> So I need to learn to accept myself....hm...isn't that some kind of 'changing' too? If I'm non-accepting of myself and I want to CHANGE that....

yeah it is kinda.

lets take something... smoking. lets say people are giving you a hard time about smoking. you can

1) accept your smoking (so you don't feel so bad about people giving you a hard time)
2) change your smoking (so people stop giving you a hard time)

yeah, acceptance IS change if one has never been accepted before...

but accepting behaviours often means that one behaves according to the status quo (behaviour does not change) though of course accepting (where one didn't before) is indeed an attitudinal change.

(people often resort to paradoxes when trying to describe meditation strategies and i'm very sceptical of the utility of resorting to paradox. introduce a distinction (attitude vs behaviour) and ta da! no more paradox)

;-)