Radical Acceptance

We don’t have to wait until we are on our deathbed to realize what a waste of our precious lives it is to carry the belief that something is wrong with us. Yet because our habits of feeling insufficient are so strong, awakening from the trance involves not only inner resolve, but also an active training of the heart and mind. (Location 121)

One meditation student told me that he felt as if he were steamrolling through his days, driven by the feeling that he needed to do more. In a wistful tone he added, “I’m skimming over life and racing to the finish line—death.” (Location 188)

“The problem is that ego can convert anything to its own use, even spirituality.” (Location 219)

Our culture, with its emphasis on self-reliance and independence—qualities deemed especially important for men—had reinforced the message. Despite his understanding, Jeff still felt that having needs made him unappealing, undesirable, even bad. As is the case for so many of us, any feeling of need brought up shame. Even the word needy made him cringe. (Location 279)

How often do we hear that someone who has just lost a dear one is “doing a good job at keeping busy”? (Location 307)

During his all-night vigil, the Buddha looked deeply into his own suffering. His amazing insight was that all suffering or dissatisfaction arises from a mistaken understanding that we are a separate and distinct self. (Location 339)

Perhaps the biggest tragedy in our lives is that freedom is possible, yet we can pass our years trapped in the same old patterns. Entangled in the trance of unworthiness, we grow accustomed to caging ourselves in with self-judgment and anxiety, with restlessness and dissatisfaction. Like Mohini, we grow incapable of accessing the freedom and peace that are our birthright. We may want to love other people without holding back, to feel authentic, to breathe in the beauty around us, to dance and sing. Yet each day we listen to inner voices that keep our life small. (Location 428)

The way out of our cage begins with accepting absolutely everything about ourselves and our lives, by embracing with wakefulness and care our moment-to-moment experience. (Location 435)

“The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.” (Location 611)

I like to remind students that radical is derived from the Latin word radix, meaning “going to the root or origin.” (Location 663)

Radical Acceptance enables us to return to the root or origin of who we are, to the source of our being. When we are unconditionally kind and present, we directly dissolve the trance of unworthiness and separation. In accepting the waves of thought and feeling that arise and pass away, we realize our deepest nature, our original nature, as a boundless sea of wakefulness and love. (Location 664)

In contrast to orthodox notions of climbing up a ladder seeking perfection, psychologist Carl Jung describes the spiritual path as an unfolding into wholeness. (Location 668)