Pursuit of happiness