Accepting Alice’s flower is the Snapdragon which symbolises releasing anger and hate, which is really interesting because that's what this blog post is all about. It's so perfect that Accepting Alice is this week, when there is so much anger and hatred in New South Wales at the moment.
We are in the middle of lockdown, we have a vaccine, we have people who are for and against the vaccine, we have people who are for and against lockdown, there are people that think COVID is not real, there are people that think COVID is real.
We have all these different perspectives around at the moment and it’s heartbreaking watching what's happening on social media. I actually went to bed on Sunday night and burst into tears because of the sadness that I had seen over the weekend after the protests on Saturday. So I’ve decided I’m not going on social media for a while because there is no acceptance there at all.
That’s what Accepting Alice is about… realising that every single person has a different perspective and when we don't accept what other people's perspective is, when we try and push our perspective down each other's throats, it creates that anger and tension. This is how wars escalate. You have one side that believes they are right, and you have another side that believes they are right and they're at war fighting to convince the other side that they are correct.
And that's what's happening in society at the moment and especially on social media. The people who are pro vaccine are pushing their beliefs on the anti vaccine people, the anti vaccine people are trying to push their beliefs on the pro vaccine people. The pro lockdown people are pushing their beliefs on the non pro lockdown people, and there is just this huge anger in the society at the moment and everybody is screaming and yelling through social media, expecting the other people to change their perspective or their belief. Because if I yell louder and harder you might be able to listen to me better. However that's not going to happen. If wars are built on different perspectives, people aren't going to get your perspective just because you shout at them louder or harder on social media.
So Accepting Alice is here to help you realise that every single person is entitled to their perspective. She’s about accepting that their perspective is different to yours, and you're not going to change them. This can be really, really hard to do, especially when you're really passionate about your perspective and your beliefs. However, when you can try and bring in more and more Accepting Alice, and just accept people for who they are, the more peace you will feel.
Also know that your perspective is not your truth. So, the truth about vaccines is not that one perspective is better than the other. The truth around lockdown is not that one perspective is better than the other. Everybody has their perspective but neither perspective is the truth.
The truth is there's a disease, there is lockdown and there is a vaccine. That's the truth. They are the facts, everything else around that is perspective.
So the people who think that having the vaccine is going to stop the disease and make us better and move on with our lives. That's their perspective. The people who think that the vaccine isn’t the solution and are worried that it hasn't been tested or is an experiment, that's their perspective.
And we're all trying to scream at each other and say you need to believe me. You need to believe my version of the truth, yet it isn't the truth, it's just their perspective.
Let's take this into a lighter example. We have a bath mat in our bathroom. If I have a shower first, I leave the bath mat on the floor for Scott. If he has a shower first, he picks the bath mat up and I have to put it back on the floor.
The truth of this situation is we have a bath mat, we both use it when we shower. That’s it… that’s the truth. My perspective of that event is, I leave the towel down for him, so he doesn't have to worry about it and he can just waltz on into the bathroom and it's all set up ready to go. His perspective of that same event is gosh she's lazy, she can't even pick the bathmat up, and I have to do it for her. So can you see, even in a really simple example about a bath mat, we have differing perspectives?
It wasn't until one day I said to him, “why don't you just leave the bath mat down for me like I do for you?”. And he responded with, “I hate that you leave it down, it makes me think you're lazy and you can't be bothered picking the bath mat up”.
See how a simple event can be viewed so differently? The truth is there's a bath mat on the floor. That's the truth. That's the fact. My belief wasn't the truth, his belief wasn't the truth,
but we both had different perspectives about the same event.
When you can bring in Accepting Alice and realise that we are all connected and that we are all entitled to our perspective, then you will have a much easier Change Journey. Because I guarantee you, that the people that piss you off in life, or the people that make you angry are the people to whom you have no acceptance of their values, or their beliefs or their perspective.
Which comes from a superiority complex. If I'm not going to accept you for who you are, then I actually must think that I'm better than you, because I think I'm right. So, if I think I'm right, and I'm better than you, I'm not going to accept who you are. Does that make sense? By the way this is done subconsciously and you wouldn’t be aware it’s happening.
In my coaching, I do a process called Shadow Values and we look at the parts of us that we don't really want to share with the rest of the world but we value it very, very highly. This is things like; attention, control, validation. None of these are things that you would go and say to people because it's a shadow value, it's the thing that you keep hidden, but you'll find that when you discover your shadow values, you will realise how much they drive your non-acceptance of other things and people.
One of my shadow values is superiority. I hate to admit it but I like to feel superior around other people. So I did an exercise recently where I listed down, all the people that were pissing me off. And I wrote their names and asked myself, why are they making me angry? It all came down to the fact that I lacked of acceptance of them because their perspective is different to mine, and because I have a shadow value of wanting to feel superior to them, I degrade their values and their beliefs, because they're different to mine. And that's not okay.
But I brought my awareness to this and I brought in my Accepting Alice and asked myself “why should I be judging them around what their beliefs are and what their perspective is?” because who makes me right? Nobody. I'm not right. And they’re not right either. There is no right or wrong, when it comes to different perspectives. Nobody has the truth. The truth is a fact. And it's not a fact that we look at without perspective.
So, if you're feeling angry and resentful to other people, I invite you to bring in your Accepting Alice and really have a look at it and say, what is it about them that is annoying me? Be honest with yourself and then bring in awareness and acceptance to release the negative feelings.
Then you have a choice to make… you can either let them go from your life, or you can choose to accept them the way they are. That's really the only two choices that you have. And if you can't accept them and if you can't get past the difference of beliefs and opinions and values, then it's time to let that person go, because you're going to move in a different direction anyway.
Accepting Alice is all about bringing peace into your world by really understanding that your perspective isn't right, that you can't force your perspective onto other people. It doesn't matter how much you shout, it doesn't matter how many posts you do on Facebook, you can't get somebody to change their mind, because they have their own perspective and their own beliefs around the same situation.
If you can grasp this concept, if you can really understand that you and your perspectives are not the same as everybody else, then you’ll have more peace, joy and happiness in your life.
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