The Many Uses of Acceptance
The other day I was sitting in traffic. Well, it was gridlock, actually. (Imagine, gridlock, right here in our little suburban area!) While I was sitting there, I was experiencing calm acceptance of being stuck in traffic. Not that I usually experience calm acceptance in traffic, and I imagine it was because I have been working on just that: acceptance. So, while the traffic jam continued, I had time to observe what was going on around me. (Another thing I’ve been working on, mindfulness!) I noticed some school-aged kids on the sidewalks. For some reason, that thing that “grown-ups” often say, like: “Oh, to be that age again” popped into my head. I have never once in my life said that, but probably not for the reason you think. Mainly, it’s because I don’t ever want to re-experience all the painful things that I’ve created in my life since I was a kid. Nevertheless, I’ve never said it. But I have envied certain things about young people. And then I thought- well, why be envious of anything about younger people anyway? Every adult of every age has already had their chance to be whatever age they wish they were. Young, innocent, unwrinkled, carefree, no gray hair, you name it- we had it all. And, now each one of us has the opportunity to be exactly where we are, right here, right now. And really, what does it mean, the difference between those that are younger than us and ourselves? It simply means we decided to show up on the planet sooner. That’s all. And, clearly, we still want to be on the planet, even if we’re “old”, as evidenced by that fact that we are still on the planet! And suddenly, being my age didn’t seem so bad. Taking responsibility for my choice led to acceptance.
Then I started to take it a step further, and realized that even gridlock is caused by the opposite of acceptance, which is resistance. Think about it. How do people create gridlock? They see that the light is about to turn red, but no, they do not stop trying to proceed through the intersection. They resist the red light. And then, the light turns red and there they are blocking the intersection so that other people who now have a green light cannot go through either. Whereas, if they had simply accepted that the light was about to turn red and stopped before blocking the intersection, they probably would have been a lot happier. And, they would have had time to practice their mindfulness while waiting at the red light!
I wonder how many of our other “problems” could be solved through simple acceptance? Maybe, all of them?