You are cordially invited to join me this month as I explore the idea of Acceptance and its powerful effects on our lives.
I'd heard of Lamaze childbirth classes, but I wanted "Husband-Coached Natural Childbirth." I first learned about acceptance in our classes. We focused on learning to breathe into the pain, to accept it and ride through the wave of the contraction.
This method was in stark contrast to Lamaze, which taught you to focus on something else and get through the pain. One says yes to the pain of the contraction and relaxes through it. The other just hangs on, trying to get through it as soon as possible.
Although "accept" encompasses coming to believe that an opinion or explanation is valid or correct, for me it deals directly with validity, and not correctness. Acceptance is all about embracing the unwanted, allowing it to be just as it is, without my judgment, my approval or my consent.
I think acceptance is, at least in part, a developmental stage we reach at different times in life.
So What?
Do you have any challenges in your life? I think most of us do. And you may have noticed how little control we actually have over the how and when and what. However, we do have at least some control over how we respond to the challenges. Acceptance is a key part of successfully navigating the challenges, and seeing them as opportunities.
Now What?
Acceptance takes intention and persistence and courage and all the good stuff inside me. Acceptance comes through love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control. It's a journey, not a destination. It's an ongoing decision for us humans.
To paraphrase an old song; What the World Needs Now is Acceptance, Sweet Acceptance.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
The theme of my blogs for the Blogging A to Z challenge this month is Acceptance, following the reflection practice of asking these three questions: What? So What? Now What? At least, unless I change my mind, which I did about tomorrow's post.
Posts
10 comments:
I'm looking forward to your A to Z posts. Acceptance is hard thing to, well, accept but something I work on every day. Thanks for exploring this!
Looking forward to your posts about acceptance. We did husband-coached childbirthing classes as well, and it was invaluable as they wouldn't admit me, and I almost gave birth in the Hyatt! Soft face, soft hands, "soft" contractions. Riding through contractions is definitely a part of the definition of acceptance.
Em, thanks so much for visiting and commenting!
Last time I did the blog challenge, the organizers suggested that we leave our own blog address on our comments in order that others might be able to easily find our blog. I'd love to visit back!
Acceptance is definitely a process.
Sarah, it has been quite a few years since that childbirth class, but the lesson has been invaluable at least five times in the births of our children, and many other times as well.
As I mentioned to Em, feel free to leave the address of your blog in your comments. It makes it much easier to find you and visit back!
Thanks again for visiting and commenting.
I like this post a lot Susan. Thank you for making us think in new ways about acceptance. This brought a real smile to my face.
Good idea - I'm Zombie Flamingos at https://zombieflamingoes.wordpress.com/ (I believe you visited earlier today) :-)
Ongoing...yes, a good lesson that it is a process.
http://linensandlaurel.typepad.com/my_weblog/2015/04/achieving-a-simpler-life.html
Acceptance is a very good word. We have to accept a lot of things in life, so we might as well accept the fact and make the best of it. The first thought that came to me was the manuscript that the publisher did not want. Okay, I accept that. :)
OMG I remember those childbirth classes! Rathr a long time ago but the breathing exercises helped with my hip operation !
Great theme, Susan. Acceptance doesn't come easily. Most of us don't even accept ourselves. I'm looking forward to your posts this month. Thank you for visiting my blog and making it easy for me to find yours. :)
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