Acceptance 4 – Why should I accept something that's wrong or bad?

We were all raised by people who had ideas about good and bad ways to act, right and wrong ways to live, etc. Whether or not we still agree with any or all of those ideas now, we still are stuck with the little judgment-machine they created in our heads that is always talking at you, yelling at you, whining, making demands, arguing with you, scolding you or telling you off. Sometimes our little judgment-machines are busy doing all those same things, except this time they're directed toward everyone else in our lives–not to mention all the situations in our lives, and in the whole world. All those stupid little voices won't shut up about what's right/wrong good/bad about ourselves, about others, about the world. They just never shut up, do they?

And have you ever noticed how some people are still listening to these voices even long after they're all grown up? In fact, that's when the voices kick in bigtime: when you leave home–when you leave the real voices (your family, etc.) that started the whole thing, behind you. It's almost like your brain is afraid to leave them behind, afraid you won't be safe without them. so you bring them along with you wherever you go.

It's paradoxical and frustrating and ironic, and still sad-but-true: most people never quite seem to learn how to outgrow the too-loud, irritating, guilt-producing, naggy, nasty parental voices they accumulated during their first eighteen or so years, even when they long ago outgrew their parents, and even when the parents have changed and are now treating them more respectfully and kindly.

If you're still run by your thoughts, your voices, all it means is that you've never quite outgrown reacting to all the stuff in your life from a judgmental, parental right/wrong good/bad basis. It's as if you were five years old again, and your mother or father or some other person from your past was talk talk talking disapprovingly all the time in your ear. And you haven't learned yet to nod, smile, acknowledge what they have to say with no reaction, thank them for sharing, and then go about your business with a quiet mind.

Until you learn acceptance, you'll always be thinking about everything in terms of good/bad right/wrong. No matter what happens in your life, you will always be about finding fault–with yourself, with everyone else, with your life or the world. You will, unfortunately,  waste so much time and energy noticing how wrong everyone else is, or obsessing about every one of your own little mistakes, or talking about how messed up the world is getting to be, along with everybody in it.

Many people have learned acceptance. They're the ones out there who really don't seem to worry much about any of that right/wrong good/bad stuff. Instead, they cheerfully go about their own business getting along with everyone, liking everyone, getting things done, and being pretty happy in their own skins and in their own lives. People who are accepting seem to pretty much like people and life and themselves the way they are.

Which one of these two types of people would you rather be? Which type has the happiest life? The most fun? Which type is probably the most effective, regardless of what it is they choose to do with their life and time and energies?

Both types of people have to live on this same planet, with the same species, with the same opposite sex, with parents, children, neighbors, bosses, relatives, co-workers. Both types are found in all walks of life, in all races and ethnicities and nations, all ages and colors and genders.

But the unaccepting ones always seem to struggle so much. Too often, they find life and everyone in it, and even themselves, distasteful, even dreadful, all-in-all quite unacceptable. And yet others, the accepting ones, somehow manage to muddle through their lives with a certain amount of cheer and fun and flair, despite their own inevitable set of life's troubles and pain.

The differences between accepting and non-accepting personalities are clearly not differences in wealth. It's not about rich or poor (although money can be really very nice and helpful to have, and not even about who is right or wrong, or good or bad, or better or worse, or luckier or unluckier–although good things do tend to happen to accepting people. The biggest difference about accepting and non-accepting people (and this is a matter of learning, of choosing) is how they deal with the bad stuff in their life–whether they accept it, or fight it. If they spend a lot of time reacting to everything around them, listening to all their own little judgmental voices tell them all about how awful they are, and how awful everything and everyone else is…they're going to be both unhappy and ineffective. People who dwell on the “bad” and “wrong” stuff about themselves and the people around them, who spend too much of their time making unhappy judgments about “what is,” and thinking about how other people should act, and what other people should and shouldn't do, and all the mistakes they and other people have made, make themselves crazy.

Instead of all this crazy-making reacting and judging, some people learn to go through life without continually over-reacting, without judging, and instead, just accepting “what is” just the way it is, and other people just as they are, and themselves, and the world, just as we are, and it is.

