Surrender

Surrender.

"What do I do?"
"Where should I go?"
"Who am I supposed to be?"
"Do I leave or do I stay?"
"What is going to happen?"

Here's my F*&@%D UP solution to uncertainty. TO DO. To try and DO as much as possible. Fix, solve, change, control, obsess.... which results in something that looks like this:

12:35am on a Saturday night. On the floor. Sweating. Tears pouring down my face. My body is shaking. My hands are wrapped around my head and I am in the fetal position. Barely breathing. The only word I am able to exhale is "help".

The moment I begin to DO anything, I have moved from faith to mistrust. From authenticity to masquerading. From serenity to chaos. I've moved so far away from myself that now I've convinced myself that having the external certainty is actually what I need in order for me to feel better.

My surrender is not graceful.

And I've had to surrender before. I am required to surrender on a daily basis! I've had to surrender my will and my life over to the care of a higher power every single day in order to keep myself from self destructing for the past 3.5 years. Because that's part of who I am. To the same extent that I am passionate, joyful, enthusiastic, driven and in love with life - there is a part of me with the same depth that is destructive, controlling, chaos creating, selfish and fearful.

I believe today that because of my willingness to go into the darkness I have developed the capacity to enter the world with such tremendous joy and freedom and light. Are you brave enough to face your fears? Are you brave enough to allow a breakdown to happen? I am moved to tears walking down the street just witnessing the sun or seeing the smile on someone else's face. I am so fiercely passionate about life that I choose to place myself right smack in the middle of it, right where it hurts, right where I'm scared, right where I must choose faith.

The desperate cry for security has made me ridiculously miserable. I imagine I am not alone in that. Doesn't it kind of sound nice? A dependable plan, a happy ending, safety, reliability, something that is somewhat predictable. - Ha, what's funny is that even as I write that there's a part of me screaming ARE YOU KIDDING ME? and my stomach turns at the thought of something being PREDICTABLE in my life, but you know, the truth is, that was what I wanted. I wanted to KNOW that everything was going to be OK. I wanted to live somewhere beautiful, I wanted to KNOW that my partner would ALWAYS love me, I wanted to KNOW exactly what was going to happen and when.  I wanted to KNOW that I would be successful and that one day I would have it all figured out. I really did want that, or at least I convinced myself I did. I wanted it so badly that I literally watched all of my life just slip through my fingers like sand. I have that feeling when I think about the beginning of my recent surrender. That all of a sudden, everything I thought I knew, everything I believed about myself and my life and my path felt like sitting on a beach with sand in my hands and all of it just sliding through my fingers and blowing away in the wind. It happened slowly. Less coaching clients, a break- up, and a plane ticket that I didn't use.

Here's my surrender. I will allow and trust in the process of life. I will surrender my desire to control. I surrender to my fears. I surrender to my need to have the answers. I surrender to my childlike desire for a life of no pain.

Faith. This is how I get to practice everything I have learned over the course of the past 25 years of my life. Nice quarter century criss I may have going on?  If we knew all the answers, if we had it all figured out, why the hell would we need God? This is how it works. If everything was always easy how would we ever discover our strength, our compassion for others, courage and wisdom - from which all of those things develop our ability to find real happiness.

I am willing now to let my guard down. I am willing now to ENJOY the sand falling between my fingers. I am willing to explore what I want. I am willing to accept the feeling of not knowing and embrace this beautiful, magical, playful, adventure of a life. I am willing to allow the light to shine through the cracks of my soul, and blast apart my ego so that everything that has ever held me back from living a life of freedom and faith will fall away.

So here's the thing. Are you willing to get honest? Are you willing to see where you RESIST what is? Where you may be holding on, controlling, expecting, demanding life to be exactly how you think it "should" be? Can you allow yourself to fall apart, so that you can, like me, pick yourself up off the floor and see how strong you are?

Here's what happens when I allow:

Calm. The feeling I am actually seeking. Deep, profound serenity. The reminder that God is real. That something is watching over me. Joy and laughter because I know that I am going to be OK.

I have slowly (and ungracefully) come to accept the feeling of not knowing where I am going. I have slowly rolled over. First, I am no longer face down into the floor. I'm lying on my back. Heart open, palms up, hands empty and ready to receive whatever will be gracefully placed there.

Then I get up, and stand up on my own two feet, and with a smile on my face ask myself - I wonder what will happen today?

I will choose to surrender to what is. Let go of what was. and have faith in what will be.

Will you?