Reflection
Acceptance is the universal currency of real relationship. It allows the other to be the other. It puts no barriers where life should be. It does not warp or shape or wrench a person to be something other than what they are. It simply opens its arms to hold the weary and opens its heart to hear the broken and opens its mind to see the invisible.
Joan Chittister, OSB
Prayer
May I accept others as they are.
Action
Think of your relationships with family, friends and co-workers. How accepting are you of their individuality? What are the stresses? How important are they?
Suggested Reading
How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!
Psalm 133:1
How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take out the speck that is in your eye,’ when you yourself do not see the log that is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take out the speck that is in your brother’s eye.
Luke 6:42
Judgment belongs only to God, to Him alone! It is for us to love, to understand, to pray for others when we see things that are not good.
Pope Francis
The most effective attitude to adopt is one of supreme acceptance. The world is full of people with different characters and temperaments. We all have a dark side, a tendency to manipulate, and aggressive desires.
Robert Greene
No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow.
Alice Walker
To be fully seen by somebody, then, and be loved anyhow – this is a human offering that can border on miraculous.
Elizabeth Gilbert
A friend is someone who gives you total freedom to be yourself-and especially to feel, or not feel. Whatever you happen to be feeling at any moment is fine with them. That’s what real love amounts to – letting a person be what he really is.
Jim Morrison
Sometimes people let the same problem make them miserable for years when they could just say, So what. That’s one of my favorite things to say. So what.”
Andy Warhol
Love is made up of three unconditional properties in equal measure: Acceptance,
Understanding, Appreciation. Remove any one of the three and the triangle falls apart.
Vera Nazarian
All of us sport an invisible sign around our necks — “AS IS.” It means, take me as I am. I may not become what you want me to be. And I’m far, far from perfect. But I have some great qualities, too, as well as my share of faults. You will have to take me “AS IS” and I’ll take you that way, too.
Steve Goodier
When you are not accepted, dare to be exceptional.
Johnnie Dent Jr.