I"d like to get some thoughts on how you understand the concept of 'acceptance', and especially in relation to the term passivity.
In common speech, I think when many people hear the word 'acceptance' they sort of associate it with the element of 'resignation'; or having to 'accept' a situation because no other alternatives are possible (or have already been exhausted). Acceptance is then done, because nothing else is possible; but its not really a 'willing acceptance', and the acceptance would be rejected if another alternative came up. Hence acceptance is like passivity; ie it is accepted because nothing else is possible at the present time.
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I contrast this usage of the word acceptance with how Ra uses the term (at least in my understanding). Acceptance in Ra's terminology would be something that comes at the forefront or an interaction, rather than at the end, when all other options have been exhausted. Acceptance is like the willingness to acknowledge that what is seen or experienced is of the self, even if it has not been totally grasped yet how what is seen or experienced relates to one. It's like a different baseline attitude.
The closest I could compare it to would be like sailing a ship over the ocean waters, and being aware of the environmental conditions and the current wind patterns. Once you are able to accept (and acknowledge) those conditions, you can then make the adjustments to the sails to tack an appropriate course to where you want to go. But without the initial 'acceptance' of the environmental conditions, one will end up fighting with the wind rather than working with it.
Acceptance here is quite an active process; and being always aware of what is around one, and how one is responding to it.
I tend to agree but why accept conditions in contradiction with what is desired when all has been attained? Are not the conditions the attainment unto themselves?
I think acceptance of conditions in contradiction with what is desired can be achieved by accepting that there are no contradicting conditions for your desire. Only the preconceptions or prejudice of how desire should manifest state there are contradictions.
I think if you truly accept things you become more active. Because the energy blockage of 'non acceptance'. Trying to correct the situation in your mind through will power, is then gone. With the clarity you simply get up and go do what you really want to do on a deep level.
This seems to be a continuous issue that I'm currently attempting to resolve. Take yesterday for instance, my ex, my daughter, and I went to the beach. I found that her car didn't have seatbelts in the front due to a current remodel of the interior. I was extremely weary of riding in a car with no seatbelts even when the drive was only 5-10 minutes to the beach from my house. I also noticed that she didn't bring our daughters booster seat that she's supposed to ride in according to the law but she a least had a seatbelt.
As we were riding, anxiety came about considering I felt so vulnerable without a seatbelt but I started to come to terms with acceptance that what will be, will be which ultimately lead me to the question of accepting everything and this is where my confusion begins. If one were to accept everything, why wear a seatbelt at all? Why look both ways when crossing the street? If all is preprogrammed, why take any precautions at all towards self preservation? Sure, all will be well regardless considering the metaphysical aspect that if the incarnation ends, it's not like that's it. But how does one come to accept the actions of other selfs if it involves ones safety or ones child's safety? I've even seen my ex allow our daughter to ride in the front of another vehicle that had an airbag where it's clearly dangerous for her to be if the airbag deployed considering her height and potential injury that could occur.
As usual as I'm typing this, responsibility rears it's head and it where my biggest challenge comes from with acceptance. Where does it begin that one has a responsibility to disagree rather than accept if it involves an other self making a potentially dangerous decision to either their self or an other self?
this was a difficulty i initially encountered when first being made aware of the Ra material and the sto/sts dichotomy. if the sto path is all about acceptance then everything is acceptable and so there is no desire or will to change anything since such a desire would in theory be a non-acceptance. this lead to a sense of passive helplessness to circumstance out of a desire to accept everything
One particular quote kept me puzzled for quite while.
Quote:The second mental discipline is acceptance of the completeness within your consciousness. It is not for a being of polarity in the physical consciousness to pick and choose among attributes, thus building the roles that cause blockages and confusions in the already-distorted mind complex. Each acceptance smoothes part of the many distortions that the faculty you call judgment engenders.
the above quote essentially paralyzed me from making any judgement for fear that this would be reducing my polarity or somehow not congruent with the positive path. This continued until i found the below gem.
Quote:41.21 Questioner: You mentioned in the last session that fasting was a method of removing unwanted thought-forms. Can you expand on this process and explain a little more about how this works?
Ra: I am Ra. This, as all healing techniques, must be used by a conscious being; that is, a being conscious that the ridding of excess and unwanted material from the body complex is the analogy to the ridding of mind or spirit of excess or unwanted material. Thus the one discipline or denial of the unwanted portion as an appropriate part of the self is taken through the tree of mind down through the trunk to subconscious levels where the connection is made and thus the body, mind, and spirit, then in unison, express denial of the excess or unwanted spiritual or mental material as part of the entity.
