Surrender. Ugh. Just saying the word makes us shudder. We conjure up pictures of white flags waving and distraught people with their arms raised, fearfully walking toward the enemy. But is that what surrender is all about?
Hell no. We’ve got it all wrong.
Surrender is a deeply spiritual PRACTICE. I say practice because just when you think you’ve surrendered to a situation, you realize you’re still holding on, white-knuckled. Surrender isn’t giving up, it’s letting go, trusting in and allowing the energy that created you, to orchestrate things in your highest and best good. Especially when you can’t fathom why something happened. Or when you’re stuck in an endless, immovable and often unfair situation that gives you no way out and no answers. Surrender goes deep. And if you don’t believe me, just ask Life to show you. Because it will.
I started my journey of surrender, letting go and acceptance back in 2007. I had been reading, meditating and “waking up” for a few years previous and I guess the Universe felt it was time for me to actually experience what I had been learning about. I remember reading about the concept of “dying to self” in Eckhart Tolle’s book The Power of Now, which is the process of letting go of attachments to things and people before actually transitioning. And so, eager little me said to the Universe, “please help me die to self before I die.”
Be careful what you ask for. 😉
Late November, 2007, I lost my home in the early morning hours to the second largest wildfire in San Diego history. And if it wasn’t enough to lose every physical thing I ever had (including family heirlooms, all of my daughter’s stuff and my entire business), two months later, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I asked and I received.
And the lessons on surrender, letting go and acceptance began.
I didn’t do so well at first. I was angry at God. How could I have felt so aligned with the Divine and then, this? My daughter had lost her home with her dad in San Diego’s largest wildfire 4 years prior to our fire. I never imagined in a million years we would lose everything, and although the entire county was on fire, I believed the newscasters when they said our neighborhood wasn’t in immediate danger. I told my kid not to worry, that we would be ok. I didn’t know the winds would kick up to 100 mph, keeping choppers out of the sky. I didn’t know that downed power lines would join with the fire and take out our entire neighborhood, with 10 minutes to escape. It was a perfect storm.
And it was perfect for me. I bought a beautiful rock plaque that sits on my fireplace today. It says “learn to let go.” And 13 years later, after 2 failed relationships, difficulty starting a new business, several moves, losing my pets and both of my parents, falling severely ill for an entire year to neuro-Lyme disease, and relocating to be with the love of my life (who is in an abusive, year and a half-long divorce battle), I’m getting a little better. But I’m still not there.
So what can you do to have more success with surrender, letting go and acceptance?
Well,
first of all, know this; if you fervently resist every single
difficulty that comes your way, I promise that life will continue to
challenge you until you begin to soften. And after that, you’ll still
be challenged because that’s a big part of life and growth. But the
difference is, as you begin to surrender, let go and accept more, you’ll
stop reacting and start moving into allowing and flow with greater ease
and speed.
Surrender isn’t the first thing we do when we’re hit with a
challenge or crisis. If you’re having difficulties in your marriage,
with a child, at work or an everyday human problem, you resist. You
generally focus on the bad and the pain of it all. Our primal instinct
is to protect ourselves or shield ourselves from pain. And then,
there’s the typical urge to lash out and blame others, get frustrated,
angry or depressed. Sometimes we get stuck there and at some point, we
reach out for help or look for solutions (we use our brains and
resources). We react, struggle, suffer, hold onto and fight our way
through the process.
And if you get hit with something really big like having to
take care of a dying parent, an injured or ill child, having someone
close to you, murdered, getting hit by a natural disaster or devastating
illness, then surrender, acceptance and letting go are a part of a very
difficult and lengthy process.
SO, how do we DO it?
#1 – When life hits and you’re stunned by it, ALLOW the reactions and
feelings to come up. When I fell extremely ill and almost died this
past year, I was really put to the test. I was in disbelief. I got
very angry at God. I was so sick I wanted to die. I asked God to heal
me or take me. I was a victim without any faith. It took me months to
come to terms with my feelings and situation. I was ashamed and scared.
I did alot of screaming, crying and soul searching in my dark night of
the soul. So, honor your human moments of grief, guilt, anger, shock
and even blame and allow yourself the time you need to process the
initial jolt of the experience.
#2 – ALWAYS have support. ASK for help. In any tough situation, you
need a best friend, colleague, or counselor to hold your hand, love
you, listen to you and accept you. My Joe, sister, daughter and doctor
were my life lines. I had several long-distance friends also supporting
me. Without them I wouldn’t have made it through the darkest days of my
life. I’d say call upon your angels and guides if you can, but in the
early months of my dis-ease, I felt abandoned by mine. It’s ok to
wrestle with things like that; it’s part of the process. You also need
someone who can shift your perspective on things so you can pull out of
fear and see things with more clarity.
#3 – Have a TOOLKIT of processes and a PLAN of ACTION. All of the
years of meditation, energy work, clearing and studying served me well.
