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I'm sure I've posted about this before but I would to hear solid program thoughts on acceptance. I'm struggling big time with it and I now have AA's acceptance prayer programmed into my phone, emailed it to myself, posted on my computer.......you all get the point.
I keep wanting things to be something they aren't. I keep expecting people to be something I think they should be. And, I keep getting frustrated at the reality of what reality really is and what I expect it to be. I know all the cliches. I know the slogans and I say them to my self all the time. But, nothing is sinking in.
So, please share your thoughts on 'acceptance'. When did you get it? what did you do to make acceptance easier for yourself? And, what did the process feel like and/or look like to you? We're all works in progress, I know that, so please feel free to share even if you are where I am......which I often think is total denial or somewhere along those lines!
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Never grow a wishbone where your backbone ought to be!
Hello Andromeda and thank you for bringing up the topic of acceptance. A line from C2C helps me with accepting things I cannot change. "Alcoholism is stronger than good intentions or genuine desires. I did not choose this family disease; neither did the alcoholic. So I try to behave with compassion for us both." C2C (97) Trying to change something that started before me is like trying to change the weather. It is present. I am aware it is there and no matter if it is pouring rain, seething hot or snowing like crazy I cannot change it. I can choose how I will be affected by my choice of my presence or protection.I have tools to help me like umbrellas, sun hats and boots and the wisdom not to go golfing in a thunderstorm. I can feel anyway I want about the weather and in the end the fact is I need to just accept that it is the weather and it is determined by a higher power than me. Just my way of reaching acceptance. Take what you like and leave the rest.
I so get you, andromeda, so I guess I'm somewhere there with you. I've been here for years, but now there's difference, I see much better where I am. I quite recently understood that I've been living in my own reality and not accepting what is, thinking things are wrong and agonizing over how to manage them. This is really a big topic for me now too, and I try to say to myself what I feel to acknowledge it - I'm frustrated that other people do what they do not what I would want them to, I'm frustrated that I have to fill up the cattle and it doesn't happen instantly, things like this. Occasionally I have even been amused by my admissions, which I find an improvement over being frustrated aboit the way things work in the world. I've also realized I'm very stubborn and perhaps lazy in changing myself, learning new attitudes, I had never done that before in a constructive way, so this is all quite new, and I don't really want to do this work out of laziness I guess but I try to because I don't want to go back to how I was and I want to get better. I am at step 4 with my sponsor and one of the things that help me most now is doing steps 1-3 in situations I struggle with... I tell myself about everything I'm powerless over, then about how my life is unmanageable and so on. Also, yesterday I tried out this app, Pacifica, there are meditations and stuff, and that helped to mostly sweep my head free of the regular inhabitants of worry and whatnot. Glad you shared and that I am not alone, although I'm sorry you are struggling.
Andromeda - for me, it took a long, long, long while. We discuss denial being a huge part of this disease, and I recall attending Al-Anon meetings and almost eye-rolling that we were as sick/sicker than the A and/or that we were in denial, contributed to the chaos, etc. My own distorted thinking did not want to hear, believe or accept this 'stuff'.
I had to stay close to the steps for a long while. Each time something went different than I wanted/desired, I felt a physical reaction with a potential emotional outburst coming. It took me a long while to realize that many of the issues that affected my serenity/acceptance were within me. It had absolutely nothing to do with others.
I had heard my whole life that I couldn't love others unconditionally until I loved myself first. This made no sense to me until I got to recovery. I now see 'this' as paramount for acceptance. I struggled accepting other people, places and things because I didn't accept me. I had to really work on being lovable and loved just as I am - imperfect.
Self-acceptance and self-love were the keys for me to unlock total acceptance around me. Anytime I find my mind/thinking wondering to what another is doing 'to me', I am acutely aware now that this is only happening in my mind. Others don't drink, yell, lie, curse, etc. to annoy, anger, upset me - they do what they're doing as a choice and it is my own 'person' who takes it to heart.
I am grateful that I have a sponsor who would always direct me back to me and my program. Never has she agreed with me that my A was selfish, self-centered, mean, or more. She listens and then refrains from judgement of anyone in the scenario and leads me right back to what can I do differently based on the facts and what did not work. I truly also focus on keeping my peace and serenity instead of 'being right' which has become easier with practice.
As silly as it seems, practice is the key for me. When I pause long enough to listen/look for that small voice within, I can tell when my serenity is threatened. Today, I am willing to go to any lengths to hold onto it, even if that means doing or saying absolutely nothing just so the tirade/behavior of another passes more quickly.
I do love the Acceptance writings of the Big Book. I have it memorized as well as the first part of Chapter 5, How it Works. Both of these are foundation bricks in my program....you got this - great topic girl - sending you (((Hugs))).
