Here We Go Again

A Step By Step Guide to Acceptance

Ahhh, Acceptance. That pesky first law of Spirit. It’s so easy until you are confronted by things you don’t like. 

“You wan’t me to accept that?!?!”

Yes.

You don’t have to like it, but to resist it is to become a slave to it.

Freedom comes from accepting those things you cannot change. 

Did you know that only you are responsible for your emotions and no one else?

Oof.

“But I’m upset because this thing happened.”

You didn’t get what you want and now you’re upset? 

That is called spoiled. 

“It’s not fair.”

Let me introduce you to life on this planet. Whoever told you that it’s supposed to be your version of fair lied to you. That’s not how life here works.

This place is a classroom, and class is in session. Welcome to your lesson!

This might rub a lot of people the wrong way, because most people like to blame others and situations out of their control for their emotional state. 

Luckily, there is a way out, and it starts with acceptance.

“But how can I accept this?”

Now that is a good question.

Take ownership of your inner environment, because once you take ownership of your emotional reaction, you have options. As long as you resist accepting responsibility for your inner environment, you are bound by outer circumstances, and will be a slave to your emotions.

In reality, you aren’t actually upset because of what happened.

“How can you say that?”

Easily.

You are actually upset because of how you are internally processing whatever happened outside of you. 

You are upset because a situation triggered an area of unresolved hurt, judgement and/or misunderstanding inside of you. It is not for the world to bow down to your unresolved hurt, it is for you to heal that hurt through forgiveness and loving.

“Oh God. Here we go again. Why do all roads lead to the inner path?”

I know, it’s exhausting sometimes. Taking responsibility versus being a victim isn’t for the faint of heart. It’s so much easier just blaming anything other than your own internal issues.

If something is upsetting you, the first thing you can do is to stop dwelling on it. That means stop relooking at what is triggering the upset. Speaking from a lot of experience, that is not always easy to do. Looking at the things that cause the upset can be addictive. 

It seems a lot of people actually like being upset about the state of the world. They are incentivized in their social circles and on social media to demonstrate how upset they are. If you actually want a happy life, but find yourself in groups where how upset you are correlates to what a good person you are, I suggest finding other groups to spend time with. 

Acting out your upset is the opposite of listening to your inner wisdom. When you look at things that disturb you, don’t be surprised when you get upset. If you hang out with a bunch of upset people, don’t be surprised when you pick up on that frequency. If you hang out with loving and joyful people, don’t be surprised when you start experiencing more loving and joy.

Start by looking at happy things. Give yourself permission to have fun, laugh, joke, and live a fulfilling life regardless of what is taking place in the world.

Spiritual bypass, pretending you’re not upset when you are, and suppressing your feelings to appear more enlightened, aren’t good approaches either. That is like forcing a beach ball underwater. Eventually it’s going to pop up somewhere.

And yet, letting your negative emotions control your actions isn’t good. 

So, how does this idea of acceptance and ownership look practically? What is the process of taking responsibility?

Here’s a step by step guide to dealing with your upset: