Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
The courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.
— The Serenity Prayer of the AA
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I’m more than a little aware that I over use these above three lines. I’ve used them in both of my books, and probably every time I talk about how to be a better you.
But I use them because they are so important and yet so poorly practiced, or even understood.
You need both serenity and courage; you need the wisdom to know what to do when. It’s not either/or.
In my new book “Chasing More and Finding Enough”, I tried to concisely as possible explain just why, and what to do about it. It’s a short book because I wanted it to be direct and to the point. No waffle.
The even shorter answer is that serenity, courage AND wisdom are all you require to be free of stress and struggle, to be free of all suffering. It’s all you need to be the greatest version of you in all aspects of life that you choose to show up fully in. It’s one of the direct results of a spiritual, inner path – the total and complete engagement of all of life.
But largely through poor teaching, I would say, people don’t understand that.
Serenity and acceptance is seen as the opposite of courage. A spiritual path is seen as withdrawal, even the avoidance of life.
This is not the case.
This is NOT the case.
You go within not so you can avoid, but so you can go beyond. So you can make a true difference to your life; and to the lives of all those you care about.
Let’s take a deeper look.
Spirituality IS acceptance
Yes, a spiritual path is an inner path that means we come to the ability to choose to be serene, accepting and at peace regardless of the external world. We “let go” – but this means the ties are cut; we are no longer monkeys on a chain being pulled this way and that by external events and other people.
You are freed; you become independent from the opinions of others, from the ups and downs of life.
This doesn’t mean the ups and downs stop. But knowing with all certainty that you are riding a rollercoaster – and choosing to fully partake in the ride – is totally different than believing that a successful life is achieved when you can control the ride and make the downs stop.
It’s when you embrace all of life, exactly as it is, in total acceptance and surrender – that’s when serenity and peace become complete.
Invulnerability is the result. You are resilient. Bullet-proof. Anti-fragile. You ride it all out, with a whopping great smile on your face.
But:
Spirituality is also courage
Just because you give up control, a spiritual path is not a denial of life. It’s not sedation of your spirit. It doesn’t make your problems go away.
It gives you the ability to engage in the world free of limitation and that oh-so familiar feeling of “I can’t”; “I’m not good enough”; “What if I fail?”; “What will other people think?”. It supercharges your passion for your life in such a way that you live life perfectly on your terms.
It means you show up more, not less. It means you live your dharma; you find your equivalent of Thor’s hammer. Everyone wants to see if they can pick up Thor’s hammer; no one goes in search of their own to throw around. As Jordan Hall noted,
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“Find your hammer – find what’s yours to do and go and do that. Everything else is wasted effort.”
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It takes serenity and acceptance to ignore those avenues of wasted effort; it take courage to go and find your point of leverage, your hammer, your path in life.
It takes serenity and acceptance to be content with the way things are; it takes courage to stand for something and grow into this worthwhile thing you have chosen.
You need both.
Spirituality, at its core, gives you wisdom
Through an inner path you connect with the source of all wisdom. Not what your small ego passes off as wisdom; but the source of ALL wisdom. The source which anyone, anywhere, any time in the entire history of the world who has ever had a moment of true wisdom has connected with.
You might have noticed:
Why do all the great teachers seem to say the same things? Why do the words from a different culture, spoken thousands of years ago, still ring true today? Not because these teachers have the same instruction book to life. It’s because they tap into the source of universal human wisdom that truly shows you how to live.
You may need an instruction manual to begin with; to know what the right direction to go in is. But the more you dive into a spiritual path, the more you find the source, the wellspring, the roots of the tree of all the teachings. Here you don’t need someone else to tell you what is right; you know.
As Mark Twain wrote once,
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“Laws control the lesser man. Right conduct controls the greater one.”
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Find an inner practice. Do it consistently. Go beyond the ego and imbalance into the source of wisdom within you.
Come to know your Self – it’s not a useless pursuit for people with too much time on their hands, with not enough to do. It’s crucial for you to do what you came here to do.
I’d suggest you learn Ascension. I am biased, but it’s simple and enjoyable yet powerful and direct. But whatever you do, do something!
And if I can help, just let me know.
As always, go well,
Arjuna
PS.
If you made it this far, I think you’ll like my new book. “Chasing More and Finding Enough” is available on Amazon and all good online bookstores.
Check it out; and if you like it, could you leave a review? Much appreciated.
And …
If you’d like more on this, I recently did a podcast that talks all about the new book with a good friend of mine, Sandy Newbigging on his Mind Detox Podcast. When I first met him I made him pretty angry by what I said – but he came around to my way of thinking. Ha!
“Why Calm is Our Superpower” is available on the Mind Detox Podcast on Spotify.