The Tao of Self-Surrender

I don't know Who - or what- put the question. I don't know when it was put. I don't even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer yes to Someone - or Something - and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life in self-surrender, had a goal.
Dag Hammarskjoeld quoted in Gerald May, M.D., Will and Spirit

When we grow up we develop an ego, a realization that we are different from our father and our mother. We learn that when we don't look out where we walk we will bump into furniture and that hurts. We also realize what we like and what we don't. We realize that all the people we interact with have their expectations of us and we try to find our balance, our role within the family and within society. All the way until mid-life we build up our ego; we somehow discover who we think we are.

Then comes the moment that Dag Hammarskjoed tried describing; there is suddenly that wake-up call that we are not on a separated island as that psychological force - the ego - would have concluded. We are very much integrated into something higher. You don't have to be spiritual to come to this conclusion. Everyone who has children someday discovers that they are in fact an extension of you. And even if you are childless, you can find your life's mission in merging with your soul partner, or you discover that you literally have a professional job to do that truly defines who you are. Every artist will tell you that the 'I' has very little involvement in the created masterpiece. It is as if an external force takes over.

A spiritual path traveler will know exactly what we talk about. A spiritual path is a journey towards overcoming the ego. You don't battle, you don't question, you just let go by objectively connecting with the Force that takes over. Every Tao traveler is an artist in the true sense. They say of sculptors that they see the object they create first and just take the surrounding debris away. That is exactly how a Tao traveler acts. You just do what is natural and you are so busy following the leads that the " I" just has no chance of speaking up. "Self-surrendering" is a strong expression; perhaps a better way of putting it would be that we see love wherever we go and following love's lead makes you happy indeed.