On letting go

Our capacity to let go is intimately connected to our willingness to be shown something we don’t want to see. Can we see without judgement, without blame, without guilt? (Adyashanti)

There are a couple of problems with our willingness to let go. First we have to understand that we really want to let go of something. Second, once we have realized that that we have outgrown a behavior or a longing, we have to figure out how to. Take greed for example. No one wants to be greedy, yet many are. Greed and neediness is so ugly that we develop nice sounding stories that tell us that we are after love instead. The love of the attractive woman we aspire to make our own, or the love for our professional mission. We run after lovers because deep down inside we crave to be needed and looked up to. We put our heart and soul into our work only to learn years later that our economic insecurities and our hunger for being popular was behind this drive and nothing else. It is hard to have these revelations, and we hate it if some try to rip off our virtual reality glasses, so we fight them instead.

Why don’t you stop everything right now. Sit down and close your eyes. Visualize your loved ones, your work mission, your accomplishments. Breathe deeply, and let memories, cravings and fantasies drift in and out just like in a dream-like state. What feelings are attached with those images? Sort through them one by one and start peeling the onion layer after layer until you truly experience love, or in the ego state, experience the fear. Being on an Awakening journey implies an openness to see what is, not what you want to see. It’s a calling, not a choice. I can tell you from personal experience that life’s willing messengers will rip these virtual reality glasses off anyhow, and it will be painful. So why don’t you change course and drop your romantic ideas of what spirituality and love is supposed to look like and face life as it is instead. The economic necessities, the encouragements and the rejections. Drop the virtual reality gear and see life as is.

Can we see without judgement, without blame and without guilt? Yes we can, but we have to be open to change and dance with life willingly to get to that stage.