The Joy of Letting Go

Lately, while sitting in meditation and my mind again captures my attention, ensnaring it in a world of thought, it is fascinating to see how much it goes into planning mode. Cancer (along with all illnesses) can be superfood for our struggling mind, causing it to try to control what we are experiencing. When I recognize I am no longer fully present, I become interested in what stories my mind is telling itself and lately it is doing a lot of planning. It tries to figure out how to not be so fatigued, or whether I should cancel my schedule and just crawl into bed, or whether it can figure out how to get everything done on that day without being taken over by the fatigue. 

But I’m aware enough to know that being identified with my struggling mind is like being in quicksand. The more it struggles, the more it gets caught in struggle and if my attention is ensnared, the more I get stuck. So, after a kind and heartfelt acknowledgment of what my mind is talking about, I then bring my attention back to my body, my breath, and the healing spaciousness of this moment. 

Planning is essential as we maneuver through life, but for most of us, it has taken over our lives. We are caught in a busy mind that is always trying to do life, very rarely opening into simply being. When we first start hearing the possibility of being life rather than always trying to do it, it can be scary because we think that we must control life or something bad will happen or nothing will happen. 

But a huge part of awakening is recognizing that life is smarter than you and most of your thoughts are not necessary. They are just stories about life. They are just clouds passing through the vast spaciousness of being, which you really are. You also discover that the safest thing you will ever do is relax into life, learning how to use your mind to connect rather than endlessly trying to control life. If you start becoming fascinated by how much your mind tries to do life, it will become easier to trust that relaxing into life is safe.  

Here is an invitation. When you wake up tomorrow morning, hold the intention to remember that whatever life brings you on that day is exactly what needs to be there on your journey to reconnecting with the joy of being fully present for life. This is all about engaging with the life you have been given. Rather than trying to make it be what you think it should be, you let it come to you. One of my favorite mantras in the morning is, “Let the day unfold according to its own rhythm.” 

You can also spend the day noticing that, when your mind tries to control life, it inevitably tightens you – tightens your body, your mind and your heart. When you notice yourself struggling with life, allow a couple of long slow out breaths and say to yourself, “Right now, THIS is life and it’s okay!” Trust this moment enough to allow the next one to appear without getting caught in trying, clinging, resisting. Be life!  

In this journey of rediscovering how to trust life again, it can be very helpful to physically allow yourself to be supported. So, for just a moment, whatever is holding you as you are reading this blog – a chair, a bed, the floor of a subway train, the earth itself – relax into being held by the support beneath you. It is a profound moment in awakening when you realize that your mind is so busy trying to control life that it sits on top of chairs, lies on top of beds, and stands on top of the earth, rarely allowing itself to relax enough to know that whatever is beneath you is holding you. If you doubt that, imagine whatever is holding you suddenly disappearing, and watch yourself fall! 

Relaxing into life is the effortless way of things and this kind of freedom is not something to get. It is your true nature, and it is always right here. When your mind gets scared and holds on again, remind it that something much wiser and smarter is in charge and it is safe to relax into the flow. And at the beginning, just moments of connecting with life as it is matter. They then accumulate over the years until being becomes your predominate way of interfacing with life. 

Know that the willingness to stop arguing with life and open to it instead allows you to reconnect with the truth that you are not in charge and that you are held and supported every step of the way.