Acceptance?

Sitting here on the cliffs of the glorious Sussex coastline I’m beginning to learn about recovery and acceptance. For a long time, my focus has been to get well, to get back to who I was and how I was, to shake off the hindrance of lingering brain injury symptoms. But like the clifftop walk, the walk of recovery has many ups and downs, sometimes the sun is out and I’m filled with hope, but there are also the lows when the clouds are looking ominous and the sky seems to darken. But the path of recovery, I’m discovering, is as much if not more about the journey than the destination. 

I’m watching the sun as it breaks through the clouds and at times it highlights different parts of the bright white cliff face or the shingle of the beach or the pale blue of the sea. This journey has been one of so much learning for me, as things about myself and about health and recovery have been highlighted to me, different insights at different stages along the way.

So now after more than 11 months, I feel able to walk the ups and downs, to go at the slower pace, and not go so far. That’s okay. I’m not pushing so hard for the destination now, as I’m present in the journey. For a long time the word acceptance made me angry, because I didn’t want to accept all of this. But I think where I am now could probably be called acceptance. And it’s good.