All then falls away and the entity, while understanding, if you will, and appreciating the nature of the rejected material as part of the greater self, nevertheless, through the action of the will purifies and refines the mind/body/spirit complex, bringing into manifestation the desired mind complex or spirit complex attitude.
here was an example where finally the act of acceptance didnt necessarily involve being a doormat to circumstance. that i could in fact choose to express denial of unwanted mental, emotional or spiritual attitudes and this could be done in an attitude of acceptance.
Whereas the first quote confused me and left me with a baffled or distorted picture of what the sto path entailed. the second quote really opened me up to how its meant to be practised. I suppose it ties in quite nicely with the sailing analogy you gave plenum,
Quote:"Once you are able to accept (and acknowledge) those conditions, you can then make the adjustments to the sails to tack an appropriate course to where you want to go. But without the initial 'acceptance' of the environmental conditions, one will end up fighting with the wind rather than working with it."
I find my definition of acceptance to be somewhat synonymous with understanding.
I find some definitions of acceptance to be synonymous with ignorance.
There is a level of awareness that brings about a vibrational state that allows for acceptance of external events/circumstances. I call this awareness "understanding".
The system we are playing with capitalizes on confusion, with those in control of accepted "understanding" capitalizing on the confusion of the rest.
Acceptance is about your emotional relationship to the external situation, it's not about what you do in response.
I agree with BE I find that understanding is interrelated to acceptance.
Faith based acceptance is much harder and rare and I'm not sure I've done it.
Huge accident on the highway? That's a part of life and I usually don't get emotional and just gps a bypass route.
Someone trying to break into my house? That's a part of life but I'm still gonna defend myself and my home.
Acceptance of everything entails the acceptance of one's desires. The question is does one desire to find satisfaction in the present moment regardless of what is desired being attained?
Pursue your desires but also pursue peace. That is the way I interpret this. With this done, the concept of any attainment falls away while still the desired service is still done.
Maybe I need a little clarification as to what is being accepted in this case. Are we talking about a scenario ones finds ones self pertaining to a particular decision or catalyst, an interaction with an other self, or simply a decision like should I cross this road of traffic?
All of those situations are identical in being catalyst and are all things that can be accepted and should be accepted if one is to desire polarization in the positive.
Ok then this is where to whole all will be well mantra and I are split. Like I mentioned previously, if one were to believe that all will truly be well and accept whatever happens, happens, one wouldn't wear a seatbelt, cross a dangerous bridge that's about to collapse, allow a child to handle a gun, let a child play in a busy street.
This is where such absolutism such as being all accepting has it's limit in my opinion. Where exactly does self preservation along with the protection and guidance of a loved one or child who isn't aware of the repercussions of their actions come into play?
Where does responsibility factor into accepting every single situation one faces absolutely and truly allow that particular situation to play out regardless of the potential pitfalls that could happen?
Again, accepting everything means accepting one's natural inclinations and desires alongside everything else. We have a responsibility to all that we perceive and the respective desires and beliefs they invoke.
There are no shoulds. There are only desires and beliefs.
Letting a situation "play out" means letting yourself "play out." You are a part of the whole too, if you choose to see yourself as such.
Quote:The third step is that step which, when accomplished, renders one the most humble servant of all, transparent in personality and completely able to know and accept other-selves.
For some reason, I just can't seem to grasp this. Is it as easy as just accepting ones position on a given scenario then honestly giving your opinion on the matter and the ways you disagree or are you to accept the position of the other self and that's the end of it? This kinds goes back to plenum's question as to passitivity. How can you be all accepting of an other selfs position or decision when that position/decision could negatively impact ones self or an other self?
(06-10-2014, 06:19 PM)Jeremy Wrote: [ -> ]Ok then this is where to whole all will be well mantra and I are split. Like I mentioned previously, if one were to believe that all will truly be well and accept whatever happens, happens, one wouldn't wear a seatbelt, cross a dangerous bridge that's about to collapse, allow a child to handle a gun, let a child play in a busy street.
This is where such absolutism such as being all accepting has it's limit in my opinion. Where exactly does self preservation along with the protection and guidance of a loved one or child who isn't aware of the repercussions of their actions come into play?
Where does responsibility factor into accepting every single situation one faces absolutely and truly allow that particular situation to play out regardless of the potential pitfalls that could happen?
I think A1's post about incorporating desires is key here.
In any given external situation that triggers issues involving acceptance, there is also the inner situation that triggers acceptance issues, the inner issue involving that you have a desire to be in some other external situation.
