Don’t let your lack of acceptance keep you from moving on.

“Things are as they are, we suffer because we imagined different”

I attribute all of my life lessons and moments of clarity to my children. Throughout our shared journey in life, they teach and enlighten me daily. Never does a day go by where something doesn’t happen that brings joy and a deeper understanding of what matters most in life. Children are amazing that way. They live each day with such freedom. They don’t hide who they are, they aren’t ashamed of their unique qualities, they are tremendously honest, and undeniably full of innocence. In truth, they live each day of their lives the way that we as adults strive to but somehow forgot how to along the way.

“When you learn to accept instead of expect, you have fewer disappointments” 

I have 2 friends that I see often, we get together a few times a week, cook, laugh, dance, watch movies, and basically just enjoy life. What I love most about my friends, is their zest for life. They choose to be happy and to live, and that kind of characteristic is infectious to be around. When I’m with them, I can’t help but feel that more is possible, tomorrow is another day, I will get through this, and the world is mine for the taking. Yes I know how cliche all of those sayings are, but they’re all true.

One particular night when my 2 friends were over, my daughter Cali had a meltdown. And a big one, I’m talking about 45 minutes of crying, screaming, kicking, etc. She was upset because she wanted to sleep on top of the kitchen cabinets and I wouldn’t let her. She didn’t understand that she could roll off in the middle of the night and fall 10 feel onto hardwood floors. All she knew was that she liked it up there and I was making her get down. My friends patiently watched me get her down and try to soothe her, asking how they could help. I explained to them that she was melting down because her mind was not able to accept what was happening. That she had to get all of her frustrations out and only then would she settle. Next thing I knew, both of my friends were sitting/lying on the kitchen floor near my daughter, not saying anything, not frantic, just calmly sitting and waiting. Every so often one of us would reach out to tickle her, or stroke her hair, sing her favorite songs. After a while she settled and cuddled up next to my friend Jerson, asking for tickles and wanting to get tucked into bed. 

“At some point you just have to let go of what you thought would happen and live in what is happening.”

As we grow and mature, those little moments become easier and easier to navigate through, often times just rolling off our backs. The meltdown, for us, comes in those bigger moments. When we lose a loved one, get fired from a job, are diagnosed with an illness, have our hearts broken, etc. But as adults, we can’t get over it in 45 minutes, we aren’t up and playing again the next day. It’s only when we allow our minds and emotions to truly accept the truth that we can begin to heal. For some of us this happens sooner than later, we don’t stay down for long. However for others, this meltdown can last a while, consuming them. There is no right or wrong way to deal with pain, there’s no how to book, but the longer we chose to keep our minds ignorant to the truth, the longer we prolong our pain. 

I started this post by saying how much my children teach me everyday, and they do. In teaching my children, walking them through problems, seeing how their minds work and breaking things down to the point where they can not simply understand but accept it, in doing that for my children I am teaching myself. Not in the traditional sense, as this is already knowledge that I posses. But I am reminding myself of these life lessons, reminding myself how to live like a child again, how to free myself from holding onto the ignorance, and how to accept life’s truths with grace and with the strength to move forward and not only better myself, but live in such a way that others feel empowered when they are with me.