Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Radical Acceptance

37th Street at 2:00 A.M.



What if, the book asked, you accepted life, right now, just as it is?

In all its emptiness and stillness, aloneness, and solitary rests, dark corners and brief pockets of light...

What if...

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Accept? To accept is to give up, to stop struggling, to stop living. One can never just accept. Acceptance is the final act. Acceptance is death.

c.o. moed said...

Love your passion, mybabyjohn and yes I agree - acceptance can bea stopping of living ... but radical acceptance... something much much different -

Radical Acceptance: Embracing your life with the heart of the Buddha
By Tara Brach, Ph.D

p. 38-41

Radical Acceptance
... does not make us passive
...is not an excuse for withdrawal
...is not self-indulgence
...is not resignation

Radical Acceptance acknowledges our own experience in this moment as the first step in wise action. Before acting or reacting, we allow ourselves to feel and accept our grief for how the earth has been polluted, our anger about the destruction of wildlife, our shame about how we have been mistreated, our fear about what others may think about us, our guilt about our own insensitivity... [Radical Acceptance] is where we cultivate the genuine wakefulness and kindness that underlie effective action. Gandhi, Aung San Suu Kyi, Nelson Mandela... by accepting rather than denying or reacting to their own suffering, they freed themselves to work without bitterness or self-pity for peace and justice.

Anonymous said...

I am going to have to read this!!

c.o. moed said...

Enjoy! I am attempting to read this challenging book of self-love/acceptance for the second time. I think the first time I broke out in hives.