Just to add a further note to my posting and your thoughts that
Personally, for me, I don't seek peace in that direct of a way or work/desire to come into a state of acceptance so much. Because that would end up with me manipulating my natural, spontaneous emotional response to an intensely triggering event.It seems like you can really relate to the dog you saw and it brings up a lot of pain you still have. I hope you and the dog find peace and acceptance.
Like with the pup, I have a long history engaging with the local shelter here, so I knew the likely plight of this innocent creature and when I saw him in dire circumstances yesterday I was torn...should I call the dog catcher and help him not get hit again? when that would highly likely mean a certain murder at the hands of the shelter director as pitbulls go right to the top of the kill list? should I call to him and try to guide him to safety if that might frighten and confuse him more? or not? should I not call the dog catcher and leave him alone when that would give him a chance at least to find his way back home? and could he...would he...survive the journey home and live? etc. And earlier in the day, right before I left on my walk, I had been stung by a bug when I tried to rescue it from a spider web that it flew into when I went out to throw away some trash and had invaded its space. So, I had a lot going on emotionally about how and when to intervene in terrible, no win seeming circumstances when I came upon the pitbull running in and out of traffic.
So, in that case, going into despair, alarm, confusion, terror, and feeling how I have no idea at all how God would want me to be in this set of circumstances...ie. what love would dictate? That is the place I longed to go...rather than into peace or acceptance. Because that event triggered other feelings. So, I trust those are the feelings God would want me to go into as deeply as I can now.
Some situations like the one at our local shelter, where thousands of cats and dogs are being killed each year, is an intense area where I have spent lots of time doing a range of things from trying to save them, to learning to love the people carrying out these things, to looking into my own emotions around having dogs and cats......to being hit full speed by a texting driver while walking a dog I had rescued when I should not have...to letting myself take a hike without going to the shelter to walk a dog when it's become an unloving demand I put on myself to do and so much more...so that is where I go...deep into a multitude of emotions. And, ironically, I do have a little more peace and acceptance around these issues, but not because I tried to get there...but, instead, just in proportion to how much I have been willing so far to feel all the other stuff in the face of terrible things. Like how my own mother left me in a crib crying day in and day out hoping desperately to be rescued (just like the pups plead to be picked and saved from death). And like how we deal as a community here in rural new mexico with the "overpopulation" of cats and dogs. It is really awful for these innocent ones. And I feel a lot of heartbreak about it still as I try to learn more from God how to be loving in the middle of world with things like this going on. Things that overwhelm me with sorrow. Like what to do, what not do, what I am responsible for, what I can't possibly hold myself responsible for and be loving to myself while doing (ie. feeling accountable to take care of the fallout of a bunch of other people's unloving choices that I had no way to stop or prevent)....and how I can help and be involved with the rebalancing of the animal kingdom and bring true love to domestic animals who are currently ensnared in all this fallout of our disowned emotions...and where the issues reside inside my own soul, etc.
I just thought to explain this a bit more because, even though I do feel your wanting to be kind in hoping I find peace and acceptance and thank you for that, I am also confident that diving deeply into the other end of the spectrum of emotions...into the "dark" ones is the way I will ultimately arrive there. By heading into the deep end of the pool....in the face of some of these terrible things going on in our world today, I feel a growing opening to connect with God. I am totally at a loss in this world in many ways and I know I need to go much deeper still...and each time I do go into the mucky feelings, I learn more about the things that confuse me.
I think it helps to give ourselves the space for that. And that it's essential. Regardless of how unevolved I might look sometimes! Not that I feel you are saying that...but that many times in the new age thinking of the day, we are shuttled toward the more spiritually evolved looking emotions as the end goal.
Even though I resist a lot of my emotions still from my childhood...I totally go into all the mucky feelings when I can...more and more...and there's nothing like the Law of Attraction to pull me right into them if I am willing.
Love,
Moti