Notes on the book Radical Acceptance by Tara Brach
The other day, I was playing the game "What animal would you like to be?" with a friend. I couldn't think of an animal, but I told him I would like to be a tree. Trees or plants give most of our food, shelter to animals, birds, insects, and wood for our homes, they prevent erosion, you can hold on to a tree to climb a tricky patch of a mountain, or to prevent being swept away in a current, their trunks or wood becomes bridges, they are universes within themselves! I would like to be such a useful being.
Today I would like to review Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life With the Heart of a Buddha by Tara Brach. Tara is a clinical psychologist, a teacher of Buddhist meditation for 40+ years, and the founder of a meditation community in Washington.
She has also written True Refuge: Finding Peace & Freedom in Your Own Awakened Heart and Radical Compassion: Learning to Love Yourself and Your World with the Practice of R.A.I.N.
Radical Acceptance
This is how Tara defines Radical acceptance,
It means feeling sorrow or pain without resisting.It means feeling desire or dislike for someone or something without judging ourselves for the feeling or being driven to act on it.Clearly recognizing what is happening inside us, and regarding what we see with an open, kind, and loving heart is what I call Radical Acceptance.If we are holding back from any part of our experience, if our heart shuts out any part of who we are and what we feel, we are fueling the fears and feelings of separation that sustain the trance of unworthiness.
Tara starts with questions that can help us reflect on how we judge ourselves or negate our experiences. And how this lack of acceptance or a feeling of "unworthiness" can create suffering, pain, and fear. And how acceptance, compassion, and forgiveness for ourselves and others is the path to embracing life with a heart.
She describes her own experiences and those of her patients and teaches exercises on how we can accept challenging things in life (events, ours or others' personalities, etc.).
My experience with the book
I read the book around two years ago and the effect of its exercises is still rippling through my life. I read it over a month and tried out an exercise from the book every day, it was often challenging and tiring.
But that month was also peaceful, and it was an eye-opening experience. I learned that being present with pain or difficulty, instead of running away from it, can make me more resilient.
And being kind and open to my own shortcomings is the road to being kind and open toward others. So in case you have been looking for examples and exercises to bring more acceptance towards difficult or unpleasant experiences, this book might be relevant for you. This was all for today.
Thank you!
Want to see if embodiment life and career coaching can help you? Schedule a call here: https://calendly.com/beant-ux/discovery-call