“Accept what you can not change-change that which is unacceptable.”
Source: Warlord
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Jennifer Fallon 2
author 1959Related quotes
“Change what cannot be accepted and accept what cannot be changed.”
“Work and struggle and never accept an evil that you can change.”
“We must accept our pain
Change what we can
and laugh at the rest”
On his stage performances, including acts where he would crawl and roll on broken glass.
Rolling Stone interview (2003)
Context: As society has changed, what had formerly been unacceptable has become colorful, even the broken-glass thing. Although, you know, there's an archetypal element to that anyway.... It's about the blood... The Christians used that riff with Christ. What did Christ really do? He hung out with hard-drinking fishermen. And when they asked him, "Why are you hanging out with prostitutes and fishermen?" he said, "Because they need me." What a line, you know? But what your martial society really wants is blood. We need some blood. We need some suffering. Like, the individual must suffer for the good of the whole. I toy around with that. Early on, I wasn't looking at Jesus Christ, saying to myself, "What an angle." I wasn't trying to be Christ-y. But, after all, on one level, this is showbiz.
“We should not accept an evil we can change.”
Variant: Do not accept an evil you can change.
Source: We Were Liars
On the BBC Radio 4 series Politics in the Seventies (10 June 1973), quoted in The Times (11 June 1973), p. 3
1970s
Niebuhr's preferred form, as declared by his widow
The Serenity Prayer (c. 1942)
Variant: God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.