Acceptance is simple, as I simply accept. I accept my powerlessness. I accept my darkness. I accept my nothingness. I accept my brain injury and I accept the mere eccentricity within it. Yet there is a ruthlessness within me that does not accept. Seriously, human nature is full of opposites and maybe this is where courage is needed ---- the courage to accept the ghost who told me who I am not. For some reason I am unwilling to accept what comes and goes like a ghost and it feels like something beyond my conscious control, unsettling. Yet it seems this courage to accept and let go of this relentless tug of self-absorption is more acceptance. Maybe acceptance is a principle rather than a mood and courage is without reference to the ghost?
Syd, I feel as though acceptance is a guideline to bigger greater things. You can’t just accept and move on. You have to accept and then do something about it. Acceptance is good. It’s a step in the healing process. But know that this can lead to more things in your brain saying deny it. Fight it. Don’t let acceptance win. This is a battle and it takes bravery and courage to fight it. Acceptance isn’t just a one time thing. It’s a long hard fought battle.
That word ‘Acceptance’ has many connotations, depending on what it is related to. Acceptance of our medical conditions/diagnosis is one thing, then acceptance of our predicament in life, that is something all together different. Prior to my own situation I saw this vividly with my client group, people with disabilities. There were many who had had their disabilities since birth and knew no other life. For them they had no other life without their disability to draw a comparison from. It was not a case of before and after for them.
But for those who had an acquired disability the reality was vastly different. Now I say ‘acquired’ but I should also say that a persons age can play a large part in this also. Acquiring a disability as a child compared to as an adult can also play a big part in the acceptance.
As children our minds are much more adaptable and we learn to change with the situation and change in environment
As adults we make plans, life plans. What we want to do in life. Plans on how we are going make those life plans work. Plans within our own limits, our own abilities. Then along comes our disabilities and all of those life plans evaporate. And the acceptance in these cases can be extraordinarily difficult.
A particular difficulty I have is symptoms. I can have days where my symptoms are minimal and I can make plans and fulfil those plans precisely, I have no troubles in accepting my abilities on these days. But then I have days where I’m bedbound and acceptance is the very last thing I want to do. I say days, but often my symptoms vary from hour to hour and this makes any sort of planning near on impossible. I seem to often be walking a fine line between acceptance and frustration ie I could this morning, why the hell can’t I now???
I agree with both Syd and Adilyn and some of their comments, but when there are so many variables acceptance is not so clear cut.
Adilyn,
What you write is touching and in many ways I agree that energy is needed to develop within acceptance. Your courage within your acceptance is a strength. Your words communicate a genuine person who appears to have learn to accept yourself. Also within your words it appears your development is interior and personal, even this matter of changing attitude and developing values. Your character feels like you have learned this acceptance of what you are not, rather than by what you are: thus not being exploitative and not being hostile. Your acceptance feels as you are this individual still in potential and are about to make something more valuable of yourself.
I affirm this about you, which is why you are touching. I appreciate how your acceptance is to do your best and offers an emotional warmth, a positive glow from you. I admire your acceptance and how you appear to see your special value as a person. Your admirable qualities of making yourself an outstanding individual someway is stimulating to be around. There is something about your quality that offers hope and it feels like your motivating acceptance partakes in the whole, even in your limitations. Your hope offers aspects of a creative flow and I thank you deeply.
My motivation is extremely limited because I have a cell disease, where my cells do not produce enough energy for my muscles. It is called mitochondria disease. Mitochondria are parts of the cells that combine the calories we consume with oxygen and in this process it is turned into energy, which runs everything in our body. My mitochondria are shot, so I experience lots of fatigue and exhaustion, sweats and nausea, even this physical depression. In many ways my depression comes from my lack of choices, feeling defeated by life and no way to come back to life.
However, it seems from you I need to make more of conscious choice to not give up. It even seems, from you, I need to stop dwelling on this sense of death and the passing of all things. Maybe it is difficult for me to sustain myself in practical activity and from you, though, I feel the need to accept where I am capable and strong. My acceptance is slow because my mitochondria disease is only eleven years old and I am still adjusting to this dragging body. It seems to me, though, you are telling me to be the kind of person where nothing is lost. A profound moment and I can even feel my body working to take in this fresh air. Thank you Adilyn and truly you are a star.
Merl,
Your writing is a good objective view on acceptance. Your acceptance even appears as an act of belief in yourself. There is no bragging about yourself. I appreciate this about you Merl, as there is no competition from you and allows us to be who we are. We also both know this attitude toward ourselves and even others is complex and confusing. This attitude of being human is complex and naturally I have my passive-aggression in it. Yet it is in your acceptance is to know what it is like to look to someone else for help is what offers this genuine emotional security to be who we are. Thank you Merl.