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Practice the PAUSE...Pause before judging. Pause before assuming. Pause before accusing. Pause whenever you are about to react harshly and you will avoid doing and saying things you will later regret. ~~~~ Lori Deschene
I just cannot "accept" my wife's drinking... I just... can't... won't.
It is destroying our family and her health.
She gets very defensive when I tell her I want her to stop drinking.
I know in Al-Anon they say the 3 C's.
I get that.
I just can't take her drinking and the abusive crap that comes out of her mouth when drunk, to me and my grown adult kids who themselves can't stand it anymore.
She told in her AA shares that she has everything to lose.
And if she continues to drink and be abusive she will lose it all cause we are getting to the end of our ropes.
I don't get it at all. She mad ethe decision to start drinking... so why can't she stop?
I can't and won't accept that.
Acceptance is the key to peace for me. Acceptance of reality of the truth of people places things as they are in this moment and not the fantasy of what I think they should be or what I want them to be. It's not the same as accepting unacceptable behaviour. It's about breaking through our denial of the truth and only then can we get peace through letting go or taking action.
I can struggle with accepting people for who they are. I think they should be better or differe t but they can only.be them and i can work on me to help me decide if I can accept or not. I do believe it's about self love like iam suggests. I think lack of acceptance leads to resentments and I've had enough of that too. I'm writing asset lists along with grà titide lists and reworking the steps to help with this.
I'm just getting around to understanding acceptance, (I so feel where you are coming from Donehurting). Yes I accept that I'm married to an alcoholic who doesn't want to sober up and work at recovery. I accept that I didn't cause it, can't control it and can't cure it. I accept it because it is what it is. I can't make him want to be sober, I can't make him want to do anything. I have beat my head to a bloody pulp on that brick wall. I am tired and am letting it go. I had no idea what toll it has taken on me physically. This week I've fallen asleep hours before bed time. I put all of my hopes, money and effort into getting my AH better. Had I put that much energy into saving me, I'd be in a much better place financially and emotionally.
I figure it's live and let live. I no longer bother arguing with him when he's drunk, (or on the rare occasion when he's sober), I put him on do not disturb on my phone, I've set him up in another bedroom because sometimes he can go an entire week without bathing, and I spend most of my time away from wherever he is. He says he's lonely and depressed, I just simply remind him that there are people in AA who understand where he is coming from and will help and move on with my day. I'm still working on the anger and resentment part lol.
Just some random thoughts...If you know all the cliches, slogans, etc. -- and nothing is sinking in -- then this is perspective and attitude. People hear may argue, but that's OK, LOL. I'll speak to the former, not the latter. I immersed myself into the topic, concept and mindset of acceptance. It's not cliches and slogans. Those items are supposed to remind us, trigger us, and keep us focused on the entire methodology behind the cliches and slogans, the entire methodology of acceptance. I immersed myself into it for almost one year.
It is not just reading the words, but embracing them as a track to follow, a way to live. I don't mean in the fanatical sense, but as a concept. Acceptance becomes part of our way of thinking, feeling, living. We've all recited the step over and over again -- but aside from admit...do we really accept. If we did, we would surrender -- to the feeling, the desire to fight it, the efforts we put forth to get what we want, to get another to stop doing something, etc.
When we truly accept -- that we have no power over another person for example -- then we STOP trying to get the alcoholic to stop drinking. Acceptance is the mindset that allows all of the other steps and tools in alanon to work for us. Acceptance, to me, opened the door and led to recovery. Acceptance is not giving up or giving in. It's freeing and empowering. It allows us to stop the fight against the impossible! It allows us to live again. Miracles happen from acceptance.
I have countless people, most people, say I get it, I admit, I accept, and they seem ready to get better, they want to get better, go on to step two, and run down the path. But, most of them don't truly accept. They truly don't have acceptance as a mindset. Because they truly want the alcoholic to stop drinking. We want the alcoholic to stop! Why accept, when I so badly, so madly, viscerally, with more passion than anything -- I want them to stop drinking. People don't naturally want to give up their self-will. Here, in alanon, we ask them to. Voluntarily. Yet many don't. I've had numerous people talk to me, people I've sponsored, even my own sponsor -- claim "acceptance is mine" (LOL) so to speak. However, can one truly say this and know it? Would it take the objectivity of another person. Can one truly judge their own self-will and it's surrender? Much of this is a blind-spot.
Look at Paths To Recovery, or Blueprint For Progress. I did both related to acceptance, and I also did "Step One" -- and I worked. And waited. And worked. And waited. And I didn't go on until I surrendered. The actual process is too much for me to type. However, today I have that. I laugh, on the inside, at those who used to offend me. I laugh, on the inside, at those who I think want to be right, and make me wrong. I surrender that I feel I am not accepting, and I feel what I want creeping in. I surrender to it. And then I let it go.
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Bo
Keep coming back...
God, grant me the serenity...to accept the PEOPLE I cannot change...the courage to change the ONE I can...and the wisdom to know it's ME...
