To Accept or not to Accept
That is the question
The first step toward change is awareness. The second step is acceptance. - Nathaniel Branden
At a recent book event, we got into a discussion about Acceptance, one of the Ten Words, which seems to be the word of the day/week/month/year for many people right now. It was a lively conversation. Several people offered stories about their struggles with Acceptance, especially around current events, and a few really interesting questions came up. They were interesting enough to warrant deeper exploration.
1. The first question is a common one: “Is Acceptance passive?” Many people assume that Acceptance is akin to “letting it go,” not dwelling on something, or metaphorically throwing your hands up and walking away. Under this assumption, Acceptance implies resignation or disengagement, tantamount to a petulant pout: “Fine! Have it your way. I’m taking my football and going home!”
But Acceptance is neither resignation nor negation, nor is it passive. Acceptance isn’t walking away or “letting it go.” That’s closing yourself off to what is. Instead, Acceptance is a profoundly active position that requires you to become even more open, present and engaged with reality. To accept something, you must stay in the ring with it. You must work to push aside any judgments or beliefs you might have that prevent you from seeing something clearly for what it is, not what you think it is or want it to be. That means you have to become very actively introspective. It might look “quiet” on the outside, but it takes real, concerted effort to peel away your preconceived notions, ideas and preferences to see reality as reality. Just ask anyone who has ever tried to accept a situation they don’t like how hard it is. It takes a lot of work. You don’t have to like what’s happening. You don’t have to tolerate or affirm it, but you have to remain open to it. You can’t just walk away from it; you need to accept that it is what it is and live with it that way.
Which leads to the subtext of the question: “If I accept things are the way they are, does that mean I can’t/won’t change them?” Not necessarily. Acceptance is an opening that is the catalyst for effective engagement. Until and unless you can see and accept reality for what it is, not what you think it is or want it to be, you can not truly engage with it or change it. You are closed off to the possibilities. If you aren’t seeing things clearly for what they are, you aren’t accepting reality; you are only accepting your own distorted view of reality. In order to effectively change something, you must first see the situation clearly without judgment or belief, and accept that it is what it is. Only from there can you be open to solutions that are based on reality, not fantasy or projection. Otherwise, any actions for change will be futile at best, destructive at worst.
Acceptance doesn't mean resignation; it means understanding that something is what it is and that there's got to be a way through it. - Michael J. Fox
2. The second question that came up that night is a corollary to the first: “Do you have to understand something to accept it?” Again, a common question, and once again, the answer is “not necessarily.” This might seem to contradict what I said above, but seeing something clearly without judgment or bias isn’t understanding: it’s just removing the filters. In our information-addicted culture, we think we need to gather all the facts available to understand something before we can accept it. In reality, the more information we have, the more information we have to sort through and accept before we can just accept that the situation simply is. Mostly, we gather facts to formulate an opinion or judgment, and that’s not Acceptance.
To put this into context, do we have to know and understand all the complexities of the Middle East to accept that there is a war and people on all sides are suffering and dying? If we gather all the facts, we have to determine if the facts are true (not opinions, propaganda or judgments), which will require even more fact gathering. In the end, you have lots of facts, but do the “facts” change the basic truth of war?
For some, knowing “the facts” helps us accept exactly what is happening or happened by giving us a sense of certainty: “I know, therefore I understand.” But the truth is that we will NEVER fully understand anything, especially when it comes to life and death, other people, politics, the Universe, God, or the whole big mystery at work here. NEVER. We have to accept that! Then, it becomes a question of how much we need to understand in order to accept.
It depends on the situation, but I would argue that most of the time, we need very little. How much do you need to understand about the combustion cycle to accept that fire burns you? How much do you need to understand about astronomy to accept that there are stars? How much do you really need to understand about Ghrelin and Leptin and the digestive process to accept you are hungry and that chocolate cake is really tasty?
We really have no idea how this all works, and Acceptance without fully understanding is the very basis of faith. At some point, we just have to say, “I don’t know, and I don’t need to know to accept that things are what they are.”
For some of us, that might sound passive, resigned or disengaged, and for many, it’s the modern argument against faith. If you can’t prove God/Source/Spirit exists, how can you accept it? But let me ask you: what do you already accept without fully understanding? Seriously. If you really look at everything you already accept, chances are you don’t really fully understand any of it, but you accept it nonetheless.
For starters, I accept that the sun will rise tomorrow. True, it might not rise in a few million years when scientists predict it will turn into a black hole, but for now and for the rest of my brief lifetime, I accept that when my alarm goes off in the morning, the sun will be burning in the sky. I don’t have the foggiest idea of how that works, but I take it on faith that there will be sun.
And that’s just the first thing I accept without fully understanding. We have to accept most things as they are simply to get through the day. If we had to fully understand everything in our lives, in the world and in our spiritual world before we could accept that they exist and are what they are, we would be stuck in a nightmare of indecision, inaction, and insecurity.
So, when it comes to the question of Acceptance, the answer is simply, “Yes.” The more we can accept things as they are, the more likely we are to live lives of peace, purpose and joy. Furthermore, Acceptance doesn’t remove responsibility; it actually engages it, by opening you to what is and what can be. From Acceptance, comes the ability to respond appropriately and effectively to reality.
Accept — then act. Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it. — Eckhart Tolle