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As powerful as relaxing and letting go is, it remains an incomplete. Necessary, but you can’t relax and let go and expect that you’ll automagically move you where you want to go. The good news there is that we’re simply not wired to let go completely. While this presents problems in learning to let go, it does keep us stimulated to action. Action is necessary if we are to benefit the world. However, if we focus too much on the actions to take, we tend to overdo. This quite often runs us into a nasty “failure” scenario. In The Secret of Successful Self-Development, Jenny detailed a metaphor from childhood which illustrated the nature of this conundrum, although the scenario was a little different.
The paradox of desire.
While it’s a great idea to have goals and desires, when we get too attached to the outcome, we often let our emotions overrule what we know is right. In spite of both logic and intuition, we proceed based on feelings of urgency or fear and actually wind up not doing what we know is right. In our exuberance or our fear we try to take extreme measures and tend to over correct. A readily accessible demonstration of this is when a major public figure requires medical attention. Especially in emergencies. Normally skilled, confident and competent doctors have been known to give in to panic because of the attachment they have to the outcome of their work.
The real conundrum is that the desire is there, but the attachments that come with that desire get in the way.
High intentions, low attachments.
As we look at this, we come back to what happens when I find myself frustrated. Maybe my meditation isn’t going where I want it, or I’m having difficulty sticking with a practice I know benefits me. What I have learned (and am still learning, as this is not so much an idea as a mode) is that if I can find the time and courage to step back and let go of the attachments, and examine what my intentions really are, I find that when I return to what it is, one of two things will have happened:
- In the first scenario, I will realize that what I’m looking at doesn’t really serve my intentions, and should be let go. Generally, I can complete the process of letting it go before I get re-attached. Not always, as I like to feel that I’m making progress, regardless of the direction.
- In the second scenario, I find that I am not as focused on the means or the method, but instead am aligned with the intention, and thus will re-work the means and methods to work towards that intention. The voices of doubt and fear are quieted for now, so now is the time to act, before they come back. Yes, it is possible that the end result will not match the intention. But taking the correct action now, and the next correct action after that will be a much surer path than letting my fears run away with me.
My frustration has evaporated. I am no longer bound to the result: I will do what I can to see to my intention, but realize that the result is not in my total control.
Threading the needle: Intentions without attachments.
Intending a result without getting attached to it is a tricky business. I’m just starting (at present) to get a handle on it. At the core of the concept is the nature of your identity: Is your identity reliant on the result, or are you an independent being who is trying to make a change in the world?
If you can recognize and realize that you, the you waaaay deep down, is an indestructible being and can’t be hurt by the result one way or another, you can move on to the thought that while you may want to be/do/have something, you as an indestructible being do not need it. As soon as you realize that you are beyond needing it, the scenario almost turns into a playground. Your skills and thoughts sharpen, and you become much more creative than you were when you were piling on the pressure at the behest of the attachments.
A challenge does rear its head when you are acting on behalf of others. (Remember the doctors from earlier?) Here your fears can draw a line and say “Ok, we might be all right, but how about them? How will you react if they wind up in bad shape?” Ironically enough, this is when it is most important to not let your attachments and fears rule you. When I get into this kind of a jam, I have to take a further step back and remind myself of a few facts:
- Given that deep down, I am an invincible, indestructible being, it must follow that everyone else is as well, either by virtue of us all being one, or by virtue of the fact that we are all “built” basically the same. As such, my actions cannot truly harm another.
- Furthermore, even if the above premise is not accepted, it has been demonstrated that I operate better if I can let the attachments go. Therefore, if I really am to be/do/have whatever, it becomes necessary to release the attachments in order to serve others. In effect turning the attachments against themselves.
Do you have any experiences in this matter to share? Please do so in the comments!
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