From Radical Denial to Radical Acceptance

 

 

This can't be happening to me.   This is not what  I want or need right now.  I am not going to accept this....

This is where I have spent my life.   I have spent so much time fighting with reality.   Refusing to accept my circumstances and my life situations.     I even spent over a decade denying that I had a mental illness.   

I put all of my energy into trying to change things that I couldn't possibly control or change.   I can't control the diseases that I inherit.   I can't control other people.   I can't control the weather, or the government or that sometimes, things just don't go my way.

Why is it that I think I am entitled to have life on my terms anyway?   No one else does.    It may seem like they do at the one moment in time I compare my life to theirs, but none of us has a rosy path in life.   We all have to deal with things and people and situations that we would rather not deal with.    This is just all part of normal, everyday life.

In the past, I used to just continue to fight reality.   Fight what was really happening in my life and hope that it would go away.   I tried avoiding.    I tried denying.    I tried ignoring.   Funny, the things I resist in life just don't go away because I want them to.   They sit there while I spin my wheels raging against them.   Then, once I am exhausted, overwhelmed, and frustrated, I open my eyes and see that these things that I don't want and can't seem to accept are still sitting there.   Waiting for me to deal with them.

I still spend time spinning my wheels in desperation, not wanting to accept certain people, situations and things in my life.   I just don't spend as much time.   I recognize more and more that there are things that I can change and things that I can't change.

I also know the magic of acceptance.    Really, acceptance is, in itself, change.    It is a change in me and my perceptions, and my actions.    Granted, I still can't change other people, or illnesses.  But I can change my reaction to these things by accepting them.    Acceptance does not mean becoming hopeless.   It does not mean giving up.   Acceptance means just acknowledging, without judgment, that these things, circumstances and people ARE.   They just ARE.

Acceptance means that I surrender my willfulness, not that I surrender my hope.   It means that I quit spending all of my energy in fighting a futile fight.   I can then have a chance to breathe, and to reframe things.   Maybe I reframe by thinking about things in a new way, or putting my energy into making an uncomfortable situation more tolerable.  Maybe I reframe by seeking meaning or purpose in my present circumstances.   Or, maybe I reframe by focusing on the things, people and circumstances in my life that are working.

Acceptance does not change the things that I don't like in my life, but it sure does change me.   Acceptance makes my life livable.   It allows me to keep my hope when things are rough.   Acceptance for me is magic.   I find myself using it more and more in my life.   I find myself using it earlier in my struggles.  Every time I use it, I grow more gentle with myself and with others.    Every time I use it, it gets easier.  Every time I use it, I feel stronger. 


And now for a message from our life coach cats:

 

Acceptance seems harder than it is.

Acceptance is really like a gentle, reassuring hand. 

It tells you: you are enough and you have what it takes.