Say the world very likely to end because of some ongoing nuclear war. You also understandably have a strong desire to live in a world where this doesn't happen. With true acceptance of the external reality of nuclear war and the internal reality that you desire to live in a world nuclear war, you action would stem from an understanding that both the external nuclear war and your internal desire are natural parts of the universe and yourself respectively. The actual course of action you decide to do as you accept both realities is less relevant than your understanding and acceptance of both the external reality and your inner desires. But I'd bet you probably take some action to try to avert the war.
Desire is a central part of free will and spiritual evolution in general, and I think it's always important to include desire in any discussion of self and other selves.
Adjusting perspective as a regular habit will help the learning. I help others do this with hypnosis.
A person may seem like a jerk with your first impression, and you could continue on with this belief, letting emotional response bring your judgements.
You could find out more about this person, learning that they lost their parents, lost their girlfriend, lost their job, maybe even all at once, turning the individual sour. When you learn "about" the person you suddenly understand their tinted perspective, and you no longer judge because you now understand.
You can also find a person that acts out on a daily basis, and find that they have a horrible home life, which also causes you to be more accepting of their current traits. You understand what catalyst they face that causes their mental/emotional distortion.
It is not much different than thinking of energy systems. You can learn enough to gauge a person's personality expressions/reactions by the condition of their energy system.
There are a limited amount of patterns as far as personality traits and energy imbalances. With enough experience you can just look at someone and "know", allowing you to not hastily judge.
Dolores Cannon has her own system of understanding certain circumstances, which is based on the complaints of the person. Depending on where they experience pain, she finds that the specific area of pain always links to specific areas of their life. She can read the person by the symptoms. Very similar.
There are limited patterns of expression, and when all expressions are learned they can be called "understood" or "known". With knowledge there is no need for judgement, and not much need for emotional response or reaction.
In this way it becomes a passive response from knowing rather than a passive response by ignoring.
(06-10-2014, 08:20 PM)xise Wrote: [ -> ] (06-10-2014, 06:19 PM)Jeremy Wrote: [ -> ]Ok then this is where to whole all will be well mantra and I are split. Like I mentioned previously, if one were to believe that all will truly be well and accept whatever happens, happens, one wouldn't wear a seatbelt, cross a dangerous bridge that's about to collapse, allow a child to handle a gun, let a child play in a busy street.
This is where such absolutism such as being all accepting has it's limit in my opinion. Where exactly does self preservation along with the protection and guidance of a loved one or child who isn't aware of the repercussions of their actions come into play?
Where does responsibility factor into accepting every single situation one faces absolutely and truly allow that particular situation to play out regardless of the potential pitfalls that could happen?
I think A1's post about incorporating desires is key here.
In any given external situation that triggers issues involving acceptance, there is also the inner situation that triggers acceptance issues, the inner issue involving that you have a desire to be in some other external situation.
Say the world very likely to end because of some ongoing nuclear war. You also understandably have a strong desire to live in a world where this doesn't happen. With true acceptance of the external reality of nuclear war and the internal reality that you desire to live in a world nuclear war, you action would stem from an understanding that both the external nuclear war and your internal desire are natural parts of the universe and yourself respectively. The actual course of action you decide to do as you accept both realities is less relevant than your understanding and acceptance of both the external reality and your inner desires. But I'd bet you probably take some action to try to avert the war.
So what you're saying pertains to my last post in that I can still accept an other selfs position on a particular matter/decision but I can still disagree? If so then that's cool with me and maybe I've been misunderstanding this whole acceptance issue I'm dealing with. Am I correct in my thinking here?
When I consider being accepting of all, I guess I'm making it an absolute blanket statement to accept ALL meaning all other selfs, all situations one experiences, and all results of these experiences.
Yes Jeremy I would agree with your last post.
Also realize all includes yourself. I've been thinking lately that the service to others path might be better named service to ALL so that it's more self evident that the all selves are to be included in any spiritual calculus, including yourself.
Not including yourself is a distortion of conditional love/service, and is not really what sto and unconditional love/service are all about. You see this type of distorted service when the sto aspiring but self-neglected entity doesn't understand why serving others doesn't flow naturally. The self neglected entity often feels both physically and spiritually drained during these acts of serving others due to self spiritual neglect. Often self-neglected entity confuses this service with martyr love, where the self is fully loved and service flows naturally and where only the self's physical wellbeing is often not paid attention to.
Martyr-love flows freely and results in seeming only service to others but not the self because the self is already so full of love love love that the entity doesn't care about its physical well being. But in martyrlove, regardless of outward acts, it's clear the entity loves the self completely and wholly in abundance. It just lacks wisdom as to what to do with all of the overflowing love energy because each act of serving others brings it so much joy each and every time and spiritually energizes the entity.
