Acceptance As My Pathway to Peace

Eight months after a tornado ripped through the city I live in, I cycled through a neighborhood where the tornado had touched down. What was once a neighborhood with houses lining the streets and old-growth trees creating a canopy over everything, was now a barren and desolate feeling landscape.

Most of the trees were gone. Many of the houses were still standing, however. You could clearly see where some houses had already been repaired, while others were in various states of repair or disrepair. It was also clear that many had been abandoned.

There was a large power line that cut through the centre of this neighborhood. On one side of the power line was destruction. On the other side of the power line was pristine, untouched property. The contrast was striking.

My thoughts ranged from the awe of the power of nature, to how lucky some properties were on one side of the power line, to how heart-wrenching it was to see the devastation on the other side of the power line...less than 100 meters away.

There was the momentary deluge of WHY questions that entered my psyche. Why did the tornado hit the community on that side of the power line? Why did the tornado leave the community on the other side of the power line untouched? Why did this happen at all!?

The experience made me realize that we ask the WHY question a lot! If anything untoward happens in our life, we tend to default to a litany of WHY questions, that typically starts with Why is this happening to me?...and then spreads out to include such endless inquiry as… Why are you doing that to me? Why are you being so mean? Why me? Why not someone else? Why are you hurting me? And the litany of WHY questions goes on infinitum.

I learned that asking WHY does not bring me peace. Asking WHY tends only to feed a loathsome self-pity and lead me into energies of anger and hatred.

My peace can only be found in an acceptance of what is; an acceptance of life on its terms, not how I want it to be. The sooner I can accept what is transpiring, the sooner I can return to a grounded sense of peace. It is during times, episodes and events that have an element of extreme upheaval about them that our acceptance is challenged.

Take, for example, the tornado and the resulting damage. How can one accept such an event and the devastation it produced? This kind of acceptance is only possible through a deep trust in life—that everything, with no exception, happens for our good. Even a tornado! Yes, life does seem to present us with challenges and challenging situations. But they will only seem like a challenge for as long as we resist them. Learn from them if we can; but accept them we must, if we are to be at peace.

Robert Meagher has been ordained as an Interfaith Minister and certified as a Sacred Attention Therapy (SAT) Therapist. Robert is the Founder and Spiritual Director for Spiritual Guidance and Co-Founder of the Center for Human Awakening.