The Power of Allowing

I invite you to say the word allow a number of times. Feel how soft and round it is but also extremely powerful.  We are just beginning to tap into the phenomenal power of allowing. 

There is a wonderful poem by Danna Faulds   

There is no controlling life.
Try corralling a lightning bolt,
containing a tornado.  Dam a
stream and it will create a new
channel.  Resist, and the tide
will sweep you off your feet.
Allow, and grace will carry
you to higher ground.  The only
safety lies in letting it all in –
the wild and the weak; fear,
fantasies, failures and success.
When loss rips off the doors of
the heart, or sadness veils your
vision with despair, practice
becomes simply bearing the truth.
In the choice to let go of your
known way of being, the whole
world is revealed to your new eyes. 

I invite you to let in the powerful message in the poem – the only safety, the only true safety comes from letting go of struggling with life and allowing whatever is here to be here. And, as she so beautifully says, simply bearing witness to the truth of this moment. In other words, if you’re anxious it is the shift from, I am so anxious. I don’t like this and how can I stop it. to- “I see you anxiousness and you are welcome here.” Then she points to where this kind of allowing takes you – “and letting go of your known way of being, (the way of struggling with life,) the whole world is revealed to your new eyes”. That is the power of allowing, of not fighting with what we are experiencing, not spending your time wishing life was different than what it is. With allowing, the clouds of struggle lift and you are now available to life – as it is. 

Allowing is all about spaciousness. In other words, giving what we are experiencing the space to be. We so deeply long for our natural state of spaciousness. We knew this spaciousness well when we were young but as we grew up our world became narrower and tighter until practically the only time we reconnect with our natural spaciousness as an adult is when we fall in love. It’s part of the reason why so many songs are all about love and there are dozens and dozens and dozens of dating apps. When we fall in love with someone, we feel spacious. Very little bothers us and what we formally struggled with passes like clouds through the vast blue sky of our natural spaciousness. But, as we all know, the spaciousness of new love has a tendency to disappear! 

But spaciousness is our true nature. It is astounding to realize how much the Universe loves space. For heaven’s sake, it is over 93 million miles from our earth to the sun and it is over 20 trillion miles to the next star – Proxima Centauri. And if you blew up an atom to the size of a major league baseball field, the nucleus would be a grain of sand in the center of the field and the electrons will be dancing around outside of the field. What exists between the electrons and the nucleus – simply space. That kind of spaciousness lives in you too.   

It is important to understand that allowing is not about being a wimp and sitting down by the side of the road of life and letting it run you over. It also isn’t about stagnation nor resignation.  It is an active acceptance of your experience – your thoughts, feelings and sensation as they are so you can investigate them – get to know them. It deeply understands that life is for you and rather than living almost exclusively in the land of struggling with life, with allowing you have more space around what you are experiencing.  

Of course, there will be situations where we need to act. Eckhart Tolle understands the importance of acting from a foundation of acceptance.  He says, “Accept - then act. Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it.”  

If there’s something you need to do or say, the chances of it coming from reaction is diminished and the chances of responding skillfully are far greater. That is the magic of allowing.