True acceptance in the midst of difficult time

Think of the moments in your life when you encountered a difficulty. What were the most challenging, difficult things to do? Was it to stay in the moment, to deal with the situation face-to-face, or to accept things for what they were? For many centuries, the most common human’s responses to difficulties were always “fight or flight”. The mind is tricky, it tells you to either to fight with the situation or to run away from it. It is unusual to just accept, to be with it and to take care of it. The practice of mindful breathing and stopping can help you to worn off this hereditary survival instinct.

The next time when you face a difficult situation, learn to stop, breathe deeply and not to do or say anything. This would save you a lot of troubles. Taking deep breaths and help us to relax and calm our mind. If you’re calm enough, you could say some things like, “I’m sorry, I don’t feel like talking now. Let us discuss this another time.” You can always take a walk or go lie down and relax. Sometimes when we are stressed, it’s very easy for us to feel overwhelm and angry at very minor things that people say to us. Perhaps it was some irritating comments your boss made at work, or the other driver who cut you off in traffic, or even your own family who complains about something you do, it can drive you up the wall if you’re not calm enough. Learn to take some minutes before you leave the house to calm yourself down. You can take some time to breathe in and out a few minutes the moment you woke up, while you’re sipping your coffee or your morning tea, or while you’re doing your morning exercises. You can smile and say to yourself, “This is a new day and I’ll do my best to enjoy the twenty hours before me with awareness” or any of your favorite quotes to start the day.

In your daily life, in the midst of your busy work or many other errands that you need to take care of, you can arrange so that you have some quiet time for yourselves, to be still and reflect things as they are. You can spare a few minutes each day, or a few hours at in the weekend to do mindful sitting or mindful walking, or even mindful eating a home-made meal. This space and time you give to yourselves can nourish and provide a sort of “immunity” in time of difficulty. You can also invite someone to practice with you to give you more support. When I was taking in my university courses many years ago, I always take some time to practice mindfulness while driving to school, while walking between classes, or while having my lunch. I also try to meditate daily before bed for about 15 minutes. This has helped me to recharge my energy for the day.

The more you practice living mindfully, the more you can learn to handle your challenges more skillfully. You can shake hand and befriend with your challenges and not running away or fighting with them. Have faith that whatever the challenge is, no matter how difficult it is, that it will soon pass and change. It’s like knowing that after the rain, the rainbow will come. It’s not about when it will pass or be transformed, but that you’ve embraced it with of your acceptance and love. You can bring your mindfulness practice to a deeper level in the midst of these challenges. For myself, I always find that my practice become deeper in these times. Over time, when your mind is calm and clear, you’ll be able to see the wisdom that help you to overcome your challenges.

Having supportive friends can help your mindfulness practice last longer and stronger. To start building a community of practice might not be easy at first. It takes mistakes and trials and experiment, acceptance, love and understanding. However, you can start gather a small group of 3 to 4 persons to practice mindfulness with. In this day and age, you can even do a Zoom practice session together. It could be a 20 to 30 minutes sitting at night or in the weekend. You can also share about your joys or struggles in your daily life with each other. I’ve seen groups of friends who do this and is able to maintain their practice regularly.

Letting go of your perceptions and views is another practice that can help us overcome difficult moments. Sometimes we cling to ideas of who we are, who the other person is, and we can suffer. The Buddha taught that everything is impermanent is subject to change. Just like Heraclitus said that “No man ever steps in the same river twice.” Things are constantly changing and same go for our perceptions and views. Your thoughts and perceptions are constantly changing, and you have the power to do that. You have the sovereignty over your thoughts and perceptions. All you need to do is to change the way you’re thinking and perceiving. A wrong or unwholesome perception can be the cause of misunderstanding and suffering. When you can let go of your wrong perception, you’ll see things in a better light. Letting go of old perceptions can also give rise to forgiveness and help you to move forward. When you can let go of erroneous perceptions about yourself and others, you can reconciliate with yourself and others, and touch the goodness in yourself and others. Therefore, you are giving yourself and other people another chance to move forward.

All of us possessed both wholesome and unwholesome traits. When good conditions come together, it’ll bring about the wholesome traits. When the favorable conditions are lacking, it’ll bring about the unwholesome traits. However, just like the weather is changing from hours to hours, these traits also changing in every minutes. No one can remain a “good” person all the time, and no one can remain a “bad” person all the time. If you look in the light of cause and effect, then you can embrace the change much easier. The main thing is to be mindful, to aware of what is happening inside and around us, and to accept, embrace and allow things to be. Only with acceptance can you find peace in your heart.

So, the next time when you encounter some difficulty, don’t run away; come back yourself with your mindful breaths, recognize and embrace your difficulty, and allow it to be. Look deeply and let go of any wrong perceptions that might have contributed to the situation and forgive. Light will come, peace will come and happiness will come to your heart and soul. Find supportive friends in the practice to help maintain your regular practice. Best of wishes to you!