ACCEPTANCE MONTH: DAY 5: “We have a choice. We can spend our whole life suffering because we can’t relax with how things really are, or we can relax and embrace the open-endedness of the human situation, which is fresh, unfixated, unbiased.” ― Pema Chödrön
This is a choice most of us were not taught to make. We were taught so many things about “making our lives work” and working to make a living. Or to grab life and make it ours. These things are guaranteed to create deep suffering and misery.
Life is life. We don’t always have to like it, but we must accept it. It will always shift and change, and us believing we have something to say about that is so painful! We must constantly choose to just let life be what it is and shift our way of believing to accommodate that.
We are going to be sick; sometimes it will be inconvenient. But our humanity demands that we accept it and take care of ourselves. Believing we are exempt from life is going to destroy our happiness.
All of us are on the journey we came here to live. Since we don’t know that journey, it is important to sit with what is coming into our lives and question where we have shut down acceptance of the journey unfolding with us now.
I know I came here to find the end of the life I started out to live. It was full of rage and fear and nearly broke me. I am deeply grateful for all the drugs and alcohol and every bit of brokenness that occurred. Today it all makes sense that it took that to create this. I am accepting of the journey, the people, their roles and beliefs and sharing their journeys with me.
As well as my path. I continue to bless each moment, love each moment, sit with each moment and ask it what it has brought to teach me. There is always more to know and learn.
We are all going to leave here, some sooner than later. I watch what our culture believes around dying and see the sadness that we have, mostly due to our lack of living well with what is. We get terribly broken around dying because we refuse to accept it as the event we came here to do last, the final curtain.
We fight so much! Addicts like me fight the idea of their addiction, which is a strange thing to fight. Especially since I fight my addiction with more addiction! Why is it that we fight so hard to hang onto a life we never embraced in the first place? I am puzzled when I see this, but I must remember my first response (reaction) to loss or change.
Defiant resistance! Yeah, that’s a good way to go…hahaha! I can tell you how I would change things, but still resist the changes that organically flow all the time, every minute of every hour of every day throughout the course of every life.
I do understand, because I AM an addict. But I am so incredibly blessed to see the journey as peaceful and wonderful, marred only by my temper tantrums about “WHY IS THIS HAPPENING TO ME?” kinds of battles.
The rain has stopped in my yard. It has been raining off and on for over 2 days. I have a herd of feral cats who have been curled up all over my porch for that time. Right now, I am watching the one mama cat playing with her 3 kittens. She is only 2 years old and has already had 13 kittens. Poor thing, I cannot catch her. But she is showing her young-at-heart self in playing with her babies. They are about 8-9 weeks old and she catches them when they pounce, nurses them for a minute or two and washes them. Then another one pounces and she chases that one. She is so cute! This is the kind of thing I would miss when I focus on what doesn’t work according to plan. Random cuteness and random fun playing itself out in the world around me. She is teaching me about how to stay young, no matter how burdened I may be. I am grateful to be mindful and open and present. Thanks, Big Guy!
Dolphin Hug 