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How can we surrender to what is?


 

As mentioned before, we are programmed to quite often reject what life is presenting us at the time. Of course, this is not always the case but it happens, that we are unhappy with the overall situation, e.g. if we permanently want to be where we are not, if we permanently look forward to the future or remember things that happened in the past.

By hardly being in the present moment, or conceptually at this location, it may happen that we feel an inner turmoil. Our thoughts are wandering elsewhere, we imagine: "how could it be", "what would it be like", "what could have been", "what will be", "what do I want to change", "how can I improve", "how do I become a better human", "how can I live a better life", "how can I do better"

Such sort of thoughts produce unrest and a lack of peace. They express our unhappiness with the "now". We are permanently seeking something allegedly better than anything we are experiencing at that time.

To overcome this pattern, it might be useful to first of all stop and perceive what is NOW and be at peace with everything that led to the current situation.

Exercise: Breathe deeply several times and make sure you are in the Here and Now completely. Envision that everything is exactly the way it should be, inside as well as outside. Let everything be the way it is right now.

Everything that life has to offer right now and here is exactly what we are supposed to experience at this very moment. Let everything be as it is. All the emotions, that are present right now, are exactly the ones meant to be there. They want to be noticed, they want to be acknowledged, they want to be looked at, they want to just be there, exactly now.

Observe your emotions, take a look at them. Try to look from an angle as if being a neutral observer. Imagine standing next to you, observing yourself, your thoughts, your emotions without judgement. You are just the observer.

Look at things like being the visitor of a theatre play. You are watching everything on stage. However, you are not the bad censor who pulls it into pieces or praises it into heaven. No, you are just neutral. You just watch and observe.

It takes a lot of practice to just be a spectator. Very easily we get back into the habit of judgment. We are strongly influenced by our system of values which lets us put everything into drawers of 'good' or 'bad'.

While doing this exercise, you might catch yourself judging every now and again and maybe you condemn your judgment. Finally, you might reach a point where you just say "ok, then this is bad, let it be bad. Well, then I am the way I am."

If we reach this point, we start to be honest with ourselves. To be honest with ourselves takes awareness. It is about reminding ourselves to get back into the spectator role and disembark the judgment. Disembark in both directions, neither judge things 'good' nor 'bad' but being neutral and observe. Everything is about experiences. Experiences are neither good nor bad. Experiences are just experiences.

If you like, you might want to give your emotions, feelings or physical pain a voice. Let this voice tell you what it wants and why the condition is there at that time. Or just watch and let it be. Every situation in our life is exactly the way it needs to be.

The more we step out of judgment and into being the watcher the easier it is to see the connections and to understand the meaning. We notice that seemingly coincidental events do not enter our lives by chance but represent exactly the experience we are meant to have.

As long as we are judging we suppress our true thoughts because our value system does not allow them. Hence, in order to truly experience ourselves it is essential to step out of the value system and be the watcher of all that shows up. This is the first step on our way to ourselves.

Later we can use this to develop a sort of barometer in order to examine certain regularities. For example as follows: "every time my neck aches I know there is fear in my neck." Then we can have a look where the fear is coming from, try to understand it and thus take the scare out of it. Then it can dissolve and the pain barometer is reset for the next experience.

 

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