Surrender

Surrender: 'to give the control or use of (something) to someone else'

I completely believe in personal responsibility. I believe that one must pull themselves up by their bootstraps and work for that which they desire. Where I got stuck over the years is that I didn't include my Higher Power in the planning and execution of my life. Even worse, as I realize this morning, I made my higher power OTHER PEOPLE. 

I grew up in the church - I've never not known that there was something greater than myself. As a child I embraced it completely and imagined heaven's streets lined with chocolate and marshmallows (at 6 years old who gives a hoot about gold and jewels). As a teenager I became more skeptical, my lens of the world shifted. But I still needed to trust in something greater than myself. So I made my friends at school and people at church my higher power. I can only tell you that bestowing mere mortals the responsibility for looking out for your best interest is naive and a HUGE mistake. Time and time again I was let down, I became disillusioned and untrusting. 

I realized that it would be up to me to look out for myself and make things happen. Now, whether I set too lofty a goal or expectation for myself or not, I ended up failing myself in those efforts. There's tremendous guilt that accompanied disappointing myself and seeing that despite my best intentions I just wasn't good enough, or disciplined enough, or [fill in the blank] enough. I just wasn't ENOUGH.

When I mustered the will to try to change myself, my habits, my circumstances in my life, it reinvigorated me. I really felt like,"I've got this!" I would obsess over details and I would run scenarios in my head so I would be prepared for whatever direction life took me. I would replay the past and obsess about how it could have gone differently. See the pattern here? I was either focusing on the past or the future, but I was MISSING the PRESENT!

What in the world could allow me to chase my dreams but allow me to be present in the moment? My Higher Power as I now understand him. Despite my best efforts micromanaging my life and others' and all the amazing things that come with it like, stress and obsessive planning, a clenched jaw and tight shoulders, crazy dreams and sleepless nights, self-sabotaging behavior, resentment, depression and anxiety... the list goes on - my Higher Power was there all along. I can look back and clearly identify circumstances that brought certain people into my life that I never could have engineered. So many times I was saved from myself when I maybe shouldn't have been.

The lesson for me now is to SURRENDER. My job is to focus on my intentions, and envision the life I want for myself and my loved ones. My job is to pay attention to the world and people around me in the PRESENT and see what blessing and opportunities have been laid before me. My job is to take action when presented with opportunities and not worry about how it's going to take me from A to B. Ask any successful person and they will usually attest that the path to success is far from straight and direct. I have also noticed that the opportunities may not look anything like what I would have expected for myself, but the results are even BETTER than anything I could have created for myself. 

Not to say I don't have to remind myself almost daily to put myself, my ego, my neurotic nature aside and just let it work itself out. I am far from perfect. I apparently have severe short term memory when it comes to control. When I surrender and blessings start to appear, my knee jerk reaction is to say "Awesome, I'll take it from here!" The results are usually less than stellar and I can rarely enjoy anyone or anything because I'm not living in the present because I'm worried about the future.

The key is to be gentle with myself and get back to gratitude. Gratitude anchors me in the present. Gratitude provides me the proper lens to see the blessing in my life and how I am a blessing to others. Then I surrender once more, focus my intentions, and prepare myself to do the necessary work.

Focus on the What and Surrender the How