There's one prayer from my days as a catholic school boy that I often think of when it comes to the idea of acceptance:
Quote:The Serenity Prayer
God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
Forever in the next.
Amen.
Maybe all the Him and His Will stuff might rub people the wrong way, but replace them with The One Infinite Creator and replace sinful with distorted or whatever you want and I think you'll find it applicable
(06-10-2014, 08:29 PM)xise Wrote: [ -> ]Yes Jeremy I would agree with your last post.
Also realize all includes yourself. I've been thinking lately that the service to others path might be better named service to ALL so that it's more self evident that the self is also included in any spiritual calculus.
Ok then that clears up a lot of my confusion then. This as I'm sure most have noticed has very personal ramifications to me. When I kept wrestling with this acceptance issue, I kept running in circles trying to find ways to accept some decisions that my ex makes regarding our daughter. I was looking for ways to accept the action and not the reason for the action. I can completely understand and accept some of the things she does because she's still quite damaged emotionally from her passed drug use and ongoing depression issues. That part I can accept and I'm ok with it it because I know it's her lesson to learn. But when our daughter is directly impacted by her actions, I'm left stumped on ways of finding acceptance of a particular action.
Damn iPhone editing. Duplicate post. Got a little sidetracked from the op in my last post.
But I think the issues of conditional service to only others, martyr service to others, and true service to others confuse a ton of people on this forum. It might merit its own thread. Maybe when I finally have a keyboard in a few days. And issues of accepting the self's desires do give a nexus to the op, so I'll leave my edits in without too much of the distortion known as guilt
To give credit where credit is due: I thank Mother Earth for this insight. For the past two days I've been in Lake Titicaca, Peru. It's supposedly the sacral or orange ray center of the earth. I've been sightseeing, contemplating and meditating. Gaia, I totally owe you dinner sometime!
everything that happens is acceptable or it would not be happening...
I don't know if that is true; could be a coping mechanism or an enlightened point of view.
(06-10-2014, 08:07 PM)Jeremy Wrote: [ -> ]For some reason, I just can't seem to grasp this. Is it as easy as just accepting ones position on a given scenario then honestly giving your opinion on the matter and the ways you disagree or are you to accept the position of the other self and that's the end of it? This kinds goes back to plenum's question as to passitivity. How can you be all accepting of an other selfs position or decision when that position/decision could negatively impact ones self or an other self?
The incorporation of all desires leads to universal acceptance at the end of this creation. How the incorporation is done is infinite in its ways. Acceptance is simply a satisfaction in that all is well and that you've done your duty towards yourself and others in the way you have chosen, which is inherent in all ways of being.
No being can universally accept all while still being with a veil of separation. What you note is simply the nature of the veil and illusion itself. Within this illusion, there is acceptance. Accepting is just acknowledging this inherent acceptance.
I hope this is clear.
(06-10-2014, 09:24 PM)Raz Wrote: [ -> ]everything that happens is acceptable or it would not be happening...
I don't know if that is true; could be a coping mechanism or an enlightened point of view.
"What does not happen" as an idea is a negation of what happens, has happened and will happen. In such, it all can happen and is acceptable.
Summary: Acceptance of all is simply saying all is satisfactory even states that are not satisfactory. All is well.
I can totally relate to spero's feelings of frozen still by taking a concept in its most literal sense, and this lead to a passivity that resulted in not taking up opportunities to serve by simply not recognising them.
This cultivated a sense of indifference within me where I completely lost my ability to empathise with others as I was viewing life from this distorted view to accept all that occurs. I did not re-evaluate this until an attack on my life occurred and jolted me out of this mental dead end I had constructed. I was merely observing and accepting life without feeling any of it.
Understanding now that I am the creator positioned at a unique reference point, I am able to act, or 'mitigate' karmic actions while still accepting these actions. This means non judgement or moral assertions in the process of acting. A compassion towards one who is in the midst of causing harm through empathy rather than fear based reaction, ie passivity.
The first distortion at play is key to recognising an accepting attitude I feel. Empathy then ascertains whether action is required.
I have yet to see any evidence of objective morality in this universe. I see a universe infinitely expanding and contracting on itself, I see how the soul is built from a single photon of light that grows into a mass of greater light. I see how it does the same: Expands, Contracts; Attracts, Repulses.
In this I see love for potentials and an unconscious of potentials that are not desired (hate). I do not see a morality, I do not see karma (no offense to those who believe in this system.)
I see only light. I see only that all is one. I see only The Law of One.
Morality, to me, is only a system of doctrine created by highly-contrived beings. It does not entail anything intrinsic to me other than an engineering of society.