Radical self acceptance

Today’s Show Up! Journal power words. Wow. This is just a handful of words, but they left me shaken. I recognize that radical self acceptance is a process, a lifelong process. Radical self acceptance means embracing every part of ourselves. It means comforting the parts that are scared. It means bringing those parts that are ashamed out into the light. It means celebrating the parts for which we have traditionally apologized: the brittle parts, the rigid parts, the fragile parts, the vulnerable parts. And it means wrapping our arms around ourselves, giving ourselves a big, huge hug, and accepting the love that only we can give ourselves. Whatever our past, we all bear the scars and wounds of cutting words, taunts, insults, and far worse for many. 

The longer I live the more I think that a healthy chunk of our adulthood is spent dealing with and making peace with whatever we endured as children. And I recognize that for many of us we are all still dealing with that and far worse. And that’s what brings me to the last part of my original statement. As we work to achieve the first three, the last, and I think possibly most important, is to reach down and pull others up. It is when we work outside ourselves that we will gain the greatest joy, the greatest gifts, and the greatest love.