Nemo sua sorte contentus.

No one is content with his/her own lot in life.
(Anonymous)

(pron = nay-moh soo-ah sohr-tay kohn-tehn-toos)

Comment: What if I were to accept myself, in this moment, just the way that I
am? No “ifs” and “buts” allowed, since acceptance precludes both. I take a
breath. Here I am. This is how I am, right now, in this moment. My own
mental stance toward how I am right now in this moment sets me up for what I
will do with myself in the next moment.

If I do not accept myself in this moment, then, in the next moment, I have
become my own enemy.

Consider: I walk into a room, let’s say at work or at home, and the other person
in the room turns and looks at me and in one shot of verbage tells me that I am
unacceptable. In the next moment, this person and I have become instant
enemies. Hostility becomes the defining attitude of our relationship. From
now on, every time I see this person, my gut will rage with this hostility
because “he/she says I am unacceptable.”

We do this to ourselves every time we pass a mirror. Or, we have given up
passing mirrors altogether lest we run into our enemy. This is not some new
self-blame game. Most of us learned very early in life from parents and other
adults who were doing their best (even if it was crummy), that something about
us was not acceptable. We bought the message and have been repeating it to
ourselves every minute of every day since.

So, no one is content with his/her lot in life, largely I think, because on some
level we, as children, did not satisfy all the needs of our parents. Something
about us was "unacceptable", and we bought that package. What choice did we
have? We were children. Despite how it may sound, this is not an ugly
indictment of parents. I am just acknowledging the reality of that dynamic.
Parents do the best they can--I am completely convinced--and most of us as
parents were/are also needy human beings who did not heal all our wounds before
we had children of our own.

But, in the next moment, with the next breath, I can accept myself in this
moment just the way that I am. I can. It’s a choice. It can happen on the
next breath. And it will define the relationship I have with myself in the
next moment. And the next And the next.