Chapter 70: Accepting and Appreciating

 For a decade I’ve been writing emails that mention my desire to embrace acceptance: of myself, of others, of what is.  It is a life-long lesson for me, this acceptance business.

Try not to resist the changes that come your way. 

Instead, let life live through you. – Rumi

Genuine acceptance invites reality without resistance.

 

“There is no controlling life 

try corralling a lightning bolt, containing a tornado. 

Dam a stream and it will create a new channel. 

Resist, and the tide will sweep you off your feet. 

Allow, and grace will carry you to higher ground. 

The only safety lies in letting it all in – the wild with the weak, fear, fantasies, failures, and success. 

When loss rips off the doors of the heart, 

or sadness veils your vision with despair, 

practice becomes simply bearing the truth. 

In the choice to let go of your known way of being  

the whole world is revealed to your new eyes.” – Danna Faulds

“Between clinging and letting go, I feel a terrific struggle… let go, to “win my life by losing it,” which means not recklessness but acceptance, not passivity, but nonattachment… Yet I feel calm, and ready to accept whatever comes and therefore happy… 

acceptance which is not fatalism but a deep trust in life.” – Peter Mattiesen, The Snow Leopard

So also is appreciation a life-long lesson and desire. Rereading correspondence from the past, I marvel at Reb’s words shared with me in 2016 in her "agua dulce" email: words she wrote in 2012, while sitting beside our beloved Lake Superior and reflecting on her summer. I am writing this while also sitting by the great lake. I was reminded of the words Reb passed along -- repeating a sentiment of her hippie friends in Tulum: “the universe will give you what you need” -- when reading this Richard Rohr quote in this past early September 2022 week:

"More and more we sense that Someone Else is for us, more than we are for ourselves. 

All we can do is get out of the way. 

We realize that this is a radically benevolent universe, and it is on our side..." - Richard Rohr

I repeat some of Rebekah’s beautifully written, insightful, epic words; they reflect my heart as well:

"I do know that part of me stepped back into the light while I whittled away my days in Tulum, a part of me that helps me see beauty and accept love and be truly grateful as opposed to feeling guilty about my privilege…

…I feel grounded by the acceptance that I'll probably never be totally certain about many things and that doesn't mean I can't be happy and productive and loving.

Today as I relish the sun and the waves and this stunning afternoon, I'm pondering the undeserved abundance I've been offered - of love from my family, of opportunities from society, of 'agua dulce' as far as I can see, of mystery that continually laps up along this jagged shoreline.

Today as I sit along the shore of this lake that feels like an ocean, this lake that I love, I can hardly believe this life is mine." 

– Rebekah Menning

 

I too have “undeserved abundance” and I want to embrace and enjoy this life that is mine.