THE POWER OF LETTING GO

The most common questions made by my meditation students are:  What really means letting go? emptying our minds? What we need to let go, and why?

These are great question because letting go is hard, and at the same time is easy.  To let go we need to accept things as they are in the moment, recognizing that we cannot have all we want in the way we want it. Life sometimes presents us things or situations that we cannot change and forcing the entrance of a closed door is always painful. When we accept things as they are, we can become free of suffering. I make this affirmation based on my personal experience which taught me that we are the artifices of our own suffering.

A recipe for suffering is wanting things to be different to what they are. Have you ever noticed how hard you try to force an outcome when you desire something? We grasp, we cling, we attach, we create excuses to justify our need of control. If it is a situation related to our children, we argue that we know what is best for them and try to impose our parental authority; but even if we are right, they won’t do what we ask if they don’t understand the why.  Another example is when we stay in terrible relationships, convincing ourselves that the other person will change. Change is possible, but only when a person wants to change and work hard to resolve his/her issues.  We cannot control or change others; we can only change ourselves.

There is a story that illustrates pretty good the danger of clinging to what we want. In Africa there were some guys that found a way to make good money selling monkeys, but they had a problem … catching monkeys wasn’t easy because they jump and move fast.

One of the guys came up with the idea of building a trap for monkeys using a type of rice they love to eat. The trap was built using a wood box with a hole large enough for the monkeys to introduce the hand. Once they grabbed the rice and closed the hand to keep it, the whole was not big enough to let them take the closed hand out of the hole.

They put many traps early in the morning and left. When they came back, it was a monkey trapped in each box. It would have been easy for the monkeys to get free by letting go of the rice they couldn’t even eat, but they were so caught up in the desire of having what they wanted that they lost the sense of their own safety.  Like in the story, we all have our own rice that keep us in painful situations.

Mindful meditation helps us to let go. How? Mindfulness is about living in the present moment. When you are a witness of your breath while observing the reactions of your body and mind, you can notice an awakening inside. You become aware of your thoughts, without engaging with them. You experiment total acceptance of what is, without judgment, or resistance. Full awareness of your feelings helps you to change the behavior causing  the suffering. That’s why I highly recommend my readers the practice of mindfulness.

You won’t see immediate results, but through the daily practice, you will start noticing a greater understanding of life and people. You won’t need to control anyone, you won’t need to cling, grab, or attach to things or people to be happy, you will distinguish the voice of the spirit guiding you toward wise decisions.

Letting go is about releasing your old story to write a new one, is spreading your wings and soaring  through the infinite space of the unknown until you reach the highest peak of the universe, free from the prison of suffering  you  have built through  your fears  coming from past experiences.

The main reason for us to resist letting go, is fear of the unknown. As we practice daily meditation fear vanish little by little, we develop trust in the unknown which is always synchronized with the lessons we need to learn, and we end up discovering that life brought to us whatever is in perfect harmony with who we are, and what we need. Our creator knows our destiny before we started our earthly journey, so lets the divine spirit take the lead.

If you want to learn more about the powers associated with mindfulness meditation don’t miss our next Friday blog. We will discover together the power of surrender. www.ocipeace.org

If you want to share a special experience about meditation or want to write about this subject send me an email to gladys.gonzalez@ocipeace.org .