acceptance

Fighting life only saps our energy, blocking us from the love,
healing, and compassion available to us from our own hearts.
Once we accept our given reality, our energy shifts.  Release happens.

Susan Santucci

Several of our children have married outside my faith.  Would I prefer they marry
within their religion?  Yes, because I know that marrying outside the family faith will very
likely bring them more problems--but not from me.  My job is to accept them and love
them, not to criticize them and make their lives more difficult.

Bernie Siegel

If two angels were sent down from heaven--one to conduct an empire, and
the other to sweep a street--they would feel no inclination to change employments.

Isaac Newton

Teresa of Avila

Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are.
When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you.

Lao-Tzu

Once you accept yourself there's no reason to hold anything back.

Stephen C. Paul

What does that mean?  Here is an example.  In a car the accelerator pedal
is on the right and the brake is to the left.  That is not a big deal.  I don't see
impassioned pleas to rearrange the pedals.  People know this and accept it
without judgment.  Now let's imagine that you think having this arrangement
is bad.  Furthermore, since you don't like it, you are going to act as if the
pedals are reversed.  It won't take you long to come to grief.

But failure to accept people is like the example above.  How many of us see,
not the person in front of us, but the person we expect to see.  Then we act
as if they are how we expect to see them.  And, sure enough, we come to grief.

Come to know them through their actions, accept without judgment and act
accordingly.  If the other is a controlling person, then I know I will either need
to let go my need for control or be prepared for a battle of wills.  If the other is
chronically late, then need to invite them early to events, be prepared to start
without them or wait.  In any case, to get upset is to pretend they are someone
different - and that's like pretending the accelerator and brake are reversed,
a quick road to grief.

Christopher Oliphant

Therapists want to help us throw out what is unwanted and keep only
what is wanted.  But what is left may not be very much.  If we
try to throw away what we don’t want, we may throw away
most of ourselves.
   Instead of acting as if we can dispose of parts of ourselves, we should
learn the art of transformation.  We can transform our anger, for example,
into something more wholesome, like understanding.  We do not need surgery to
remove our anger.  If we become angry at our anger, we will have two angers
at the same time.  We only have to observe it with love and attention.
If we take care of our anger this way, without trying to run away from it,
it will transform itself.  This is peacemaking.  If we are peaceful in ourselves,
we can make peace with our anger.  We can deal with depression, anxiety,
fear, or any unpleasant feeling in the same way.

Thich Nhat Hanh

What you are comes from the blood of those who set you on this journey.
That is likewise unchangeable.  What you see in the reflecting pool of truth
is who you are.  You cannot change that, so it is wise not to curse it.
The wiser choice is to embrace it and make it your strength.

Joseph M. Marshall III

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tom walsh

Acceptance is not a talent you either have or don’t have.
It’s a learned response.  My meditation teacher made a great point
about the difference between a reaction and a response:  You may
not have control over your initial reaction to something, but you can
decide what your response will be.  You don’t have to be at the mercy
of your emotions, and acceptance can be your first step toward
empowerment . . . For me, acceptance has been the cornerstone
to my having an emotionally healthy response to my illness.

Morrie Schwartz

One of the worst features about worrying is that it destroys our ability to concentrate.
When we worry, our minds jump here and there and everywhere, and we lose all
power of decision.  However, when we force ourselves to face the worst and accept
it mentally, we then eliminate all these vague imaginings and put ourselves in a
position in which we are able to concentrate on our problem.

Willis H. Carrier

We cannot change anything unless we accept it.
Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses.

Carl Jung

The people with the clear heads are the ones who look life in the face,
realize that everything in it is problematic, and feel themselves lost.
And this is the simple truth:  that to live is to feel oneself lost.  Those
who accept it have already begun to find themselves, to be on firm ground.

Jose Ortega y Gasset

It costs so much to be a full human being that there are very few
who have the enlightenment or the courage to pay the price. . . .
One has to abandon altogether the search for security, and reach out
to the risk of living with both arms.  One has to embrace the world like
a lover.  One has to accept pain as a condition of existence.  One has
to court doubt and darkness as the cost of knowing.  One needs a will
stubborn in conflict, but apt always to total acceptance of
every consequence of living and dying.

Morris L. West