Let go and Let God - The Challenge of Spiritual Surrender
The importance of spiritual surrender on the path of awakening and self-realization is integral to most teachings but the actual practice of letting go and trusting the universe to support you is certainly easier said than done.
Being in the flow of the river, actually letting the river carry you, rather than hanging on to the sides of life, waiting for the flow to stop, is something I have struggled with all my life.
I have been like the fella who falls off a cliff and catches himself by one thin vine. He's hanging off the cliff now with no way to get back up. "Help!" he yells. "Is there anybody up there?"
After a tense moment, he hears a voice, the voice of God beside him in thin air, saying "I'm here. Let go".
The terrified man pauses then yells again...."Is there anybody ELSE up there?"
It isn't that I haven't gotten answers; sometimes it's that the answers so often seem so outrageous that I hesitated until the door of invitation closed. Anyone else up there, indeed. Other times, the answer is one step of many when I'm expected to be Spirited to the end destination in one fine leap. Taking one step, when the next step is no where to be seen, is often difficult for me. I want to know there's a next step and what it will involve.
Despite it being a challenge to let go and let God at such times, I'm always blessed when I'm able to do so. There have been times when I surrendered out of sheer exhaustion. Whatever brings me to that letting go is a blessing but those times leave a mark on the vitality of the body system so I'd rather get there through intent and joy.
Sometimes, I get glimpses of what life might be like if I lived in a state of spiritual surrender instead of resorting to that when my back is against the wall and, like the man hanging off the cliff, sometimes not even then. If there is a natural flow to life, and I believe there is, what would it be like to be in that flow all the time?
