On trusting, in the present continuous tense

Learn to accept your pain

Surrender and let go!

Don’t try to solve your problems at the same time

When faced with enduring seemingly unsolvable situations…

Surrendering to Life means dropping debilitating feelings and being free

Going with the flow will deliver you to where you really ought to be.

Last night’s Super Moon, brought back haunting memories from some years ago. We had no money. The situation at home was so bleak, we were out of groceries. And just that evening our lawyer had called us to say that an order that had been issued by the court to seize all our movable assets and auction them, would be executed the next day. (PS: We are going through a bankruptcy; and to know more read Fall Like A Rose Petal and watch Rise In Love.) There were only two ways in which to prevent the court order from being executed. Pay the bailiff from the court money as a bribe or settle with the complainant so that they would not press the execution of the court’s order. I was very unsure of how we were to deal with this Catch 22 situation. We would never pay a bribe, but even if we had to, we had no money. So, in such a cashless situation, how were we to settle the complainant? Unable to sleep, I got out of bed around 11.30 PM and I stepped up to the balcony. I looked up at the full moon. It was a magical night – Chennai’s hot summer breeze blew in from the Bay of Bengal, the bamboo trees in the neighbor’s backyard rustled rhythmically, and the moon shone in all glory. I lifted my hands apart, part in prayer, part in invocation, and howled, in the dead of the night, looking up at the moon, “I don’t know who you are, I don’t know what to do, I surrender.” Almost instantaneously my stress dissolved, the fear that was gnawing at me from within – on what would happen when the bailiff arrived – just vanished. I went back into my bedroom and slept through the night – soundly, like a baby.

The next morning, the bailiff came at the appointed hour. We offered him a glass of buttermilk that he accepted. In the time that he took to drink it, I told him our story. We offered to comply with his process seamlessly. He heard us out. Then he looked at me and Vaani and said, “Look Sir, you and Madam look genuine to me. Don’t worry about this order. I will take care of it.” So, saying, he just got up and went away. I have not seen him since that day.

I am not sure what the bailiff did or why he did what he did. All I know is that I surrendered to a Higher Energy. So I believe my family and I have been taken care of and provided for. This has not happened to us just this one time. It has happened again, and again, and again, every single time that we have surrendered.

Whether you like it or not, whether you ask for it or not, at some time or the other, in some unique, unfathomable way, Life will bring you to a state when you will awaken to the truth that your Life is not in your control. At such times, the best response is to simply surrender to Life. Let whatever must happen, happen. Because, whatever is to happen will anyway happen!

But the normal human response is anger, frustration, depression, fear, insecurity, anxiety, worry and grief. There’s no point suppressing these feelings. They will naturally arise in you. Allow those feelings to come. Feel each of them and ask yourself if they can help you deal with your Life situation any better. If they can, persist with them. Let’s say, someone’s dying of cancer. How can any of these feelings help cure the cancer? Or prevent that person from dying? Or let’s say you have been let down in a relationship. How can these feelings help you cope any better? When you sit calmly and analyze your Life situation – any situation which cannot be solved at a human level; and there are many of them – you will understand that going with Life’s flow, and the grand Cosmic Design, the Master Plan, is the only intelligent option you have. So, logically, there’s no point persisting with these debilitating emotions. Surrendering to Life really means dropping these feelings and being free!

I have come to believe that not knowing what to do in Life is an opportunity to understand, appreciate and live Life better. It is a humbling experience. Our education and intellect make us believe that we are in control, that we are achieving this and that, we are creating assets and raising families, that we have everything planned out and mapped out in our lives. But when a Life situation strikes, and pushes you into a corner, you realize that you were never in control then – or now. It is only through this awakening that you understand the value of surrendering to Life and going with its flow.

So, if you are in a place in Life when you don’t know what to do about someone or some situation, go with wherever your Life is taking you. Don’t resist. Don’t fear. Don’t agonize. Go with the flow, because, always, you will arrive where you eventually need to be and that’s where you will be peaceful and happy! 

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‘Letting Go’ is the way!

There is no way or method to ‘Let Go’!

In response to my blogpost of yesterday a reader wrote to me wondering if there was a method to letting go: “I find it very, very difficult. The more I try to let go, the more I feel the urge to be in control. I feel that we have been given a human mind only to solve the problems we are faced with. And letting go, without attempting a solution, or in spite of attempting a solution, is counter-intuitive to being human! Is there a progressive approach to letting go?”

