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TRAVELING LIGHT
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"let's just go"

Is it wrong to accept bad things?

Updated: Jan 1, 2023


Good morning!


Today I want to share about something that's come up several times with clients, with the mentor group I'm in, and through the signs from the Universe I'm always watching. It's this:


ACCEPTANCE


We all know what acceptance means.


In mindbody healing we have to pay attention to what we are accepting. Self-acceptance is one of the tenets of mindbody work. That's because when we fight our pain, our symptoms, etc., we stay IN fight or flight mode. Because we're fighting!


The fight or flight reaction of our nervous system is not designed for healing. It's designed for surviving. Acceptance, on the other hand, urges us, our nervous systems, toward feelings of peace. When it calms down, it can stop focusing on fighting to survive. It can turn its attention toward healing.


Here's the thing:


When I suggest that we accept ourselves, you will get tripped up if you take that to mean you need to resign yourself to having unwanted symptoms for the rest of your life.


Instead of being angry and fighting whatever dysfunction you are experiencing, instead of resigning yourself to it, I am asking you to gratefully accept it as a key that opens you to your healing process.


We do this by


1. focusing closely on the symptom.


2. Then we pay attention to the thoughts and feelings that arise in reaction to having that symptom. "Ergghhh, I hate this pain!" or "Omg I am so tired of this. I thought I was making progress!" or "Lisa, I feel like crap and my life isn't working. Don't tell me to accept this!"


3. These reactions are what I'm suggesting we accept!


In mindbody healing we need to get at the thoughts and emotions that keep us spirally downward. And paying direct attention to our symptoms is what brings those thoughts and emotions to the surface for clearing!


We are NOT aiming to accept everything bad or unwanted as an intractable circumstance of our life. No, we are accepting our human reactions to things that upset us.


This is the self-acceptance that begins to free us.


Of course the symptom IS troublesome. It IS painful. It DOES disrupt our lives.


You are NOT those symptoms, though. You are not pain. You are not depression. You are not grief.


You are love.


In the moment it hits you how much you have been fighting yourself, a new world of healing will open. You can stop feeling bad because you were unable to "accept" the parts of yourself you don't like.


You don't have to "accept" being in pain, or depressed, or sad as the only option for being that will every be available to you!


Accept the "bad" part as a part of yourself that IS present. Then accept the other part of yourself that hates it. Both of those parts are hurt and deserve love!


Now, today look for the part of yourself that sees those hurt parts and is willing to show them compassion.


That's the real You, right?

Right.

I see the You I want you to see, too.

💖


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