The Path of Surrendering
The path of surrendering and letting go is one of the fundamental parts of the spiritual journey. It is also one of the great teachings of Grandmother Ayahuasca and the plant medicines. In life we are surrounded by much conditioning which we over time we take on. It may come through our ancestral blood lines, through society or just our own karmic inheritances of our own doing mind. The path of awakening is a step-by-step journey and it is not like one day to the next we learn how to trust... it is a process.
The interesting thing we find is there are many hooks along the way. The mind says "okay great, now I have another job and it’s to let go” but that in itself is another way of grasping. So there is a time when we are studying somehow the process of letting go and even more than that sitting in the experience of how this would be.
In the end really it is a path of patience but one where we are committed and dedicated to take every step along the way. One helpful step is to investigate where are our hooks? What pulls us into the egoic doing mode and perhaps bring a sense of anxiousness or unease. And there in these moments what practices can bring us back to the present moment and slow us down. What healing modalities can release baggage we are holding? As we journey, we will have glimpses along the path of this space of freedom that lives within but then we will forget it and lose track. Again, we come back and we see how we can sustain and reside in this place.
As we step onto this path more and more, we will see that life itself is in support of our awakening. Life is constantly sending us new dance partners who have just the right steps to bring us closer to our true home. But we need to meet them with openness and be ready to learn the new dance steps. It is fine that we may take a few steps, a few turns and realize that this is not the dance we prefer and transition to something else but we still would have learned something here. In the end it is not so much what comes to our live that is important but it is how we meet it. In life we never experience suffering but we often choose to suffer experience.
Grandmother Ayahuasca has been one of my key teachers in the art of surrendering. She is very skillful at putting these key spiritual inquiries into the center stage of our consciousness. Sometimes a beings of light comes forward to bless you with potions of love and healing and at other times a being of darkness may seem to be trying to pull you into an abyss. However, it is our perception of what may lie in this abyss and what could happen to me that spooks us.
I once had a journey where what seems to be a temptress came to me in the vision. It felt like she wanted to harm me or to seduce me. My first reaction was I need to get away from her and something was going wrong in the ceremony. However, a deeper voice said to me that the medicine always bring what is needed and so I settled into the vision. I relaxed my body completely and then took some longer slower breaths. As I relaxed it seemed like she only grew stronger, and it seemed she wanted to tear me to pieces.
She had many arms that extended forward and wrapped around me. It took all of my inner strength to remain in a calm place. And then as I said to her that I am here to meet you with love no matter what. And with this last stand into love she started to transform herself. She became a magnificent goddess of light and a halo spread out from her in all directions.
She looked at me and without saying anything she pulled a golden orb out from her chest and it into my heart. The vision then closed and a deep peacefulness settled over me. This vision has stayed with me for many years and it is one which stands as a reminder on my path of surrendering.
In some way we need these markers along the way to direct us back to our true nature yet at the same time we are already eternally free. We are walking on the path and yet were already at the finish line. Through this understanding we learn to cultivate both patience and compassion with ourselves while also keep the fire burning of determination and perseverance.
As our practice becomes deeper we can touch into the truth of our being at anytime. The more we touch into it, the more we realize that this is where we have always been and that really it was just an illusion that we could ever truly leave it. This is the journey-less journey that we are on, it is the pathless path and the freedom that we are seeking. At a certain point the process of surrendering leads us to surrender even the one which is itself looking to surrender. Step by step we are all just walking each other home and I am grateful to be walking with you.