bosporus
1. The unspeakably pleasant weather outside must be putting everyone in a good mood. Today at Panera the cashier spontaneously decided she’d give me the cookie I was buying for free. It was quite the munificent gesture.
2. I think I’m going to start using my Gmail account as my primary e-mail service. Lycos has been great but after 4-odd years and only 25M of space, it’s reaching the end of its service life. Time to step it up. My Gmail address is the same prefix as my current address with “@gmail.com” tacked on the end. I’ll update all the references I can.
3. Night flight this evening. It will be a break from the routine in not only that aspect, but also in that it will be my first dual time in fully two weeks. Yes, I had that stage check two Mondays ago, but since there was no instruction, only evaluation, I might as well have been solo. I’ll see if I can’t snag some pictures tonight.
4. Obligatory pretentious philosophization: Have you ever thought about the connection between acceptance and understanding, specifically from the standpoint of relationships? This subject ran through my head on the way home from work a week or two ago and Elizabeth and I speculated about it further returning from the ski trip last Saturday.
I arrived at the subject thusly: Pulling out of the parking lot after a particularly long day, I breathed sighs of relief and decompression, and in doing so just muttered random thoughts and phrases as I am wont to do occasionally. Song lyrics, bits of conversation from the day, etc. That particular evening I thought about the concept of understanding, and I said, flatly, “Everybody just wants to be understood.” But as soon as I said that I thought about a similar universally-held desire, acceptance, that I had heard referenced in more contexts than my own mind. In other words, it’s more common knowledge that we all want to be accepted by our family, peers and so on. It’s mentioned in certain circles as a driving force in our social development years and beyond–the shifting of allegiance from our parents to our peer group, the overwhelming desire to fit in, i.e. to be accepted. And it pushes past that–think about your own social motivations. I’d wager much of what you do (and I do) can be traced back to the root desire for acceptance; add whatever trappings you will on top.
So I had these two core social desires, understanding and acceptance. I started to think about the two, and this is where Elizabeth and I hashed over the subject on Saturday evening in the car. We talked about the relative importance of the two, and decided that acceptance is certainly a more universally-recognized desire, but for those of us familiar with the concept of a deep understanding, the latter becomes almost equally important, certainly in a romantic relationship. Could a relationship exist without one or the other? I can certainly think of instances in which acceptance was present without a fundamental understanding. Many heterogeneous friend groups are like that. We recognize each others’ backgrounds but push through those to accept one another. The unconditional love of a parent is like that too. My father doesn’t understand me in lots of ways but I know he loves and accepts me. But can understanding exist without acceptance? Can you understand someone’s drives and desires and not welcome them into your social circle? That’s a fair question and one much harder to procure an example for. Any thoughts?
5. My car really, really really needs a bath. And a tuneup. It’s disgusting. Both. Equally.
1. It’s still a great day out. Is it this beautiful in K-Ville?
5. A wash is in the cards for this weekend, provided it doesn’t rain. The rims in particular need a good scrubbing. Yay scouring pads :)
can you have true acceptance without true understanding? once you really understand someone, and then you still accept them, that’s the ultimate. you can accept someone, but if you don’t really understand all that you accept, its not something of any depth; its not really all that special and doesn’t really make you feel warm all over like it should… sort of like when people say they like cars or sports, or whatever. they might like it, but unless they’ve taken a car apart and put it together, trained for an athletic event or done the intense version of something, they can’t really understand it, so their “acceptance” is somewhat superficial and not worth as much. now, if someone who had a horrendous experience with an engine swap or ran a marathon and killed their shins, and the person still liked the associated activity… then you have the proof of true acceptance based on a true understanding, even iof the really bad stuff. that person really “understands” and “accepts” and so loves that thing.. i think that’s all a basis for true love. so, back to my point: true acceptance worth something deep and valuable (something that would be a basic desire, something we long for, like in romantic relationships) only comes after true understanding (which, yes, has to have a certain amount of acceptance before they ever get to that true understanding part. no one who doesn’t at least like physical activity is going to start training for a marathon…but you get the point?)
okay. i’m done. thank you and have a nice night.
I think I would have to disagree to some extent. Whereas I do feel a deep understanding of at least a few areas is ideal, I don’t think it is necessary. I think it is essential that we are able to be accepting without understanding and in that acceptance show the love of Christ. I have a number of friends that I accept as they are, love them for who they are, but don’t understand them in the sense that I’ve been through what they’ve gone through in their lives. If I waited until I found people who’ve had similar life experiences as I have I’d probably be strapped for friends!!!
I think acceptance brings about a relationship to a certain level. And after that point you get to learn more about a person… you find out their quirks… you discover what really makes them tick… there’s a sharedness there and with that comes the understanding that, in my opinion, is desired. When I try and capture a time when I felt an understanding like Matt’s talking about I fall back to my roommate in college. By the end of our four years, she and I could almost have whole conversations without talking. There would be a pointing out of something, a look, a giggle, a nudge, another laugh, maybe a snort… There was a deep connection there that came from time more than “the past” but if we hadn’t accepted each other “as is” before hand neither of us would have allowed it to happen.
I suppose my point is that true acceptance yields a yearning for deeper understanding, but understanding in and of itself does not guarantee acceptance at any level. For example… I talk a lot. I would definitely need someone to accept that about me in order for us to be friends. Once they have accepted me and love me for the wonderfully chatty person I am (!), then they may or may not desire to understand why I am that way. And, at the same time, I think I would want someone, especially a “significant other,” to understand why I am the way I am. BUT there have been people in my life who understand why I act the way I do, but they can’t accept it.
I think it takes a truly delicate balance of the two to genuinely make a relationship go from friendship to that of a romantic persuasion, but, in my humble opinion, I think at least a moderately high acceptance is a key first step.