Quotes About Acceptance

There's no "should" or "should not" when it comes to having feelings. They're part of who we are and their origins are beyond our control. When we can believe that, we may find it easier to make constructive choices about what to do with those feelings.

It's a mistake to think that we have to be lovely to be loved by human beings or by God

Feeling good about ourselves is essential in our being able to love others.

You are a very special person. There is only one like you in the whole world. There's never been anyone exactly like you before, and there will never be again. Only you. And people can like you exactly as you are.

Mutually caring relationships require kindness and patience, tolerance, optimism, joy in the other's achievements, confidence in oneself, and the ability to give without undue thought of gain. We need to accept the fact that it's not in the power of any human being to provide all these things all the time. for any of us, mutually caring relationships will always include some measure of unkindness and impatience, intolerance, pessimism, envy, self-doubt, and disappointment.

You can't really love someone else unless you really love yourself first.

I've often hesitated in beginning a project because I've thought, "It'll never turn out to be even remotely like the good idea I have as I start." I could just "feel" how good it could be. But I decided that, for the present, I would create the best way I know how and accept the ambiguities.

I realize that it isn't very fashionable to talk about some things being holy; nevertheless, if we ever want to rid ourselves of personal and corporate emptiness, brokenness, loneliness, and fear, we have to allow ourselves room for that which we can not see, hear, touch , or control.

There's a part of all of us that longs to know that even what's weakest about us is still redeemable and can ultimately count for something good.

There are times when explanations, no matter how reasonable, just don't seem to help.

People have said "Don't cry" to other people for years and years, and all it has ever meant is "I'm too uncomfortable when you show your feelings: don't cry." I'd rather have them say, "Go ahead and cry. I'm here to be with you.

Play is really the work of childhood. One of the most important gifts a parent can give a child is the gift of accepting that child's uniqueness. When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, 'Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.

I know that when I walk out of the studio someday and there is a child who has Downs Syndrome, for instance, and that child comes up and gives me a hug, I know that that's the field I want to be growing in. Because I see that people who are not the fancy people of this world are the ones who seem to nourish my soul. And I want to learn how to be the best receiver that I can ever be. Because I think graceful receiving is one of the most wonderful gifts we can give anybody.

The most important learning is the ability to accept and expect mistakes, and deal with the disappointments that they bring.

Mary Lou Kownacki: "There isn't anyone you couldn't love once you've heard their story.

One of our friends asked Fred about his thoughts on heaven when she was taking a walk with him on a Nantucket beach a few years ago. I'll bet there was a twinkle in his eye when he told her, "Oh, I think there will be a lot of people surprised to see who's there!" Fred would never want anyone to think they might not be worthy of getting through heaven's gate. His God loved everyone—just the way they were!

Some days, doing "the best we can" may still fall short of what we would like to be able to do, but life isn't perfect—on any front—and doing what we can with what we have is the most we should expect of ourselves or anyone else.

Deep within us—no matter who we are—there lives a feeling of wanting to be lovable, of wanting to be the kind of person that others like to be with. And the greatest thing we can do is to let people know that they are loved and capable of loving.

Love isn't a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like struggle. To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now.

A quote he loved especially—and carried around with him—was from Mary Lou Kownacki: "There isn't anyone you couldn't love once you've heard their story." There were many times I wanted to be angry at someone, and Fred would say, "But I wonder what was going on in that person's day." His capacity for understanding always amazed me.

Love doesn't mean a state of perfect caring. To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now—and to go on caring through joyful times and through times that may bring us pain.

If the day ever came when we were able to accept ourselves and our children exactly as we and they are, then, I believe, we would have come very close to an ultimate understanding of what "good" parenting means.

It's the people who feel strong and good about themselves inside who are best able to accept outside differences—their own or others'. We help children develop this ability every time we affirm how special they are to us for being themselves, and how special to us are all the things that make each person different from anyone else.

Little by little we human beings are confronted with situations that give us more and more clues that we aren't perfect.