How to accept yourself when others don't accept you as you?

It can be really tough living in an environment where you don't feel affirmed and accepted. I'd like to share a little bit about my journey finding self-acceptance in the hopes that it might be something that resonates with you or others.
I grew up in the 1970s and '80s and at that time without internet or ways to connect with larger world I had very few positive role models in terms of other lgbtqi people. I was also the only indigenous students in my school and experience a lot of negative stereotypes on that subject to from both teachers and peers.
At the time I didn't realize this but I internalized a lot of those negative messages and stereotypes about who I was both as a queer person and as an Indigenous person. The result was that in my teens I engaged a lot of self-destructive behavior, experienced anxiety depression and try to self-medicate that with my drug of choice.
It was just before my 25th birthday that I ended up going to rehab. When I wasn't using all of the feelings of not liking myself not feeling accepted etc became even more intense and for a while I had panic attacks so bad that was very hard for me to leave the house.
At the time I didn't recognize this but I later came to understand that so much of that anxiety and fear was of being judged by others, rejected by others. Most of my thoughts were always on what other people might think of me.
At the time I was really reconnecting with my culture and I was fortunate to meet an elder who was incredibly nurturing and kind to me. He used to invite me over to to his house and we would sit in the kitchen and drink coffee and talk and one day he said," Alistair, your life belongs to you and no one else. Take time to think about the kind of human being you want to be and the kind of character traits you want to develop in yourself and live according to that. Throughout your life everyone's going to have all kinds of opinions about you, but in the end it's your life to live according to what you believe and value."
What he said really struck a chord with me and of course it wasn't as easily done as said, but I spend a lot of time journaling and figuring out what kind of person I want to strive to become in my lifetime. I spent untangling the differences between my feelings about my gender identity and sex orientation from the opinions of others and in the end I think that being who I am has given me a more nuanced understanding of the world and cause me to think a lot more about love and relationships and gender identity this helped me become a more open-minded person and so all of that is a good part of me. I also came to conclusion that my gender identity and or sexual orientation do not directly affect anyone else.
One of my habits is that at the end of each day I spend a little time journaling her meditating and asking myself what I did that day that I am proud of, what things I would like to work on, and if they're were any interactions I had with others that don't rest easily with me or where I feel I might have been unkind or unhelpful to someone. If that's the case I try my best to acknowledge what happened and put things back into balance, or as they say in Western culture "make amends".
Part of self-acceptance for me is learning to be honest about things within myself that I need to work on, but still being able to love myself in that process.
There was another aspect for me of not feeling accepted, and that was loneliness and isolation. One of the things that helped me was finding ways to volunteer and help others, in my case both people and animals. It has given me a sense of connection and purpose and responsibility.
Early in recovery when I was really struggling with PTSD and anxiety and depression I just started off small. This was in the days before email so I used to volunteer to put News letters in envelopes for the local lgbtqi organization. As my life began to become more stable I began to take on more responsibilities and eventually ended up being offered a job doing harm reduction work.
That job really challenged me to set aside my fears of rejection and become more outgoing in meeting total strangers and talking to them. This was back in the days when there were almost no treatments for people with HIV and I had lost a number of good friends. Therefore I knew how important the work I was doing was and even though it wasn't comfortable for me I learned to be much more outgoing and set aside fears of rejection.
That translated into making me more comfortable around people in life in general and I found that I began to be able to meet new people and eventually find the people that were the right ones to form strong and lasting friendships and relationships with.
An irony is that the same things that I felt rejection for in my youth, are the very things friends tell me they like best about me today. It made me realize that some people not seeing my value didn't mean that I am not a valuable human being. It just means that my values and their values don't align and if we aren't meant for each other's lives.
I know it's difficult on the societal level because while we can pick the people we invite into our life as friends and chosen family, we cannot always escape the ways in which we face discrimination in the larger society. I think that right now it is a struggle to be inundated with negative messages and not the affected in how we see ourselves and our place in this world.
Because of that the way that I deal with this is that each day I set aside a certain amount of time I spend becoming informed about what is going on in my community or the country or the world and decide what action steps I could take to support others/etc. Based upon what my capacity is to do I decide on what action steps I'm going to take and carry those out. And then I turn off the news, stop scrolling the comments under articles about trans people, because my goal is to get informed get out and get on with living my life and caring for the people I love.
I also try to remember something that an amazing mentor of mine said to me: "Sweetheart, nothing pisses of the bigots more than seeing us experiencing joy and celebrating our lives!"
And so every day I try to remember to feel some Joy no matter what else is going on in life... Because I, like you, like every human being deserve to be able to feel that Joy...and celebrate the one of a kind, beautiful, human being we are.

@alistair4444, there is so much wonderfulness in this post. My favorite line is "... some people not seeing my value didn't mean that I am not a valuable human being." Touché

Thank you for sharing your story and the words of your mentors to help mentor others.

i feel like i am pretending to be happy when i am not

@ginnysnow There is some truth to the phrase "Fake it till you make it" because by doing the action, such as smiling, the act does increase endorphins. So what exactly is "happiness"? Most of us are surviving. We experience feelings of happiness now and then, but have others we feel or are responsible for, such as children. I start each day enumerating everything I take for granted that much of the world struggles with, such as food, drink, clothes, shelter, friends or family. I do this daily 1st thing in the morning when preparing for meditation or prayer. It helps when my attitude needs adjusting. We are our own worst enemies. I think happiness has a lot to do with our sense of worth. I am 80 yrs old. I have hurt many people because of my ignorance, but I have also blessed others by being honest about my feelings. Learning to love and forgive yourself is essential to happiness.