Unaccepting people notice every little “wrong” thing about themselves, about others, and about the world, and make themselves miserable over it all. Accepting people don't spend much time worrying about all the right/wrong good/bad stuff. Somewhere along the way, they learned to accept things as they are, and not to waste time dwelling on how things aren't or ought to be. Accepting people have learned to focus on “what is” in life, instead of “what ought to be.” They've learned not to waste time worrying about what other people do or don't do or should or shouldn't be.

Accepting people–happy people–go about doing what they do without bothering to name it or anyone good or bad or right or wrong (i.e., judging everything and everyone.) Unaccepting people spend their life being upset about how awful life is, how disusting, how shocking. They spend life being righteously indignant about how wrong other people are, and how unfair, unkind, unjust, uncaring.

Accepting people rarely bother with all that negativity and hostility, which is not to say that they don't work hard for the changes they want in their life and in the world–we all do. Just like everyone else, accepting people have to work hard to make the changes they want to see in themselves and their own lives and in the world. It's just that they don't get all upset about everything and everyone while they're waiting and working and hoping for change. Which is good, because if they did that, nothing would ever change.

Acceptance is about accepting things as they are right now, while working to let go of your angry, resistive stuff about things-as-they-are, working calmly, peacefully, cheerfully, to change the things you want to be better and different.

Next: Isn't it better to change something rather than just accept it?

Acceptance 3 – What does it mean to accept something?

Acceptance is easiest to define by saying what it is not. It's not giving up, or giving in. It's not settling or resigning yourself to anything.

Acceptance–the kind I'm talking about–is only about right now, this very moment–or at the very most, only about today. Acceptance has nothing to do with accepting anything at all forever, for tomorrow, or for the future. No one can foretell the future, so why would anyone ever accept anything “forever?” You can only accept stuff for now anyway, since unimaginable turns of events occur, and things often change when we do nothing at all. No one knows what the future holds.

To accept something for now means to take whatever or whoever it is in your life that seems to be causing you pain, and practice non-resistance. Don't resist it. Don't do anything about what has happened. Don't push it away, don't rebel against it. Don't scheme against it, don't analyze it, don't think about it at all if you can. Don't get upset about it, nor do anything about it except just let it be, whatever “it” is. Don't judge it, don't label it–right/wrong or good/bad, difficult, impossible, torturous, terrible. Just let it be what-it-is, as much as possible without any reaction at all, and stay in that space for a little while.

Acceptance is not about sitting and thinking about something. Acceptance isn't about imagining something, nor visualizing it. And it's certainly not about hearing yourself talk about it, or listening to your inner voice or inner voices talk at you about it, or about any of the bad stuff in your life (which would just make you even more unhappy.) Again, acceptance is not about thinking, talking, visualizing, or even feeling. It's about just knowing, being aware, but without all the added resistance.

To accept something–anything–that you don't like about your life, just know it “is,” know all about it, hold it lightly within–without pushing it away. Just be there, be here, with it, for awhile. Acceptance is staying with what you used to resist, staying with it just for now without running away, without avoiding or defending or escaping or flinching or squirming and without fighting back or fighting against anything about it (and/or all the feelings that might come up about it.) Or if the feelings do come up, stay with them, accept them, and be with them for awhile.

You'll find that your reactive feelings will come and go. Accept that. Thoughts may come and go, and images that you don't want, just accept that they keep coming up, and keep letting them go. Just stay quietly with all of your crazy-making stuff, and don't, just for now, do anything about it, nor do anything else. Sometimes acceptance feels hard and sometimes its easy, and sometimes it's scary and sometimes peaceful. Sometimes the hardest thing is slowing down long enough to be still with whatever is making you crazy, when what you want most is to do anything else but that.

What happens when you accept “what is” in the present about yourself, your life? When you stop for just long enough to accept “what is” and who you are–just for the moment, without all your crazy and mental and reactive and stressed and freaked-out non-accepting stuff attached to it?

