Struggling to Surrender
The most difficult thing for me to do: Surrender to the Universe.
Long story short, I’m trying to learn to go with the flow. I realized a few weeks ago that trying to exert control over incomprehensible parts of my life just causes debilitating emotional upset for me. It seems like a really simple task – just let go of the idea that I need to plan and hope for specific outcomes. I can’t seem to do this.
The problem is that, to me, Surrender really means Submission.
Twenty five years of my life went to Submitting to the Universe – I believed that anything that happened was meant to happen in that exact way. There was nothing to question, and I believed my wants or needs were irrelevant… because Universe Knows Best. Eventually, I became so unhappy that I got angry about it. I then became belligerent, and that’s how I decided to take my life and destiny in my own hands.
I decided to shoot for my dreams and let the Universe come along for the ride. I was and am all fired up – “THE UNIVERSE CAN’T CONTROL ME, YOU CAN’T CONTROL ME!!! I make things happen in this world, baby!” It feels good to achieve things in my life, especially things I’d previously conceded could never happen because I believed I wasn’t allowed to have a say. I’ve done some completely fantastic things in the past couple of years, all by myself. I feel powerful, and like I know where my life is going.
Kind of. Not everything is working out the way I want it to. Some of this powerful feeling turns into utter dejection when things I believe will be my future actually become dead ends.
I do see the reality that I have attachment to certain future outcomes. There are specific things I want to happen in my life. These are things I call my hopes and dreams. Except, to me, they aren’t just fantasies; they are “Things I Need To Happen.” – it’s non-negotiable, somehow. It is my fear of losing those specific outcomes which causes me to try to force order upon my personal universe.
The most confusing part about this is that I don’t actually believe I have my heart set on any specific timeline for outcomes. In my mind, everything is fluid – something that I want to happen “in the future” can happen anytime in the future, whether it’s tomorrow or ten years from now. I totally understand the concept that good things come to those who wait – something I wish could happen NOW will probably happen eventually, whether I feel impatient while waiting for it or not.
There is a specific set of outcomes I reallyreallyreally want to happen – the things that make my heart skip a beat when I think of them. So, I try to make them happen. One thing I have trouble realizing, though, is that these things DO happen. Just not in the ways I plan or expect them to.
For example, I’ve always wanted to be a farmer. The past few years, my main focus has been on getting a farm. It was a goal – “I will have a farm.” In the meantime, I placated myself by using my current home to grow food, run small-scale experiments on cold-hardy seed for future use, collect heirloom seeds, and even sell some of my produce for profit.
I realized only a few days ago that I already AM a farmer.
My singular and headlong barreling toward “being a farmer” completely blinded me to the fact that I can be (and am) a farmer wherever I am. I don’t need some specific plot of land in some specific spot that is specifically named “a farm” to be a farmer. This was apparently a mind-blowing realization, because I’m still reeling from it.
Point being, things happen as they will happen – it doesn’t matter what I try to do to “make” my preferred outcomes a reality. I understand now that my preferred outcomes are really just ideas I’ve had that I enthusiastically write a rough draft for… and then assume the draft is the final version of the story. My attachment to my farmer story’s specific process (I will do X,Y,Z to become a farmer) is what caused me to completely miss it when the intended outcome actually happened.
So, I am caught up in the flow of the universe, even as I try to steer myself to where I think I “need” to go. I’m using a pole to try to steer my boat through rapids, but my pole doesn’t even reach the bottom of the river – all control I think I have is just an illusion I intentionally maintain so that I can believe I know what is happening while it’s happening.
My next task in life is to learn to withdraw that pole, sit in the boat, and just watch where I go; I need to experience and savor the journey as it happens. I need to trust that the boat will get where it’s supposed to go, one way or another. My attempts at steering are futile, and this is something that I need to accept.
This does not mean I can’t select which river I put my boat into, it doesn’t mean I can’t select my boat… It just means that once I put the boat into the river, it will go as the river takes it. And, I need to allow myself to be what I am, just as a river is what it is.
I need to learn that Surrender does not mean Submission, it means Acceptance.
I will learn this. Maybe I already have.