Honestly, there is no easy explanation to this conundrum. Because truly the benefits of, the value in, letting go cannot be explained. It has to be experienced.

Even so, let me attempt to share what I have understood from my own experience of learning to let go. When we are confronted with a problem situation, we want to solve it. We believe that either we can solve a problem or at least we believe we can find someone who can solve the problem for us. Well, if we can solve a problem, or if someone can solve a problem for us, surely, there is no problem. But there will be Life situations when no one can solve your problem. Life – and time – alone can solve your problem or heal you. Ask, for instance, those people who lost their dear ones in the MH 370 episode. Or ask the Talwar couple who are in Dasna jail in UP. Or ask me and Vaani – and we will tell you what it means to be living with a problem that refuses to get resolved despite all our efforts.

But that’s not the only way to look at problems of an enduring kind. Look at them another way too: No matter what you do, how hard you work, what you wish, whatever has to happen alone will happen. So, when you realize that something’s not in your control, when you are unable to control the flow of events in your Life, don’t resist it.Just let it happen. You simply learn to go with the flow.

My late grandfather, my father’s father, used to say, in chaste PalaghattanTamizh: “Nadakarthu ellam nadakarapadi nadakattum.” Meaning, let everything happen in its own way. It also means don’t come in the way of Life. Because in reality, Life has been happening in its own way – whether you liked what happened or not, whether you like what you are getting or not. And if you elevate yourself to see Life from a spiritual plane, there are no problems. There are only events. Mere incidents on your journey called Life. You call something, which really is a simple event, a problem because you don’t like it, you don’t want it in your Life.

Letting go is not a call to inaction. Letting go is wisdom. If you like, you can call it an advisory which says that despite your best efforts, if you don’t see the results that you want, don’t agitate, don’t despair, just go with the flow of your Life. Which is why the spiritual perspective that there are no problems to be solved, there are just events to be experienced, is very valuable. When something is an experience, whether you like it or not, you have to learn to live and deal with it. It is only when you label something as a problem, that you feel you must solve it!

If you observe your Life or that of those around you, apart from all the challenges that Life throws at us, we create a fresh one for ourselves by seeking methods to deal with Life. We have become so method-driven that we now want to know if there is a method to intelligent living, if there is a method to inner peace, if there is a method to happiness and if there is a method to letting go. Life doesn’t work on theories or models or constructs for methods to work for, or in, Life. In my humble opinion, and from my experience of this lifetime, there’s no way to let go. Letting go is the way!

Fighting Life is what causes misery

Just surrender to the Universe’s energy, to Life, don’t fight it!

Don’t you agree that if there indeed is a Master of the Universe, who was controlling, coordinating, delivering, granting, blessing and driving whateveris happening in the world, in your Life and mine, then this person is mighty intelligent? So intelligent that zebras have stripes while horses don’t, that when the East has daylight, the West has stars in the sky, that there are four seasons that keep changing as if someone is operating the switches in a Master Control Room, that mangoes are different from oranges and the Himalayas are different from the Rockies! None of these has been or can be controlled by you or me. Yet they happen! And so, we have to admit that the Universe’s energy, which, in my humble opinion, powers our lives, is far more intelligent than all of us put together.

If this energy is so powerful, so intelligent, why are you not able to trust it? When things go per your expectation, you don’t have an issue. When they go against what you wish is when you start fighting Life. Your DVD player doesn’t work when you sit down to watch a movie and you start complaining about Life. Small thing, you will eventually get over that setback! You will fight your DVD player for a while, then chuck it out the window and move on. When you are out of job, or when you are out of cash, or both, you fight, you resist the Life which you currently have to endure. You sulk, you brood! Does that change anything? Or what if your liver malfunctions or your heart suffers an attack? That’s a situation you can’t even mentally fight! That’s when you learn the art of surrendering to Life. Now, if we could consider surrendering to Life in all contexts, how much more simpler and easier to live will our lives be? In Hindu scriptures, they talk of surrender as ‘saranagati’ and to a physical God, an idol. I am suggesting, surrender to Life, the energy that keeps you alive! Think about it!

