This is http://www.essayz.com/a8811241.htm Previous-Essay <== This-Essay ==> Following-Essay Click HERE on this line to find essays via Your-Key-Words. {Most frequent wordstarts of each essay will be put here.} ========================================================== %GOD GROUNDS FOR SELF ACCEPTANCE ESTEEM CONFIDENCE 881124 It is dangerous to accept any but God's ground for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence or self pride. God accepts the creatures whom She conceives, and esteems them with Her own self confidence and pride. Only on this ground can creatures properly accept themselves with secure esteem, confidence and pride. When absent from God, creatures become confused. In the absence of God many creatures choose their own grounds for self acceptance, and thereby lose touch with God as the ground of their being. In the absence of God they fail to be who God made them to be with integrity. They disintegrate. Too often God's creatures become confused regarding the proper grounds for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride. God's creatures leave God's presence and become confused. In God's absence they come to believe that the proper grounds for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride are their own personal accomplishments, possessions, powers, attributes, perfections, beliefs and convictions. Such beliefs are misleading. They lead to personal disintegration; and to the loss of personal and communal integrity. People who do not honestly practice the presence of God become overly concerned with being accepted by each other who is not practicing the presence of God. They work themselves to death trying to become accepted by each other who is also working themselves to death in futile efforts to merit each alienated other's acceptance. In the presence of others who are practicing the presence of God each person may relax in the secure confidence that each person is grounded in God's grounds for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride. All persons can then with confidence be all together with self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride which are properly grounded. All humans may be together in God's presence and enjoy personal and communal security in vulnerable intimate relationships which are grounded in God's being the supreme Lover who accepts Her own conceptions with pride. When not in the presence of God, humans are prone to focus their attention upon human rejections and the possibilities of being rejected. When not consciously in God's presence there is a tendency to become focused upon the possible grounds for rejection and the fear of being rejected. This leads to alienation and disintegration. People are too often prone to try to achieve some human ground for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence or self pride. Such human grounds are paired with human grounds for rejection, and cannot be separated from them. Thus, human efforts to achieve acceptability lead to rejections, excommunication, alienation, and disintegration. God's Love is the only proper ground for human self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride. Insecure people often try to achieve security. Attempts to achieve a secure human ground for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride are futile attempts. That ground is God. God cannot be achieved. God's Love may be accepted. God does not exist to be understood, predicted or controlled. Attempts to understand, predict and control God lead to human frustration and disintegration. God does not exist to be a tool in human hands. Humans are creatures of and can be fulfilled in God's Love. God is not a means to be used by humans in trying to achieve human grounds for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride. However, God is the proper ground for self acceptance, self esteem, self- confidence and self pride. People who are not honestly practicing the presence of God lose their ground of being-with-integrity and find that that ground cannot be achieved. However, the ground of being-with-integrity is God and, may be accepted as a gift of Love. The gift cannot be achieved. It may be accepted. The ground of being-with-integrity is not an achievement or a possession. The ground of being-with- integrity is God. God cannot be achieved. The ground of being-with-integrity cannot be controlled as a means to self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence or self pride. God will not be used as a means to any human goal. God is not a tool to be used by humans for any purpose. God is not a fix. However, God may be accepted as the human goal; the only proper ground for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride. God does not exist to be understood, manipulated or controlled by human beings. Humans can not understand, manipulate or control God. Humans cannot find their fulfillment in trying to understand, manipulate or control God. However, in God's presence humans can find the only proper ground for self acceptance, self esteem, self confidence and self pride; but the ground cannot be found in the absence of God's presence, for it is God's presence. God's presence cannot be understood, manipulated or controlled by any human means, procedure, ritual, institution, technology, system, beliefs or convictions. God's presence is a not a human tool or otherwise the means to any human goal. However, in God's presence all human desires may be met and fulfilled with integrity. (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy) ==========================================================