Acceptance of Health Challenges Empowers you Transform Chronic Health Issues

One of the frequent things I see in my practice is the beauty of transformation when clients accept change in their lives.

Acceptance doesn’t mean giving up or compromising. Acceptance means living one’s life in accordance with the realities that experience is presenting.

It means accepting that our bodies are changing in some ways, and that these changes create new spiritual lessons as we learn to adapt. For example, the acceptance of diabetes means that one embraces the tools necessary to manage the glucose levels, such as dietary changes, the correct types of exercise and management of stress, along with proper medications and herbs.

One of my clients is a shining example of acceptance.

When he was diagnosed with cancer, he made the decision to reduce stress in his life by embracing early retirement, changed his diet, integrated qi gong and also integrated traditional western therapies of radiation and other medications along with herbs. He also surrounded himself with positive support and let go of relationships that were not serving his life well. Thus, cancer was the wake-up call to start a new life. He is now living a cancer-free life that is more vibrant and balanced than the life that he had prior to the diagnosis of cancer.

Often times there are emotional challenges or pressures associated with change. For instance, the journey of cancer or any chronic condition can create a myriad of feelings beyond just the physical discomforts and challenges of dealing with a chronic illness. Some of these emotional feelings might include:

*A sense of losing control over the life.

*Grief over the loss of parts of the physical self that represent our sexuality (such as the loss of breasts or prostate after cancer surgery).

*Grief over the loss of the life one once knew and lived.

*Anxiety and fear around whether one can regain health.

It is important to acknowledge and process these very real feelings as the emotional work is also a part of recovery and effective management of any chronic or serious health issue.

One indicator of the need to process the emotional aspects of experience is insomnia.

Insomnia can often arise to signal us that we may need to change how we are moving through challenging experiences, be it physical, mental, or spiritual demands on our lives. When we cannot get adequate rest, it becomes difficult to heal because rest is a critical part of restoring and rejuvenating ourselves at a cellular level. Also, sleep nourishes the “hun,” the more benevolent parts of our spirit that allow us to be open, compassionate and empathic with others.

Thus, insomnia can be an important indicator that we may need to slow down in our lives and develop a practice of meditation, integrate more regular exercise, and also change what we take into our bodies. Usually, when these three aspects of living, meditation, exercise, and diet, are incorporated into the life, insomnia improves, the body rests, and deeper healing occurs across emotions, physical and spiritual aspects of self.

Shifts in paradigms and beliefs are also an important part of accepting challenge and change.

Many of us get into the comfort zones of routines and in doing so, we may refuse to see that change is occurring within and around us. Some people hold a belief is that if changes are ignored, challenges will naturally resolve themselves. Sometimes this is true, but often times, if changes are ignored, stressors become magnified and snowball to create even more challenges. Ostriching rarely is healthy or a helpful strategy. Yet, if we acknowledge and address changes proactively, we can develop positive strategies to help us adapt and even grow stronger through change.

For instance, when we age, our bodies naturally go through changes in terms of our level of immunity, mental energies and physical stamina. Once we might have been immune to common colds and viruses, but now find ourselves getting ill more frequently. Once we might have been able to deal with many stressors at work or at home, but now find that such experiences now evoke irritability, a sense of being overwhelmed, anger, or sadness. Similarly, we might also experience a decrease of physical stamina. Once we might have been able to push through injuries and discomforts and keep going, but now we find that injuries linger and fatigue might occur quickly.

By ignoring these changes, we may fail to use the opportunity to reevaluate diet, medical care, exercise and how we are managing stress so that we can maintain optimal health through all stages of life.

It is important to let go of the idea that what worked for us a year ago or even six months ago, will work for us in the current moment in the same way because we are ever-changing and not the same as we were six months ago or a year ago. We have to look at how we have changed and adapt by adopting new ways of approaching our health, relationships, work, and other activities in our lives.