I pulled out the stops. On my worst days when I couldn’t see, function
or leave the house, I wrote affirmations on sticky notes and put them
all over my walls and ceiling. I created a huge vision board on my wall
for the future. I had sessions with practitioners for tapping,
emotional releasing, energy and spiritual healing and more. I did
energy work every day. I forced myself to get up and repeat positive
sayings, I danced and listened to Jason Mraz all day long to try and get
my vibes up. I bought weird devices and took all kinds of vitamins,
herbs and even changed my diet! I did whatever it took to get me
through every second of every hellish day.
#4 – TAP into your inner fire. We humans are miraculous. In the
midst of trauma, even when we feel like we’re sinking into the deepest
pits of despair and hell, we can come into an alignment with who we
really are. I imagine this also happens when we start the process of
physical death. My mother was the most beautiful, powerful and
courageous I had ever seen her in her final days. We are also built for
survival. There’s a fire inside of us that fuels us and fights to live
and win. Look for it. Feel it. Embrace it. Learn from it. Grow
from it.
#5 – SURRENDER is a long process. It happens little by little. It
happens over time and through many challenges. We can only chip away at
it but each time we do, we begin to loosen our grip on “clinging on for
dear life.” Each difficult experience begins to soften and refine us.
Breathe into surrender. Ask the Divine to help you. Feel your body
relax. Ask yourself what it would feel like to fall back into the arms
of the Divine. What it would feel like to trust a power you can’t even
see. To truly give into the gifts and lessons that life has for you in
each moment. You’ll be met with resistance at first, but what does it
hurt to try it? To play with it and see what it would feel like gets
you more used to saying YES to the powerful process of surrendering to
Source.
#6- LETTING GO is the same as surrender. See yourself loosening the
“white-knuckled grip” you have on yourself, your beliefs, thoughts,
perceptions and judgments. Let go of what others might think of you.
Let go of trying to control others, situations and outcomes. Let go of
expectations. Let go and let God, as the saying goes. This is
also a process. Take time every day to sit quietly and again,
visualize yourself letting go of whatever you’re holding onto. Ask
yourself (or journal) why you feel the need to control and hang onto
this. What purpose does it serve? Does it make you feel safe? Is
letting go scary because it’s unknown? I love doing a process where I
close my eyes, seeing myself floating freely up and into the sky and
then, space, with arms open wide and without any fear. I allow feelings
to come up and then, float past them. Actively practice processes like
this to feel what letting go might be like. It’s so relaxing and
calming!
#7 – ACCEPTANCE is really just making peace with what was, what is
and what will be. What is, is what is, or it wouldn’t BE in that
moment. And what was, was necessary for us to become all we’re here to
be. I remember my last year filled with so much regret and remorse,
wishing I would’ve known I was harboring Lyme disease in my body for an
entire lifetime and wishing that others knew, too, so I wouldn’t have
constantly been called a hypochondriac. I wished I could do my life
over. I wished I wouldn’t have been married to a brutal
narcissist/sociopath; that I would’ve been more conscious and a better
mother so my daughter wouldn’t have had to suffer. I sometimes wished I
hadn’t been brought together with my Joe. Even though the
synchronicities and Divine orchestration were unmistakable and
miraculous, and our love is deep and true, our awakening and union has
caused so much pain for ourselves and others. And, our choice to be
together created a few haters, who continue to write carefully crafted
stories about what they think happened, when in fact, they know nothing
about what’s real and true. So many things can hurt us deep down to our
souls if we allow them to and I believe this is due to non-acceptance of
self and our choices. But in reality, our self-criticism and judgment
is worse than anything anyone could ever say or do to us. ACCEPTANCE is
again, a process of loving and honoring one’s self and truth no matter
what. ALLOWING what IS or WAS to just BE without examining, pushing
against or wishing it to be different.
All there IS in life is CHANGE. If you’re stuck in a difficult
situation, find a way through it, no matter what. Make peace with it
the best you can. Work on surrender, letting go and accepting, knowing
that the process is a gift, leading to a stronger, more compassionate,
loving, perceptive, connected YOU. And knowing that your journey will
support others when they have a similar experience.
And remember, life is ALWAYS happening FOR you, not to you. We are
not victims of fate. There are things that happen that we cannot
control (like the day we die) but I’ve experienced too many
synchronicities and seen too many signs and coincidences to believe that
I’m just randomly here and that things bad things just happen. I
believe our time on earth is a time of learning and growing (or not).
We get to choose. So choose to SEE the gifts, even in the hardest, most
painful lessons. Ultimately, this entire LIFE that we cling to is an
illusion. We CAME FROM somewhere, we’re HERE NOW and we’ll GO BACK TO
somewhere when we’re complete. Just living this life, just coming to
this planet is all about surrender. We were created in our mother’s
wombs and birthed through a tiny canal. We survived. We live on a ball
that spins in outer space and is part of a giant Universe. Think about
THAT next time you’re hanging on for dear life, trying to control
something or someone. You’ve never had control yet, you’ve always being
held. Hang onto THAT and surrender will become much easier. You are
SO LOVED.
