Eating Uncertainty for Breakfast

"If uncertainty is unacceptable to you, it turns into fear. If it is perfectly acceptable, it turns into increased aliveness, alertness, and creativity."

-- Eckhart Tolle

If you're not uncertain about damn near everything you're asleep at the wheel! The sin qua non of life is uncertainty. In other words, certainty is a myth on par with Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and compassionate conservatives. It is found nowhere in nature, and it is not a component, or quality, of reality. Hard, bold fact: There's no certainty in life. Get it? 

What there is is change. Perpetual, ubiquitous change. And that's a good thing, it keeps the juices flowing, keeps entropy at bay, keeps life interesting. Our role, first and foremost, in this whole process is not to become "agents of change," but to accept the uncertainty that comes hand-in-hand with natural, perpetual change. I ain't saying you have to love it (yet), but you do have to accept it, or you're stuck in the mud of resistance.

And it's not just uncertainty and change that require your acceptance -- it's all and everything. Acceptance of what is is the only sane response to reality and, joy of joys, the cognitive precursor to love. 

What's love got to do with it? Everything. Love is the Great Redeemer of both you and the world. By all external standards, the world's a friggin' mess! A mess just aching for love. Not unlike your own messy heart. Acceptance is the first step -- accept it today, love it tomorrow, or perhaps many tomorrows down the road, but with acceptance at least you're on the road and no longer stuck in the ditch of resistance and despair. 

Huh? Just try it. Each time you start to feel anxious and uncertain today, banish the anxiety by letting the uncertainty be. Be a Beatle, and "let it be." Accept it. And then see if Eckhart is right. Do you feel increasingly alive, alert and creative? If not, relax into an even deeper level of acceptance. Embrace the uncertainty, merge with it, let it permeate your being, and see. 

It's the Great Acceptance Experiment, and you're part of it everyday. You, the magical alchemist, transforming the dross of uncertainty into the gold of love with one simple, little ingredient -- acceptance.