A Big Bowl Full of Lemons

Today I’m struggling with acceptance:  acceptance of myself and my myriad of flaws, acceptance that life is full of ups and downs, and acceptance from others.   The first two are hard enough to accomplish, the last is probably impossible.  We will never be able to make everyone happy and accepting of us, try as we might.  So I guess the challenge then becomes to accept that fact.

We’re all full of flaws.  While we all evolve with different life experiences and outlooks, isn’t the common goal to be happy?  If we take the common themes from each of the major belief systems around the world, it is basically that we should strive to be “good”.  Now, exactly what “good” means is subject to interpretation, but to me the broad meaning is just this: treating others as you would like to be treated, loving yourself and loving humankind.  Empathy and Love.  Pretty simple?  Not really.

Empathy:   the ability to identify with and understand somebody else's feelings or difficulties.

Love:  transitive and intransitive verb to feel tender affection for somebody such as a close relative or friend, or for something such as a place, an ideal, or an animal.  We’re not talking about romantic love here people, so just get your minds out of there…

So if you are empathetic and have love, doesn’t it stand to reason that you would be accepting?

It’s so hard actually practicing these ideas every single day.  We deal with all sorts of stresses like work, and money (lack of), difficulties with relationships, health problems, etc. that cause us to lose focus.  It’s also hard to be empathetic when you are constantly being instructed to “win at all costs”, “focus on the bottom line”, “don’t be a pussy” (yeah I said it).

It’s hard to love your neighbor when they are constantly letting their dog shit on your lawn, tailgating you on the highway, allowing their kids to bully yours, cutting in front of you in line…just writing this I’m getting stress induced hives.  It’s hard to accept when people in your life let you down, when your kids lie to you, when your relatives take advantage of you, when you and your spouse grow apart.  We become jaded by all these influences and lose our ability to accept ourselves and others.  It’s much easier to judge and criticize and that becomes habit over time, yet often hurts us as much as its hurts the one being judged. 

To become more accepting of others is to become more accepting of ourselves.

Do I have any answers?  Hell no.  Well, maybe a bubble bath and a glass of wine.  That always provides me with a moment of bliss, a temporary respite.