Surrender Is What Is

Saturday, 07 August 2010 15:26 Written by Nirmala

Someone contacted me with the folowing question:

Seems to be a looming hopelessness in ever truly fulfilling this yearning of totally surrendering to the Beloved.

There is a giving up in resignation or a sense of what is the use -- like since I am not this body what is the use of taking care of it?

And here is my reply:

I would simply suggest that everything is unfolding naturally and normally. And within this unfolding, hopelessness is a valid perspective. However, I would invite you to check if there is truly an absence of any hope or expectation, or if there is a negative expectation or "negative hope" that things will not unfold completely. True hopelessness is a recognition that there is no need for hope or expectation of any sort since life itself brings every experience just as it is needed. It is hopeless for you to surrender only because you have already lost the struggle, life is already surrendering to itself. Everything is happening perfectly whether you struggle or not. At most, struggling delays things a bit and causes you to suffer, but it all works out anyways. So there is nothing you can do, nothing you need to do, and nothing you need to not do in order for surrender to happen. Surrender is not a prescription for you to follow, but a description of your true situation.

As for taking care of your physical body, I would suggest that while it ultimately does not matter if you do not take care of your body, it also does not matter if you do take very good care of it. If you are meant to experience health and well-being, then life will bring these experiences to you. And if your soul chooses to experience physical challenges or diseases in this lifetime, then these will arise. Whatever experience is needed will naturally arise. And part of this natural arising is all that you do or don't do to take care of your body. Again, if it truly does not matter, then it does not matter if you eat well, exercise and get healing support for your body, or if you don't. Holding the question this lightly allows deeper impulses and intuitions to guide you as you go. It will simply feel truer in each and every moment to take care of the body or not to take care of the body. And it will change moment to moment as life unfolds. Sometimes you will be moved to take very good care of the body, and sometimes you will be moved to just let it be.

Sometimes, when we experience hopelessness and the depths of knowing that there is ultimately nothing we can do to come to a full surrender to Being, we fall into the trap of thinking that therefore we should do nothing. But there is also no "non-doing" that we can "do" to make surrender happen. And it turns out that all of our doings and all of our non-doings are actually a part of the natural unfolding of life that already is always coming from the surrendered depth of our soul.

There was a scene in a Woody Allen movie where all of a sudden a UFO lands in front of him and some little green men come out. Woody's character runs up to them and says, "Thank God you're here! What is the meaning of life? Is there a God? Why are we here?" And the little green men reply, "These are the wrong questions." and fly away again in their UFO as Woody runs after them yelling, "Wait! What are the right questions?"

Sometimes the biggest question is not so much, "What should I do?" But instead, "What is happening right now? What is this like? How do I know what I am thinking, feeling or experiencing right now?" For instance, you might ask: What is it like to have no hope or expectation either way? How do I know I am hopeless? What is it like to have a body right now? How do I know that this is my body? What is true right now? What am I spontaneously doing already? What is already surrendered to Being right now?

This kind of inquiry is in between doing and non-doing. It is not totally passive and yet it is not really very active or effortful. It is giving space and curiosity to the unfolding of life that is already happening through you, around you and within you. You can do this as hope comes and goes, and as taking care of your body comes and goes. The real gift of this kind of questioning is not that it answers the more relative questions or what is right to do, but rather that it means you are paying attention when a bigger truth arises. If you are always asking, What is happening right now? then when a deep recognition of the Beloved arises, you notice that it is happening. What a treasure to be home when the Beloved comes for a visit!

Questions also do not make surrender happen, but they can show you that it is always here. Surrender is what is.

I hope this helps.

2 Comments

Our Inner Compass Is Always Working

Thursday, 05 August 2010 14:46 Written by Nirmala

I received another question about how the Heart is our true guide:

How do you determine which is more true right now? By the Heart? Or else experiment rationally and see which turns out best, but with that method you can never really know what the "best" outcome really would be so it's hard to evaluate the results.

So we've circled back to the Heart, but this brings up for me a question on "unconscious wounding". I've been reading lately about how certain childhood experiences result in "addiction to unhappiness", that is, the inner compass of what feels "right" is off. Self-sabotage and veering toward situations that don't serve occur. But the key point is that this is all a completely unconscious mechanism. If this state of affairs is true the Heart is off and you're really at sea without a compass. There may actually be an expansion, not just an emotional need or craving but a true expansion, toward situations such as, for example, caretaking others at the expense of your own needs.

