Acceptance cultivates contentment.
Yes have goals, strive for the stars, and yet live in the present with acceptance.
Sometimes people can use notions like self love, just ‘be yourself’ and self care etc to justify their bad behaviour.
Being ourself is not losing ourself in a fit of anger, judgment, addictive or destructive behaviour.
Being ourself is learning to hold awareness within us to view these behaviours and make a choice that is aligned with our true heart and values.
Awareness is the quintessential key for creating change, both with others and ourselves.
Couple it with compassion and you have the two main ingredients for growth and an awakening path.
What we try not to feel, ends up unconsciously controlling us.
Spirit, soul, inner self, Buddha nature, Christ Consciousness, Self with a capital S, awareness, inner being… whatever words we want to use, they’re all pointing to the same thing..
The only unchanging certainty throughout all our life, is the knowing that we exist.
Stability is within Self knowing.
Self knowing stripped of all ideas, identities or possessions one might add on top of their pure presence.
Everything in life changes but our essential spirit. Know yourself as this, be this, and stability will come.
When I came to Whanganui I struggled for a while to adjust to less variety and options of choices where I might walk. There are certainly beautiful spots around, but not the degree of choice I was used to.
Now, through the last five and a bit years I’ve been here, I’ve found so much joy through learning to recognise and receive the depth of variety available within simplicity.
The same simple walk each day offers me something different. The different seasons offer their own array, different days, weather and light, different people I meet, and their dogs, the movement of the trees, wind and water, the birds singing and dancing around me, the way my dog plays and sniffs and enjoys. Everyday is fresh and new for him too.
I think one of the things I value the most now, is the strong relationship I have formed with my neighbourhood through this daily connection. I feel this place. I notice each of her precious gifts with so much more reverence and appreciation.
Variety may be the spice of life, but deepening into simplicity, I am learning, is definitely where true joy lies.
We can’t trick ourselves when it comes to self love and self acceptance.
When there is a part of us that needs to be felt and allowed, it will know if we are just counting the minutes until it hopefully feels better.
We split off from aspects of ourself, because we don’t want to feel them. They get locked away and told they are unacceptable, unlovable.
It is only when we are willing to be with all our feelings with loving kindness, that we can free our heart.
Being able to let go and cry our heart out and not be ok is a part of being ok.
What we run from offers us the highest insight and the deepest key to ourself.
Get support and practice tools, to learn to feel safe enough inside to be with all parts of yourself.
Nothing is more powerful than the light of our consciousness.
RATNA DYER 