The earth here is in the transformation of long-awaited spring. The sprouting of flowering bulbs in our front yard, and the early garlic, chives, and rhubarb already sprouting in the garden. It’s early for us here in the Midwest this year, but so very welcome. The hope the earth offers as it brings new life is hardly comparable. The closest thing I can find is the hope of new life when it comes true in the soul; when we are at that place when something sprouts new. Even though small, we know it is new because, often without realizing it, we know our soul-terrain and we have lived the barrenness of its lifeless places.
Like the earth when it’s ready with warmth, light, and water to accept new life, our souls need acceptance to grow new life from the fodder of the living we do day-to-day.
After Awareness, this is the second movement of the soul in the transformational process: Acceptance.
In fact, acceptance may even be more fluid than being a “second movement”; it may be the first, middle, and last movement of every bit of transformation. Acceptance of ourselves is the fertile ground from which new life always sprouts. Acceptance, which brings a sense of love and belonging, is inherently opposed to shame, and shame is always counterproductive to transformation. As long as we live without acceptance, we will live without transformation.
This post is Part Two of four in my Noticing Transformational Moments series. It also includes an optional imaginative experience, so these movements of transformation can take that necessary journey from learning about something to knowing it deeply inside.
So, what is acceptance?
Because I am so impressed with the person of Jesus Christ, I’d like to start with him in considering acceptance. Try to pull your thoughts away from your experience of the church, your thoughts about politics and those who have slapped the name of Jesus or the views of the entire church on their ideologies. Let’s focus instead on the person of Jesus as found in the Scriptures.
Jesus comes to each encounter with another person with an acceptance of what is. He consistently drew to himself the people who were not accepted in other places. Why do you think that was? Because he was wildly and uncomfortably accepting; he created a sense of belonging for those people who were, at best, marginally accepted elsewhere. He is not approving of their sin, in fact, he generally confronts it outright. But he is so wildly accepting of others that he angered all the religious “commandment-fulfilling” people.
Jesus’ method of exposure was often asking questions or stating facts about the person’s place in society. This was not manipulation, it was bringing to light what that person, everyone else, and he already knew about him or her. I imaging it was often rather uncomfortable. For example, to the woman at the well he exposed her as having 5 previous husbandsand living with a man now who isn’t her husband. He revealed her deep shame. Or how about the man at the pool in Bethesda? He exposes him by asking if he even wanted to get well, I mean, he had been there for 38 years….what’s your deal?
Jesus doesn’t seem to want something shallow and merely feel-good for these individuals…he wanted transformation for them. He needed to expose these deeper places so he could bring new life there. Once the soul experiences transformation, it cannot unlearn it. We can sin, and trip up, and make mistakes, and doubt, but we cannot unlearn what has been transformed in those deep places. Jesus wanted that for them. And he wants that for us.
Awareness, as I wrote in my last post, is the place we are exposed. This is where our motivations are laid bare. Where the questions we ask and answer reveal the parts of us we would rather hide. This can easily become a place of shame, bereft of love and belonging.
It is in that very moment of awareness that we must seek to accept ourselves as Jesus accepts us. We can do this through the practice of mindfulness, which is simply becoming aware of something without passing judgment on it. Judgment and acceptance cannot exist at the same time. If we will meet Jesus, if we will experience transformation, we must hold off on judgment so we can know his love and belonging. We must trust the Spirit of God, Christ’s presence on earth today, to walk us into something new in our souls. I actually believe self-judgment is often easier for people than self-acceptance. Judgment is evaluative, it is vigilant, and it is all in our head. We can calculate, know what is right and wrong, and make judgments accordingly. But true self-acceptance is different; it involves an open willingness to Someone higher than us to guide us into new territory.
Before all the baggage that can come with the word “acceptance” clouds our ability to actually experience it, let’s pause here and consider two common misconceptions about acceptance.
Two Common Misconceptions About Acceptance
The first one is this: that acceptance means approval. These two are not the same. Accepting us for who we are, with our mixed up motivations, deep shame, and insecurities is the work of God. His Love would be no Love at all if it approved of our willing sins and the heaped-upon-us shame that destroy our souls. It would be insufficient Love incapable of transforming us. But God’s love, which does not turn away from brokenness, is all-sufficient because it sees us, all of us, and Loves us. It sees the truest us and is utterly comfortable accepting us in our brokenness without approving of those things that destroy us. This Love is complete. It is much fuller than a “love the sinner, hate the sin” response. It is a love that can be trusted in every sense of the word.
