When we are in the peak of health and are suddenly struck down by a serious illness, our whole life seems to crumble. All our beliefs about ourselves and our world may become meaningless and we feel powerless to act. But if we learn the art of acceptance, we can still make choices and these choices will affect how we live our lives.

Accept the things you cannot change and change the things you can. This timeless truth is one of the primary principles for creating enlightenment, peace of mind and lifelong contentment. When we practise applying this principle to our lives, we can walk with greater ease on the path of learning, healing and integrity. Every experience offers us the opportunity to grow, but without the virtue of acceptance many of those opportunities slip through our fingers.

Acceptance is not about giving up beliefs and values and surrendering to someone else's views, nor is it about compliance and the subjugation of feelings out of some sense of fear, guilt, doubt or misplaced loyalty. Acceptance is about freeing the mind from inner conflict, self-destructive patterns and enslaving views of ourselves and the world. Acceptance is also the state in which we realise that we can only influence and change something when we acknowledge that it is in fact having an impact on our world. Until we own what is negatively affecting our reality, we cannot disown it and move on. Once we have defined and named the forces affecting us, the next step is to decide how best to respond. Without adequate contemplation and reflection, we are likely to act impulsively or surrender to our old self-limiting habits. Neither response is helpful to our cause.

Copyright Reach.