If you’re not familiar with 12-Step programs, there’s something they feature called “The Acceptance Prayer,” which, upon first reading can be very hard to swallow. “Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today…” See what I mean? It goes on to say that if you want serenity, you must change your attitude.
My attitude is often the root of my suffering. Specifically, my attitude towards myself. For example, I’ve often judged myself harshly. I say, ‘I’m not doing enough to help the world. Look at all those enlightened activists and teachers doing their part.’ And then my thoughts get even darker, and I think, “I am not enough.”
Simply put, my attitude towards myself creates my suffering. When I remember the Acceptance Prayer, I have a better chance of accepting all my faults and gifts with humility.
The A.A. Big Book contains many spiritual gems of love and wisdom that resonate even if you’re not an alcoholic or addict. One such gem is the passage, “living in the answer.… When I stopped living in the problem and began living in the answer, the problem went away.”
The problem, for me, is often some form of thinking that I am not enough. ‘Who am I to say this, to believe that, to want this, etc.?’ When I turn instead to living in the answer, which means being aware of God’s abiding love for me, my angst disappears.
“[W]e are all children of God and we each have a right to be here. When I complain about me or you, I am complaining about God’s handiwork. I am saying that I know better than God.” –(A.A. Big Book p. 417)
Touché.
And when I struggle because life doesn’t go my way, the way I expected, the way I counted on, I can return to acceptance rather than harbor resistance or resentment. Neither of those attitudes changes reality and only makes me suffer more. Besides, the unexpected happens all of the time. God doesn’t say, ‘Here’s exactly what’s going to happen in your life, and this is how you’ll deal with it.’ What’s the point in that? I’d have as much meaning as a ticking clock—and I don’t want to just mark time with my life. I want to live life fully with all the unexpected turns, disappointments, and joys that it holds.
The lively way to live is exactly the way the writer of that acceptance chapter in the Big Book suggests—by accepting the feelings and emotions we have at the moment and expressing them appropriately.
“When we deal in feelings, we tend to come to know ourselves and each other much better.”
That is excellent guidance whether I’m talking with my spouse, my children, my mother, my sister, my boss, my colleagues, anyone. I can check in with my feelings, whether I’m troubled or joyous, accept where I’m at, and take care of myself accordingly. I can decide whether to share what I’m feeling, or protect myself by not sharing if that feels appropriate. Acceptance is such a lively, gratifying way to live.
The Acceptance Prayer
“Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today. When I am disturbed, it is because I find some person, place, thing, or situation, some fact of my life, unacceptable to me, and I can find no serenity until I accept that person, place, thing, or situation as being exactly the way it is supposed to be at this moment. Nothing, absolutely nothing happens in God’s world by mistake. Unless I accept life completely on life’s terms, I cannot be happy. I need to concentrate not so much on what needs to be changed in the world, as on what needs to be changed in me and my attitudes.” –The A.A. “Big Book” p. 417