A couple of years ago, I went through a period where a few bigger things in life went wrong at once.
It was painful, and at the time I would have preferred that none of those things had happened, but I was also pleasantly surprised by how I was reacting, by what I felt happening within me.
I noticed that I accepted it.
I accepted what was happening.
Acceptance feels soft, spacious.
It opens up space.
It might not change the things that are happening in our lives, but it shifts how we relate to what’s happening, how we take it in, how we move with it, how we experience it.
When we can feel acceptance, tension falls away; it dissolves.
So much of our tension in challenging experiences comes from trying to fight and resist and wishing things could be different.
But when we can accept that what’s happening is happening, there’s a lightness, an ease, a softness.
We accept.
We allow.
We allow ourselves to flow with it and through it.
We understand that we are where we are and what’s happening is happening.
We might feel pain or sadness or heartache. We might have conflicting inner feelings or restlessness or fear. But we don’t have to carry unnecessary tension—the unnecessary tension that comes from resisting what is.
Acceptance doesn’t mean we have to enjoy or feel good about or like everything that’s happening in our lives—it’s simply accepting that what’s happening is happening. It’s allowing what is to be.
In some ways, life is just happening and we’re moving with it, navigating it in the moment, figuring out how to relate to it, how to breathe with it and through it.
We can flow with the changes, intentionally. We can tune into how we feel and allow all parts of our experience, all aspects, including the parts of us that might want to fight and resist, the parts that ache, the parts that would like something different—because that is also so normal, so natural. We can accept it all.
What’s happening is happening—whether we like it or not, whether it feels good or bad, whether we would have chosen it or not. Where we are, what we’re doing, what we’re experiencing in this moment—it’s what’s happening.
We can accept it all, hold space for it all. We can allow the nuances, the different thoughts and feelings to move through us. We can allow the different dimensions and aspects of our lives and our experiences.
We can accept what we’re going through and also accept the parts of us that don’t want to accept it.
We can accept what’s happening in our lives, and we can also accept the different thoughts and feelings we may have about what’s happening.
We can feel sadness or heartache about something that has happened, while also feeling deep joy and appreciation for the present moment, for ourselves, for the beautiful little things—like fresh air and sunshine or a beautiful walk in nature or quiet time alone doing something we love.
Acceptance both arises softly within us, without us consciously choosing it, and it can also come through practicing it, through intentionally reminding ourselves that we are where we are, that what is happening is happening.
Can we hold space for all of it, allow all of it, accept all of it?
We can choose how to act, what to do, where to go, from a present place of accepting where we are.
Acceptance can come through practicing coming back to the moment we’re in, through training ourselves to come back to where we are—to be where we are.
It can come through practicing coming back to the present moment.
We can find acceptance through understanding—and reminding ourselves—that what is happening is happening. Through reminding ourselves that we can allow all of it. Be with it all of it. Hold space for all of it. That it can be what it is.
We can allow all parts of our experience to exist, to be.
We’re right here, right now, where we are, in this moment.
~
AUTHOR: LISA ERICKSON
IMAGE: DƯƠNG HOÀNG/PEXELS
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