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  %DIFFERENT KINDS COERCIVE HEALTHY ACCEPTANCE LOVE 900213

     The kind of context in which we have a chance to grow
to  healthy maturity depends upon the kinds of  acceptance
which we enjoy or suffer.

     We may be accepted in coercive ways which do not give
us  a  chance  to  be true to ourselves.   A   bright  and
attractive  woman may be accepted only as a sexual  object
to be available for the use of men, but not as a scientist
with  whom men might comfortably collaborate in scientific
research and teaching.

     The  way in which others reject us and/or  accept  us
plays  a  major  role  in  defining  who  we  may  become;
especially if there is a consistent pattern in the ways in
which different people accept us. If we are always avoided
when  we are open and honest about our emotions,  we learn
to  live emotionally barren lives in which emotions  erupt
in senseless violence, if ever.

     We may be accepted only when we are not authentically
being our true selves;  and so be taught to be  dishonest.
Through selective acceptance we may become conformists who
always  do  what  is  expected,  who  lack  any  sense  of
creativity, and never take any meaningful initiatives.

     We  may be rejected whenever we are authentically our
true  selves;  and so taught to conceal our true identity.
Through  patterns  of rejection of  our  authentic  selves
others never get to know us; and eventually we come to the
point  where we do not know ourselves,  do not know who we
really are.

     We  may  be accepted only as actors in a  drama  over
which we have no control;  and over which the other actors
in  the  drama  have no independent  control,   all  being
victims of a drama without meaning. In such a tragic drama
everybody  does what everybody else expects in  a  violent
pattern of coercive expectation and coercive acceptance.

     Who  people are and how they grow and change are  not
objective  realities  which are determined  by  impersonal
facts  and  processes.  Neither are such  realities  fully
determined  by the will and actions of people  themselves.
Who  people are and how they grow and change are realities
which depend significantly upon the ways in which they are
accepted and rejected;  and upon the logic of those  ways.
The  logic  may  not be reasonable and may be  based  upon
false  perceptions;  and yet have the power to coerce  and
kill any spark of authenticity, creativity and initiative.

     People  are not objects and cannot be  understood  as
objects; objectively.  People grow to become who they are,
and change as they do change, in large part because of the
ways  in which they are accepted and rejected;  because of
the reasons perceived for their acceptance and  rejection.
The force of the acceptances and rejections resides in the
perceptions of them and their logic; not in intentions. It
is  not  objective  realities which  are  paramount,   but
perceptions  which  are paramount in how we  are  rejected
and/or accepted.
                                                                                                                               
                         (c) 2005 by Paul A. Smith in      
                    (On Being Yourself, Whole and Healthy)  
                                                                                                                               
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