To me accepting reality in this context just means acting and thinking accordingly about the people involved. My mother is extremely oppositional. Left is right and up is down, if that's what it takes so she can talk down to people or tell them what to do or otherwise try to put others 'in their place'. The result for me is that I ignore most of what she says and don't take her very seriously.

I remember one time years ago (not even sure why this particular memory has stuck with me), I was making a grilled cheese sandwich, and she insisted that everything I was doing was wrong. She kept ordering me to adjust the stove flame setting, and it was always not enough (one way or the other), and I finally just started ignoring her. She'd tell me to adjust it, and I'd just ignore her and keep doing my thing. She finally shut up and was in a snit of a mood about it, but oh well. Then I enjoyed my sandwich. I guess the moral of the story is ignore annoying people and do what you've gotta do. Enjoy your sandwich.