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Self-acceptance
from Superconsciousness by Swami Kriyananda
direct disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda
The first attitude fundamental to “centering” is self-acceptance. You are who you are. Make the best of it, and envy no one for what he or she is. Don’t draw comparisons between you and others: Encourage yourself, rather, in your efforts to attain your own highest potential.
Self-acceptance will come progressively as you try to live up to the highest that is in you. Unless you are already in superconsciousness, you cannot but recognize the fact that an inner conflict exists between your soul’s call to the heights, and the siren call of temptation to the depths. You can’t laugh off soul-longing, though you may try.
True conscience is innate. It is the silent voice of the soul. To achieve self-acceptance, you must be clear in your true conscience. Such clarity comes only when we accept that our higher Self is our eternal reality.
Needless to say, one doesn’t achieve this degree of self-acceptance in a single leap. So long as you sincerely resist your lower impulses, and strive toward your own inner heights, your conscience will be reasonably clear, and you will find yourself able to achieve that measure of emotional and psychic relaxation without which it is not possible to find rest at one’s center.
Self-acceptance makes it possible for one to view others also in their own higher nature, and to accept that potential as their own reality. Only from within will it ever be possible for you to know others truly. When you relate to their center from your own, you will find that they, too, respond to you from that center in themselves. Soul speaks to soul, and recognizes itself in an infinity of manifestations. This was what Jesus meant by the words “Love thy neighbor as thyself.”
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Ananda is located in the tranquil hills of Umbria, Italy on “Strada Statale 444” between Assisi and Gualdo Tadino. It is the largest retreat center in Europe for Yogananda’s teachings.
Ananda Associazione • Via Montecchio, 61 • I-06025 Nocera Umbra (PG) • ITALY