Where Acceptance Meets Action

There are moments when life hands us something we didn’t ask for. A shocking turn of events, a disappointment, a door we thought would stay open.

Our first instinct is to resist it, make it make sense, or look for someone or something to blame.

I’ve done that plenty of times. It’s part of being human. The mind wants stability, a plan, a reason. But not everything can be fixed or forced to go our way.

When frustration shows up, I still feel my body tighten, my chest clench, that familiar flame rising from my gut. But now I notice it sooner. When I’m ready to let it go, I take a slow breath, release the tension, and accept what’s right in front of me.

The Three Gifts

Sometimes acceptance isn’t enough on its own.

That’s when I turn to what Shirzad Chamine calls the Three Gifts technique in Positive Intelligence®. It’s the practice of imagining at least three ways a difficult situation could eventually become something good.

The gift might show up quickly or years later. It might look like a lesson, a boundary, or simply being able to let something go without regret. What matters is training the mind to look for possibility instead of proof that everything has gone wrong.

I’ve seen this in my own life: job losses that freed me from toxic environments, the loss of my parents reminding me how precious time really is, even a recent ankle injury that slowed me down just enough to notice how much I take movement for granted.

Each one started as something I wanted to resist, but all of them eventually revealed a gift.

Letting the Gift Reveal Itself

We may not see it right away, and sometimes it can feel impossible to imagine, but almost every experience holds a gift.

When we stop resisting, we make space for it to reveal itself in time.

Mini Practice

When you notice yourself tensing against what’s happening, pause.
Feel your feet on the ground and your breath moving in and out. Then ask yourself:

Can I accept this for now?
If not, is there a small way to turn this into something good, a lesson, a boundary, an act of kindness, a shift in focus?

💛

Reflection Question: What’s one situation in your life right now that might hold a gift you haven’t yet seen?

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