If I am to surrender to a higher power: my problems, efforts, self, I have to actually let them go.
I forget where I first heard this analogy, but it has stuck with me. In the analogy a young boy has a broken toy and hands it over to his Dad to fix. But he doesn't want to let it go.
Like us.
We may want to micro-manage the repair. We may want to keep hold of it while the higher power works with it. In both cases we are not letting it go. We are not surrendering it.
To really surrender it, we have to be willing to never see our desire for it fulfilled. We have to let it go and trust our higher power to fix or to not fix, to keep or to return. It doesn't belong to us. It belongs to the world. And we have to be perfectly ok with life if it never gets fixed.
I have a thing going on that might be resolved by the time this story goes out to you. Or it might not. I ordered an internet system that is new to our area, and by all accounts a good idea. So I ordered it. One part arrived exactly as scheduled, but the main component is no-where to be found. In the past I would have had a pretty strong emotional investment in this new tech, but today I don't lean in quite so hard. I've been disappointed by promises like these since internet became a thing. So I refused to think about it too much until it was installed and working. I connected with the shipping company, and when I got no-where with them, I contacted the shipper. The shipper sent out a second unit. Then just like the first unit, it, also, is no-where to be found.
Something greater than me is causing a glitch in the matrix.
I thought about the child with the toy. He really had to give it up, to let the responsibility for the repair lie in someone else's hands. I had to do the same. So I asked my Internet Angel to take care of this for me.
Surrender doesn't come easily in a society that emphasizes personal responsibility, and downplays the connections that interweave our lives. We get tangled up in personal responsibility. At what point does this stop being my sole responsibility and start being the world's responsibility?
Depending on our conditioning, it can be hard to find that middle ground.
By thinking I'm letting Divine Beings handle the details, it's easier for me to give over personal responsibility. They certainly have a bigger view of the situation than I do, and I can assume, as Beings of Light, their plan is beneficial for all. That softens the disappointment.
It is getting easier as I get older, too. A lot of things in life are annoying and stupid and never get resolved. That's just part of life. And as I am less able to carry the responsibilities I carried when younger, it's easier to kick back a bit and let others do more of the heavy lifting. It doesn't mean I give up all personal responsibility though. I'm not going to plunk myself down on a beach and do nothing (although that sounds pretty nice).
But I still get caught up in my attachments. I can see myself as that little kid, grimly hanging on to my toy - or my belief, or my role, or my ... stupid internet.
All these things belong to life. To the world. They are not mine to hold. So each time I find my mind thinking about those missing packages and wishing I had better internet, I hand the problem over to the Angels again. It may never get resolved, but I figure it has a better shot in my Angel's hands than mine alone.
(photo by Trym Nilsen)
