Acceptance is a gift of grace. It is not giving up, it’s giving in. Acceptance means allowing and trusting God’s will in my life. This is very easy to do when God’s will coincides with my will, but I am challenged when God’s will is contrary to my own. This is when I pray for the grace of acceptance, the grace to take what comes, and to trust that God has a plan for my life, beyond my comprehension.
I had to muster up courage to accept my own destiny. Acceptance seemed like defeat. I felt like I wanted to fight the inevitable with all I had. How could I sit back and just accept it? I felt guilty about accepting my daughter Lauren’s death because it meant living without her. If I could hold on to the fight in my heart, the impossible fight of keeping her here, I could keep her here, even if only in memory. But memories fade with the passage of time, and I wanted more than just a few tattered snapshots in my mind.
I have learned to embrace the grace of acceptance. I quit trying to hold on to Lauren’s memory so tightly, and I started to accept the reality of Lauren in the present and in the future. The grace of acceptance taught me that Lauren will always live in my heart, in a much bigger capacity than just the memories. By letting go of holding on to her memory so tightly, I have gained the gift of loving her as she is today, through the grace of acceptance. Sometimes I think of it as loving my child even though she no longer has a body. Lauren survived her wreck, it was her body that didn’t. I will always love her, no matter what the condition of her physical body, even its non- existence.
The grace of acceptance has brought me to the realization that I could hold on to Lauren through memory, and fight the reality of her death, or I could learn to love her with no body, and embrace her death as part of her life, not the end, just a part. It’s hard to explain how the love between me and Lauren still exists in a present form, but it does. Although her body is not here, her spirit still is, and I feel it with my heart. I like to think of her as my own personal pioneer, the fearless brave soul who taught me to accept God’s will, who took away my fear of death, and who will lead me to the next part of my life.
Tara Rodney
1/2/12