Here is my reply:

The Heart can help you know what is most true right now. The truth gives an expanded, relaxed sense of self and also quiets the mind. I do not agree that the Heart can be wounded in a way that causes the inner compass to be off. I would suggest that even when there is an unconscious addiction to unhappiness, that the experience is still full of inner contraction and tension. The Heart is still showing you how true your addictions or compulsions are. So the true inner compass is still working, even if we are following a false compass like our fears or desires.

Of course, there usually is a way that we are rewarded for our addictive behavior with a pleasurable or comforting sensation or emotion, or a false sense of superiority, or some protection against our own self judgment, but that is not truly an expanded and easeful experience. I often say the truth is like when you have a roommate and they go away for a month....you can just relax and be yourself. The addictive and distorted defense mechanisms we learn never really give that sense that you can just be yourself and that is enough. Instead, they are like your roommate coming back and bringing his or her parents for a month long visit: we can't just relax and be. Even in our unconscious defense mechanisms we can never relax and just be, we always have to "keep up our defenses".

Consciousness itself has no preferences, so it always allows you to move into any experience including very contracted, confused defenses against the residue of our childhood wounding. Of course it is also always willing to consciously see the truth of our wounding and thereby start to heal it in a way that actually does allow an expansion and realization of our truer nature.

In response to your first question, when it comes to practical decisions and sorting through the many thoughts, feelings, intuitions, desires, longings and impulses of our daily life, there are limitations to how useful the Heart can be. That is because it ultimately does not matter that much what we decide and what we do each moment. Life has a way of getting us where we really need to be one way or the other, so if we miss one opportunity, we can always get there another way.

The real value of listening to your Heart moment to moment is not that it makes everything work out well and avoids all pitfalls and wrong turns, but that it means that we are listening when a profound truth arises. When we are touched by a deeper knowing, the Heart shows us how true the bigger truth is by softening and expanding to a striking degree. We can expand right out of our usual sense of "me." These bigger truths appear in our lives spontaneously and more often than we might realize, so it is a great gift when we are present and aware of them.

0 Comments

Loving How Hard It Is to Love

Tuesday, 27 July 2010 15:25 Written by Nirmala

Here is a dialogue I had with someone on Facebook:

Q: So what would you say in your experience is the most effective and simple way to open one's heart?

A: The simplest thing is to give love. Just give love to objects, sensations, your own body, the trees, the clouds, thoughts, feelings....whatever your awareness lands on now. You can read more about this in an article entitled Love Is For Giving here.

Q: Thanks. I will look at this. The idea of giving everything love is appealing and I understand it theoretically. To actually be able to do it is another story.

A: It helps if you strip love down to its essence which is awareness and space...or noticing and allowing. You do not have to like something to give it space to be here, and to notice what it is like. And at the same time you can give space and awareness to your not liking it. You can love not liking something!

Q: That sounds so hard. Ive tried things like that before but I lose my boundaries and start accepting things I shouldn't which only leads to conflict with myself and others. So I've never quite gotten how to do it.

A: There are two keys to this possibility of loving everything in awareness. One is to love whatever is present right now. So when it is hard to love, then it is important to simply love how hard it is. Again you can just allow and be curious about the experience of how hard it is. How do you know it is hard? What is that like in your body? If you were going to teach me how to make it hard for me to love something that is hard for you to love, what would you have to teach me to do?

The other key is to include everything that arises in your experience, especially including everything that arises within yourself. The problem with boundaries often occurs when we do not include our own feelings and preferences and discrimination. When you love these as much as you love the things arising in the world and in other people, then you can naturally act in a way that takes care of yourself as well as others. It is not that you completely avoid all conflict in this way. It is more that you are very present to any conflict or difficulty that appears, and so you both respond to it appropriately, and at the same time you open your heart and love it. Since life already has plenty of conflict in it, why not experience it with open loving awareness?

Surrender Is What Is

2 Comments

Our Inner Compass Is Always Working

0 Comments

Loving How Hard It Is to Love

3 Comments

More Articles...

~Satsang Blog Archive~