Life is a balance between what we can control and what we cannot. I am learning to live between effort and surrender. – Danielle Orner
I’m with Danielle. I too am learning to live in the liminal space between effort and surrender, and some days I’m better at it than others…. I see this same struggle in many of my friends and clients, who have excelled in life by being fully in control, until something told them in no uncertain terms that they actually weren’t.
When we experience a loss or a longing that cannot be filled by ordinary measures of effort, it can cause us to question our beliefs about life and ourselves. Few of us want to accept life as uncertain; we want certainty and guarantees, and safe risk (if that’s even possible). Uncertainty, unpredictability and ambiguity make us very uncomfortable.
When we realize that our belief about life has been mistaken, we find ourselves at a loss of what to go do, so we keep doing the same thing over and over again–and that’s like doing more of the same and expecting a different result. It’s an infinite loop that never ends or a wall we keep running into. Effort, although it feels safer and more familiar, may not be the place to go to find resolution.
When we’ve exhausted ourselves and our options, we come to the realization that we have to let go of something, whether it’s a belief, pattern, or issue, that’s holding us back from what we truly want (more joy, connection, purpose, etc.). That letting go is what is called in spiritual terms, “surrender,” and it doesn’t feel either safe or familiar to those of us who have relied solely on effort.
Finding the sweet spot between effort and surrender just may be the key to our frustration and discomfort. Seeing with new eyes that surrender and effort can be complementary–a “both/and” rather than an “or.” What if we surrendered to surrendering? And then acted from there?
Two resources that came to me as I was looking for guidance in this realm have beautiful ways of navigating this liminal space. The process in each, even though they come to it from very different healing perspectives, is strikingly similar. Each has tremendous value and power in itself, and I also found in working with both that blending the two is a truly powerful combination.
The first resource by Michael Mirdad, a spiritual healer, is, Healing the Heart & Soul: A Five-Step, Soul-Level Healing Process for Transforming your Life, which takes a more spiritual approach based on his work with A Course in Miracles. His healing method follows this path:
- Recognizing the issue: the courageous step of recognizing the need for healing and choosing to make a significant change in your life
- Accepting: taking responsibility for identifying the cause(s) of the issue and acknowledging the deeper emotions behind it
- Surrendering: surrendering all issues, emotions, people, events unconditionally by giving them to a higher power for healing
- Refilling: consciously calling in guidance and healing from a higher power and receiving the message
- Giving Thanks: releasing the issue, showing gratitude for the healing and acknowledging your readiness to move on.
The second resource, which I mentioned in an earlier post, by Leslie Davenport, a family therapist and ordained minister, is Healing and Transformation through Self-Guided Imagery, which walks us through self-guided meditation to access our heart’s guidance. Her path to healing and transformation is:
- Asking what you need guidance about: one word or phrase that encapsulates the issue
- Accessing your heart: bringing attention to your breathing by breathing in “Clarity” and breathing out “Peace”
- Discovering your inner sanctuary: allowing an image to arise of a place where you feel most at peace
- Bringing your issue to heart: holding your issue up to receive guidance (surrender)
- Receiving your heart’s guidance: asking your heart for “a wise and loving response”
- Thanking your heart: thanking your heart for its message and integrating its wisdom into your daily life through action.
What’s so amazing is that each process only takes about 20 minutes to complete, and you can do them all on your own. With both, I’ve found writing in a journal helps with the discovery process and integrating the healing guidance into my life.
Surrender all that no longer serves you. Let all that remains buried in your heart come to the surface and be healed. Let there be space for new energies to enter. A new beginning transforms darkness to light. – Anonymous
For those of us who are used to efforting, these powerful, transformative processes provide us with the steps to find our way to surrender and access our inner knowing, which then guides us to right action. We live in that space where both surrender and effort reside.
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