The second misconception is this: that acceptance means passivity. Acceptance is not a “well I guess this is just the way it is” or a “that’s just the way I am” response. Passivity is a position of the soul that is not open to transformation; passivity is more akin to resignation than acceptance. Resignation lacks hope is inherently closed off. It lacks possibility, and therefore, cannot experience transformation. Acceptance is open and willing, ready for something Other and previously unknown to come in and bring new life.
Engaging Acceptance in Our Lives
Now we have a framework of what acceptance is and is not, let’s briefly consider the how of acceptance in our daily life. St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila, contemporaries in 16th century Spain were great friends along the spiritual journey. St. John of the cross wrote the poem The Dark Night of the Soul, which you may have heard of. They held this idea that acceptance of these deeper and often times darker parts of our souls and spiritual life must be accepted. In Spanish they used more nuanced word recibir, or to receive, rather than the word accept. This has been likened to welcoming a neighbor or guest who stops by in your home.
An Experiment in Acceptance
Because I think we need to experience life in more than just our brain, I like to incorporate my imagination, my body, art, etc. into my spiritual life…so that I can actually experience God in a way that is the way I experience the rest of life: with my whole self, not just my brain. If that sort of experience resonates with you, here is a little something to try when you are alone to begin to experience this kind of acceptance. If this doesn’t connect with you, just move along, no judgment 😉
Close your eyes and use your imagination for something transformative (it maybe that writing this out or drawing, painting, or sitting with another trusted person as you “walk” through this experience helps you, engage it in the way that connects with you). Picture yourself at your own table, or a table where you like to sit. It may be you prefer a couch or a sun porch, or may be a deck or around a fire. Wherever you feel comfortable and are able to welcome visitors.
Before you welcome them in, remember this process is about bringing the broken places already within you to Light rather than keeping them in the darkness. You need not fear you are creating something bad within, these things already sit in the darkness; you are now exposing them to the Light. In its truest essence, this is like declaring war on that which destroys your life and keeps you stuck and away from Love.
Remember that Light is the place where God is. So first, imaginatively create something in that room that represents God. Maybe God is the table where you are sitting, maybe the light coming through the window, or God is sitting in one of the seats. Whatever shape this takes for you in the exercise is fine as long as it hold true to God: Light, Truth, Love, Grace, Gentleness, Power.
Then, welcome your visitors that were exposed from my last post about Awareness. Your unfortunate motivations, your envy, your overeating, your apathy, your disappointment, your anger, your hurt, your anxiety, whatever it is for you. Welcome it in as your visitor(s).
Notice how your body feels. Are you relaxed? Is your jaw clenched? Is your stomach in knots? Is your heart racing? Simply notice.
Notice where you are in the room. Are you looking into the room or are you sitting in the room?
If fear or anxieties are there with you accept them as one of your visitors, refrain from judging your fear or anxiety as something wrong with you. This is part of our human condition: the besetting and the possible all woven together. Recibir it. Welcome all of this to your imagined setting and sit with that, knowing God is there, too. God is much more comfortable with this scenario than you likely are. God knows how to untangle these places, God knows your deepest longings, God loves without fear.
Then, breath. Breath with all these parts of you exposed. Breath in life. Breath in possibility. Breath in Hope. Breath in Trust. Breath in Presence. Stay in this place long enough to get out of your head, where your judgments call, and simply rest. Notice God’s openness to you. Expect A New Way forward in the presence of such Love.
Next: A New Way
The next post will be about the third movement in transformation, which is receiving A New Way. We listen for what our new way is now that we have been exposed and accepted in all our complexities of sin and shame. While we can’t experience transformation while remaining in judgment, we can enter into discernment, moving along with the inherently invitational Spirit of God. And that’s the only hint I will give you as to the next post, which will likely be interrupted by the birth of our next child (and a post about that, I imagine!). I look forward to being in the space with you again soon as we continue this journey of noticing transformational moments in our daily lives.
I would love to hear your thoughts on engaging this journey.
Until next time,
Kimberly