Try it.

Next: Why should I accept something that's wrong or bad?

A smallc christian in a BigC Christian world….

I'm a smallc christian, in the sense of “That's very christian of you,” or “She certainly has a christian spirit.” I make a humble attempt to be like Christ…to be Christlike.

As a smallc christian, I have no beliefs about Jesus, no articles of faith, and certainly no magic words or deeds that insure me a place in heaven or on God's good side.

As a smallc christian, I think following Jesus's example and teachings is the main point of being christian. I think some BigC Christians miss the christian point, getting caught up in interpretations and arguments about who and what is right and wrong, what his life meant. As a smallc christian, I think Jesus was right, so I try to understand what he said and did.

Jesus taught people to love one another, to be kind and generous, to care for the poor and the sick and the needy–so as a smallc christian, I try to do these things. This smallc christian thinks Jesus would be pretty happy if we all just got along and treated each other the way we'd like to be treated.

Jesus prayed often, and so do I. Jesus encouraged his followers to ask, seek, and knock, and promised they would receive answers (this smallc christian always has.) Jesus lived his life for others, in peace and gentleness. Jesus was an itinerant rabbi, appreciative of church traditions and teachings. He suffered much violence and injustice in his life, but never added to it.

Smallc christians think Jesus saw himself as a teacher, not as God, or a saviour, or as head of a church. As a smallc christian, I see Jesus as God's beloved child–just as we all are.

I view the New Testament as a mixed record of varying reliability (like the Old Testament,) left by early writers touched by oral and written traditions of Jesus's life and teachings, and often touched by God. Smallc christians study Jesus' words and example as found in the Sermon on the Mount, the parables, the beatitudes, etc. I question interpretations of Jesus's life and meaning by early writers such as Paul, as well as later doctrines established by various other “authorities.” I try to open my God-given mind to freshly consider what the Bible might offer us in today's world. I enjoy reading biblical scholars and historians who seem equally open and far more knowledgeable in this field (David Kling, Jaroslav Pelikan, Marcus Borg, others.)

Smallc christians try to live by what Jesus declared were the two great commandments: love God, and love thy neighbor as thyself. I try to understand and follow God as completely and honestly as I can, and to love all God's children (that's everyone) just as if they were myself, and just as much as I love myself.

Jesus taught that we are all always forgivable and lovable and worthwhile, even though each of us will often fail, and none of us will ever be perfect in anything. So smallc christians try, like Jesus, to forgive ourselves and others.

Are smallc christians Christian? Who gets to decide?

About This Blog….

What is this blog about?

An epharmonious sharing of…

my responses to breaking news stories;

occasional essays on culture, politics, spirituality, gardening, animals, art, relationships, religion, history, and other subjects I'm interested in;

my short stories;

a comic strip I'm creating;

my watercolor paintings;

my thoughts on acceptance and related topics;

photos from my garden;

occasional prayers; and

whatever else I'm learning or thinking or creating….

I haven't stopped to learn how to market this blog; I need to. I also want to make it prettier.

Lately, I've been busy breathing. Mostly in, but sometimes out, too.

Here are some future postings I'm working on, but you gotta be patient….

News That's Neither New Nor Interesting

Why It's Dumb To Pick On China

Government By Bad Policy Barfed Up in Four-Year Cycles by Unaccountable Presidents

Germany's RAF, and Our Own John Brown Terrorism National Park

Bloggers Need Old-Media Journalists

Our Own Bad Habits: Not Just Our Own Bad Business

Don't Sell Federal Land; Trade Up For Green Space

Dead Soldiers' Faces in Photo After Photo Keep Staring At Me

Worse Than You Thought: Couples Retiring Together (book review)

Care, Work, Persevere, Fall Flat On Your Face (the Modern Heroic Cycle)

Frederick's Humblest Hometown Hero (Bob Hanson)

Green Day: Review By A Complete American Idiot (DVD review)

Happily Lost In Translation (movie review)

New topics come up every day, so stay tuned!