Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Acceptance is the Start

One that sums up another part of acceptance:

Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.
--William James
This of course is the starting stanza of the Serenity Prayer:
  • To accept the things I cannot change.
Which includes far more things than we care to admit or imagine. And I don't just mean whether the sun came up today. I mean things like:
  • How people act toward us
  • What our children do when they are not in our sight
  • Whether people really like us or not

It continues with many things that happen to us
  • Being born or becoming handicapped
  • Having a particular disease
  • Winning the lottery (other than buying the ticket, of course)
  • The person in the car ahead of us who insists on going the speed limit

On and on we can go.

In short, acceptance of people, places, and things that are beyond our control.  Yet too often we live in the problem- and forget to move on. We live in the wishful thinking that it could, should, or might have been different.
  • In an even shorter way- our real trouble is that we cannot admit or accept being powerless.

And, yes, with no surprise, it brings me around to the 12-Steps again- and most fully the First Step. We get nowhere until we take a first step. A journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step.

  • Acceptance is the first step.

Meditate on that today. Ponder the depth of truth in acceptance of what we cannot change. It sure makes the world a healthier place for us.

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