truth, not force

love love love this:

http://www.urbanmonk.net/135/love-sorrow-and-attachment/ :

"Love and Improvement

Recently I was reading another blog on personal development. It was a long, complicated post on reconciling the conflict between self-acceptance and self-improvement. And that issue has been raised in many other places before – “How can you love and accept yourself exactly as you are and still want to improve yourself?”

My question is: How can you not?

Have you ever seen a man who is in love with his car? He spends hours polishing it, waxing it, tinkering with the engine. Have you ever seen a woman and her infant? Does she leave it alone, simply because it is perfect as it is? No. The baby is perfect to her and yet she wants the best for it. She cuddles it, kisses it, feeds it, and plans for its future. Where is the conflict?

And, I beg you, think of the opposite. How many self-improvement projects stem from a lack of self-acceptance and self-love? How many of us meditate, work out, volunteer at a charity, go looking for a lover, drive ourselves to earn more – to fill a deep sense of “not enough”?

First, know Love. And from there, let everything else flow."

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Geneen Roth: "Truth, not force, does the work "