No matter where you go, if you run into a spiritual master you will receive the instruction in some way to let go. This is interesting. It is surprisingly difficult. Most everything that is really good to let go of feels a little like letting go of the branch not knowing how far you will fall. Letting go feels like falling backwards, trusting that someone will catch you.
Or another picture, I was a diver in my young days. I learned the half and full gainer. These dives are especially difficult for two reasons. The first is this fall backwards thing. In this dive you give up your vision at a critical moment as you thrust yourself backwards. When you are flat on your back out over the water, the trust is in momentum and energy to do what they do and keep you going in your flip. The second is trusting in another part of the momentum, that of your approach. As you leave the board you are flipping back toward the board. If you don't have forward momentum, you will hit the board. Hmmm. I learned a whole bunch about doing my job and letting go as I learned these dives.
I wish it was that easy emotionally and spiritually. Heh.
A Typical Lesson
This is really tough.
You say I'm in a foolish
Argument. I say
I exist. That's wrong.
I say then I don't. You say
I'm still wrong headed.
Why should I trust this?
You say I don't have to do
Anything. That's when
I go ballistic
But I won't let go my hold.
Then you say let go.
February 11, 2009 3:40 PM
Contraction
1 week ago
This one hits home although I know it was not for me. Thanks for the momentum
ReplyDeleteLinda
Letting go is the hardest part, especially when the fall is into the unknown.
ReplyDeleteTo "let go" does not mean to stop caring, it means I can't do it for someone else.
ReplyDeleteTo "let go" is not to cut myself off, it's the realization I can't control another.
To "let go" is not to enable, but to allow learning from natural consequences.
To "let go" is to admit powerlessness, which means the outcome is not in my hands.
To "let go" is not to try to change or blame another, it's to make the most of myself.
To "let go" is not to care for, but to care about.
To "let go" is not to fix, but to be supportive.
To "let go" is not to judge, but to allow another to be a human being.
To "let go" is not to be in the middle arranging the outcomes, but to allow others to affect their own destinies.
To "let go" is not to be protective, it's to permit another to face reality.
To "let go" is not to deny, but to accept.
To "let go" it not to nag, scold or argue, but instead to search out my own shortcomings, and correct them.
To "let go" is not to adjust everything to my desires but to take each day as it comes, and cherish myself in it.
To "let go" is not to criticize and regulate anybody but to try to become what I dream I can be.
To "let go" is not to regret the past, but to grow and live for the future.
To "let go" is to fear less, and love more.
Christopher, I found this 'poem' in a book: "Codependency: Breaking Free from the Hurt and Manipulation of Dysfunctional Relationships" by Pat Springle many years ago and have carried it around with me in my billfold ever since. The wisdom it contains is priceless. Great post. Blessings!
Oh my, falling backward. One of my worst fears. One of my only nightmares. And then right behind you use the word trust. Oh my. Years ago I attended a week training where I climbed to the top of a telephone pole and stood up and then jumped to the next place, of course in a harness. One of the things that became clear to me at that place was how much I did not trust, I could not fall backward from a platform on high into the waiting arms of my team members who were strangers to me. I "failed" that test but it in fact was good for me.
ReplyDeletehi christopher!!!
ReplyDeletei like Marion's poem also
sometimes...
in the midst
of a dive
i can totally
let go, while holding on
on my way up
to the surface
of the water
i will sometimes
find myself still grasping
or
if i'm lucky
i am free
jumping
out of the pool
like a dolphin
which is me
Wow. I leave the playpen untended and look what happens. I have been otherwise engaged with run around chores. I guess there are a few folk in the world with this letting go issue.
ReplyDeleteThe Pat Springle poem, as I was reading through it, I was going to declare Marion a member of Alanon. I went there ten years letting go of my wife as she died of alcoholism and depression and a medical disaster. Not in that order, the other way round in terms of history.
Techon's story sounds sort of military.
Jozien's poem feels somewhat like a dolphin for some reason.
Karen knows life is difficult because the unknown happens everyday.
Linda needs momentum.
You leave the playground untended and all this stuff comes up. Thanks for leaving castles in the sand for me.
You hit the nail on the head, Christopher. I went to Alanon for many years. I'm the adult child of an alcoholic and learned much about myself from that fine group. Sounds like you're a survivor, too. It's a large club, the survivor club. Wishing you love, peace and blessings!
ReplyDeleteYou know what, I am sick of letting go. Seems to me lately that that is all I do. Like some invisible boss just decided that I was to be unable to hold onto anything, even a damn thought, for a couple of years.
ReplyDeleteI'm going on strike.
I want something to hold on to.
Just for tobloodyday.
S'cuse my rant.
xxx
Marion, the survivor club is not one we aspire to join. Just like Michelle writes, sometimes I just want to catch a break.
ReplyDeleteMichelle, the thing about arguing with God, you will lose. The other thing, some of us are destined into that argument. The archetype is the wounded survivor of the struggle. God marks you and also honors you. Argue away my friend. I need partners in this. I am honored to have you if not at my side then at least working the argument from another place. We will both lose but it's a good fight, by God!
Is it perhaps in letting go of control, or letting go of the desire to control, that we gain something?
ReplyDeleteIn all of this that I'm going through in my personal life I have decided to let go, let it happen, let it resolve. That is not to say that I have no action. No. I am an action oriented person. But I am not trying to control anything. And it seems so much more authentic.
And then in relation to learning about the devine, it seems to be coming hand in hand with learning about myself and my place in this world. I wasn't even looking to understand. And here I am, in my relinguishing hold on so many other things, that a vision of...what should I call it...faith?...understanding of something larger?...it is coming into focus for me. What gifts I am receiving in letting go.
I have to let go of fear, as well, fear of an unfavourable outcome. It is not the outcome, after all, that I am after. It is the journey between here and there.
Deep breaths...
xo
erin
LOVE what you wrote at my place just now about wood and water. And my, how the monks put it into language that I can understand!