Feeling the Joy of Surrender, or Not Yet!

Meditation – Friday (4/27/12)

Pause and Consider: Feeling the Joy of Surrender, or Not Yet!

So much moving within my Soul and Psyche these past two days. First was the meeting of our Leaders Retreat committee – three of us (Karen, Julia, and me) planning the retreat for next weekend. The meeting turned out to be amazing to me. Not so much in the results but in the process.

We started out not really knowing for sure which way to go. Karen had written out an outline of what had come to her about the agenda for the Retreat – integrating what the three of us had discussed in two previous meetings. Julia and I were fine with this, but the details were not clear. I had, as is my nature, prepared a PowerPoint presentation for Pathwork Lecture 131 – the lecture we were using as a foundation – but neither Karen nor Julia brought it up as something to discuss. I wasn’t sure whether this presentation was just to ground my own understanding of the lecture or something that would be useful for the retreat. I do realize that a lot of energy arises in me as I prepare such material.

As we talked, I suddenly noticed something in Karen’s outline that seemed important and which I had missed entirely in my own reading of the lecture and in my presentation – the distinction between the “clouds” in our life (disharmonies, frustrations, anxiety, loneliness, doubts, feelings of insecurity, etc.) and their underlying causes – notably our unconscious untruths (misconceptions, images, wrong conclusions about life, etc.) and our subsequent Lower Self and Mask Self defense behaviors based upon these unconscious untruths. These unconscious images combined with Lower and Mask Self behaviors give rise to the clouds, the disharmonies in our lives. I was able to speak this sudden insight, and it proved helpful in establishing how we saw the weekend unfolding. And it led me later to excitedly modify my presentation to incorporate these new insights. By the end of the 2-hour planning meeting we were all pretty excited about what was coming into place for the Leaders Retreat.

The new experience for me here was the teamwork – each of us contributing and each of us willing to hear the other two – and together following Spirit. It was a surrendered place – and I was experiencing a kind of joy and excitement in this surrender and in the clarity that was arising out of the surrender.

Well actually it was the “arising clarity” that excited me – the “surrender” piece was not a part of my excitement.  I noticed I was not quite yet able to trust surrender, and I found myself perplexed by my resistance to surrender in spite of seeing all that arose out of surrender as we worked together on this retreat plan.

Another factor that was moving for me in our planning meeting was Julia’s reminding me how she has witnessed my Pathwork helpership  skills in leading work scenes from that ego-less surrendered place. She reminded me of how powerful they were – something I realized in the moment as well – and how I needed to remember their effectiveness when coming from that surrendered place.  And yet again I notice my resistance to trusting the surrender, even though I have witnessed first hand the joy that comes up within me when I operate from that surrendered place. Why the resistance to Joy when it arises spontaneously from within? I am reminded of the Bert Hellinger quote Pausing Before the Mystery (click here to open)

My immature ego is at play here – thinking it is separate from the whole and wanting to perform and be special from a place of separateness. And feeling a need to be in control – controlling the outcome, even though it is clueless as to what the outcome could or should be. My ego will not relax into surrender as of yet.

But maybe maturing means my child-self growing up to trust the benign nature of the Cosmos, of God. Here I am reminded of the quote attributed to Einstein about the importance of knowing whether or not the Universe is friendly (click here to open).

Yes, coming to trust God, trust the Cosmos, and trust myself and others as part of this Cosmos. Perhaps from this surrendered place I could step into leadership by letting go and riding the waves of the NOW as they are all around and within me. Reminds me of learning to ride a bike – the thrill of finally surrendering to my instinctive feel of bike riding, and to feel the thrill of riding my bike from that surrendered place for the first time. In this way, can I say, “Yes” to stepping into helpership, into leadership, and into life, for that matter?

I am working on a business card for myself. Always a challenge when I do not know who I am or how I want the recipient of said card to respond to me. Do I want a person to go to my website? To engage me? To have a conversation with me?  I have to smile, even laugh at so much inner confusion on such a central point.

But I was struck by a paragraph in Pathwork Lecture 131 that resonated with me deeply. I used it as a focusing statement for this morning’s meditation.

Focusing Statement: Pathwork Lecture 131 Interaction Between Expression and Impression; ¶ 6:

If you truly understand yourself in relationship to this very moment, momentary unhappiness notwithstanding, you must be happy.  In other words — and this may sound like a contradiction, but it is not — no matter how unhappy you are now, by understanding this now, you must be happy.  Conversely, no matter how favorable circumstances are, and no matter how happy you may think you are at this moment, if you do not fully live in the moment and understand it in relationship to you, you cannot be fully happy.

I found myself saying, “Yes! This is a statement I want on the back of my business card – it says what I am about, helping people find happiness in themselves, just as I am looking to find happiness in myself.” Other words to add to the card came up: “A Shared Life of Curiosity, Wrestling, and Exploration,” “The Thrill of Living the Questions,” “Happiness from the Inside Out… Feeling the Thrill of Surrender, the Thrill of ‘Connecting the Dots’ (OR NOT) in the midst of life’s inevitable ups and downs.” This is what I want for myself. This is what I want to share with others.

Now to take this Spirit of Surrender into MAP (Mid-Atlantic Pathwork) – into my leadership role in MAP. To feel the thrill of surrender to life, both for myself and for all of us involved in MAP. Somehow I feel prepared to lead, if my leadership is called for, from that surrendered place.  Yes, now to form my discernment team as part of the process of claiming helpership. I am feeling the joy in this moment in all of this arising! Lots of energy.

Coffee Time with Pat

After some exchanges about what was up with each other, I began sharing all that had arisen in me, including the insight as to the words on my business card. Pat: That’s a lot of words! She then went on…I notice when you get up early and do your meditation in the way that you do now that when I come downstairs to join you in our precious Coffee Time together you are full of words. So much writing and thinking. The words overflow out of you.

At first I was in denial of how Pat’s response hurt inside of me, like I had been given a strong blow to my gut. The wind went out of my sails. My excitement collapsed.

But our conversation went on and I could see her need that I tune in better to where she is when we get together in these coffee times. I did not collapse in retreat at her comments, but rather added a little more background as to how all this had arisen in me. Pat explained more what her needs were as we came together in the morning. There was a meeting ground. Pat: What you do with your mind reminds me of the Inquiry Practices that A.H.Almaas uses in his Diamond Approach. Inquiry is what you do in your Pathwork Daily Review. Her comments settled me down.

We were able talk about needing balance – in ourselves and in our US. Our lives are a tapestry woven from the threads of each of US. Pat: Me pulling my dead parts to life, and you pulling your dead parts to life.

So this coffee time together was one of those times when the “OR NOT” was arising in the connecting the dots of life. And this is messy and real – and brings its own joy, even in the “momentary unhappiness.” The happiness comes from understanding the unhappiness in the moment. So “Yes, the Thrill of Surrender” even when at first the dots do not seem to connect. In the end they do, and eventually, perhaps, I shall be able to live more from that surrendered place that brings joy no matter external circumstances. But I sense it will be some time before this manifests fully within me. And that’s OK. After all – coming to this point is part of why I am incarnated on this planet Earth!

Shared in love, Gary

Epilog

Later, in sharing my new insights about my business card with my good friend and marketing consultant, she, too, thought my brainchild had way too many words. I could more easily see the wisdom in what she was saying as we worked this through. My sense is that my business card will have but few words and will simply let interested people go to my website for more, if they are so moved.  I’m curious about all the energy in me related to the simple matter of my business card.