The truth about Life is, no matter what, what is to happen, will happen! Take Shah Rukh Khan’s Life for instance. The story goes that the TV serial ‘Fauji’that launched him in 1988 as the smart, daring Abhimanyu Rai, was supposed to have had a certain Milin Kapoor play that key role. Kapoor was 6 ft+, handsome and fitted the role perfectly. But because the show’s producers wanted Kapoor, who was well qualified technically too, to focus on the cinematography and editing, the role went to Khan. The rest, as they always say, is history. This is what will happen to you too. Ahead of your time or beyond what is ordained for you, nothing in your Life will ever happen to you. When it’s your turn, the Universe will conspire to deliver whatever you need for your Life’s story to advance. And advance does not always mean ‘meeting your expectations or exceeding them always’. Advance here means to simply (be forced, at times, to) go with the flow on Life’s pre-planned path. The Universe’s design, the Master Plan, is inscrutable. And yet, what I have learnt, is this – the Master Plan has no flaws.

Whatever is happening to you just now is what is ordained to happen. Therefore, intelligence demands that you don’t fight Life. Fighting Life is what causes you misery! You will find bliss instead, when you simply, sensibly, surrender to it!

Find peace by walking away from whatever holds you to ransom

The simplest way to peace is to walk away from things that imprison you, trouble you, anger you and tempt you.

This doesn’t mean that you abdicate your stand or your responsibility of those things. It only means you don’t react and seek time to think through the situation and act on it calmly. Consider what can possibly be imprisoning you. Your fears, insecurities, anxieties are all the metaphorical shackles that keep you nailed to the ground. Because you are not free, and a prisoner of your own thoughts, you are in despair. You are troubled. Continuously being in an agitated state can cause you to explode. Initially your tolerance levels are higher. But over a period of time you become a victim of your own reactions. You are angry first. But soon you are angry that you lost your cool. You are angry with yourself. Then you succumb to the temptation of pitying yourself and get into that ruinous depressive spiral. Your temptations can also come from your desires. From eating an extra piece of a Black Forest to having that smoke to compulsively wanting to control, everything is a temptation that you find hard to resist. When you are controlled by your desires, you are but a slave of your mind.

To be free, to be the Master of your mind, and therefore of your Life, you must first walk away. Don’t think. Just walk away. From an argument, from a bar, from your desire to light up, from irrational behavior that provokes you. Walk away and ask yourself what will be lost if you don’t succumb, if you don’t indulge, if you don’t get involved. Almost always, the answer will be that nothing will be lost. Though the mind would have been tempting you, creating often a sense of urgency, that without your immediate involvement, Life will go out of control. Resist that mind game with a physical response: walk away! Almost instantaneously, you will discover you are at peace with the moment. Just this awareness that walking away is not going to bring the world to an end, is inspiring. It is an action that demonstrates immense trust in Time’s ability to heal and resolve. It never is borne out of cowardice and insecurity. But is an act of courage and delivered with a feeling of complete security.

Try it on anything that is troubling you or holding you in its vice-like grip (a habit or a relationship perhaps?). Try it on your own emotions, like your compulsive urge to get angry. Or on your inability to resist temptation. Try it once by walking away. You will find peace in a nano-second. And then, like Oliver Twist, you will want more!

Stop coming in your own way

Life’s at work on you continuously.

Life’s like an artisan-sculptor-miner who’s chipping away, digging, at times even polishing, to get you to the gold__to get you to the real you. Every event, opportunity or ordeal is Life’s way to purify you so that the real you emerges: cleansed and resplendent. So submit yourself to Life. And yes, one more thing: just make sure you don’t come in your own way!

We view Life’s myriad challenges as part of a grand conspiracy to suppress or annihilate us. Relax: this ain’t any conspiracy! On the other hand, Life has a grand design for each of us. It is Life’s responsibility to ensure we know ourselves and see ourselves as who we truly are. Though all of us are born pure, over several years of conditioning, we have acquired a different hue. We can’t even recognize ourselves. Our insecurities, our anxieties, our greed, have made us cold, bitter and lusterless. Our simple nature has been overshadowed by a complex craving to be noticed and understood, our intrinsic selflessness has been held hostage by me-first-ism, our fears suppress our faith and jealousy prevents us from letting others win.

 

We must recognize and accept the truth that we are not in control here. No, not in this lifetime. We are like passengers on a plane: we have to fasten our seat belts, sit back and either enjoy or endure the ride. At times it will be calm, sometimes fun; at some other times there could be turbulence and the journey could be scary. To enjoy or endure a plane ride is a personal choice. But instead of trying to take charge, don’t we always simply let the pilot to do her job and land us safely? Do the same with Life too. Stop coming in your own way. Stop resisting every move of Life. Simply surrender and go with the flow!