Well, I heard a new phrase today. Radical Acceptance. I have heard of radical change, radical candor and the typical surfer dude "radical". I have never before heard of radical acceptance.
The phrase was introduced to me by someone I had just met. They complimented me on my radical acceptance. My response was typical "I don't know what that means". The explanation went like this - I was recognizing my current situation for what it is. I was allowing myself to feel all the emotions, actively taking steps to move forward, while continuously providing myself with enormous amounts of self-compassion and self-love. Wow! Who knew I had it in me?
To me, I was doing with I always do. Facing my problems head on. Living with the pain, the hurt, the rejection and the sadness. Ensuring to take part in activities that bring joy to me - writing, reading, learning, helping others.
I struggle with running away/hiding from my problems, this never ends well for me mentally or emotionally. To me it has always been important to feel every emotion - from pain and devastation to joy and euphoria. I would not have it any other way! I am a person who does not want to be vanilla. I love all my emotions. I hate all my emotions. The one thing I never want to be is indifferent.
Although I understand how I cope with adversity, ambiguity and fear, I found this outsiders perception of this strength to be eye-opening. I honestly did not realize that this was a unique trait. I thought everyone did this. As I plug away at my values and strengths I am learning far more about myself. One would think that after doing this for the last 9 years I would be an expert. Not so.
Yes, I do know a lot about myself and my behaviours. What I am finding is that I don't understand what I have learned - the value it has brought to me. I have faced a great deal of adversity in the last 10 years. This has made me highly adaptable to change and able to recover quickly from adversity - which are now 2 unique strengths I now possess. The question is what did I learn from all of these events? What skills do I have now that I didn't have before?
I am beginning to realize that life itself is a career. We are all the CEO of our own organization. We get to choose the culture we work in. Do we want to work in a fire fight culture or a continuous improvement culture? Do we want to work in a clan culture or a hierarchy culture? Do we want to be a power driven, mission driven, or task oriented culture? Perhaps some of everything? We are all responsible for managing our own projects, processes, deliverables and outcomes, all the while remembering it is critical to measure the success of these projects we call life.
Peace
The phrase was introduced to me by someone I had just met. They complimented me on my radical acceptance. My response was typical "I don't know what that means". The explanation went like this - I was recognizing my current situation for what it is. I was allowing myself to feel all the emotions, actively taking steps to move forward, while continuously providing myself with enormous amounts of self-compassion and self-love. Wow! Who knew I had it in me?
To me, I was doing with I always do. Facing my problems head on. Living with the pain, the hurt, the rejection and the sadness. Ensuring to take part in activities that bring joy to me - writing, reading, learning, helping others.
I struggle with running away/hiding from my problems, this never ends well for me mentally or emotionally. To me it has always been important to feel every emotion - from pain and devastation to joy and euphoria. I would not have it any other way! I am a person who does not want to be vanilla. I love all my emotions. I hate all my emotions. The one thing I never want to be is indifferent.
Although I understand how I cope with adversity, ambiguity and fear, I found this outsiders perception of this strength to be eye-opening. I honestly did not realize that this was a unique trait. I thought everyone did this. As I plug away at my values and strengths I am learning far more about myself. One would think that after doing this for the last 9 years I would be an expert. Not so.
Yes, I do know a lot about myself and my behaviours. What I am finding is that I don't understand what I have learned - the value it has brought to me. I have faced a great deal of adversity in the last 10 years. This has made me highly adaptable to change and able to recover quickly from adversity - which are now 2 unique strengths I now possess. The question is what did I learn from all of these events? What skills do I have now that I didn't have before?
I am beginning to realize that life itself is a career. We are all the CEO of our own organization. We get to choose the culture we work in. Do we want to work in a fire fight culture or a continuous improvement culture? Do we want to work in a clan culture or a hierarchy culture? Do we want to be a power driven, mission driven, or task oriented culture? Perhaps some of everything? We are all responsible for managing our own projects, processes, deliverables and outcomes, all the while remembering it is critical to measure the success of these projects we call life.
Peace
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