…how to discern between the real deal v.s. bypassing & avoidance...

Like many of you can probably relate to, the past few years in particular have provided a rich opportunity for me to step way out of my old comfort zones, to take huge Leaps of Faith and take risks - some calculated, others rather involuntary & dictated by pure necessity - that would have any sane financial or business advisor break out in a cold sweat & prematurely grey the hair on any caring parent’s head.

It’s probably not surprising then that the question of how to distinguish between real Trust in the “Divine”, anchored in a true Surrendering to a Higher Power, expressed in a full embrace of Acceptance of “What Is” - born from a wise, experienced maturity versus a need to bypass our fears and avoid taking responsibility for our own lives by clinging to a false, tenuous positivity - has been alive within me for quite a while now.

I’ve been contemplating off and on how to put my thoughts around this on paper.

Recently, I have noticed a marked resurgence of this theme of “Trust in the Divine”, both in my weekly Energy Readings (“Weekly Cup of Reflectivi-TEA”) and also, increasingly, in my one-on-one Spiritual Guidance Sessions & conversations with friends.

So, I decided that today is the day to pray for deep insights and inspiration, and to tackle an attempt at putting this intangible, deep & potentially rather contentious topic into at least half-way comprehensible words and strings of thought…wish me luck!

As always, before we proceed to dive in, don your Critical Thinking Cap, fortify yourself with a big dose of Discernment, open your Mind and Heart, and let my offer of Food for Thought run through you in ways that may inspire your own creative thought processes and insights, rather than looking for hard Truths. You won’t find those here. I’ll leave that task for someone else…

WHAT IS DIVINE TRUST, WHAT IS SURRENDER?

To me, Divine Trust and Surrender are like a delicious, cosmic Dance.

You know - that epic, timeless zone of bliss that transcends all time and space, when you are just floating along in complete harmony and unity with your Dance Partner, trusting them implicitly to keep you safe, to not let you bump into anyone, to keep a perfect rhythm & step to the music of your Life, to guide you effortlessly, firmly yet without force, into the most thrilling spins and turns and dives…all without even one, fearful thought of losing control…or being let down…

That’s what Divine Trust and Surrender conjure up for me. Letting go & following the lead implicitly, while knowing yourself to be an equal part of this Divine Dance Co-Creation; willingly surrendering control to a most capable, most beloved and trusted Partner, and enjoying every moment of it…even when - especially when - you cannot predict (nor care to anymore) what the next move is going to be, or when…

Of course, to accomplish such Divine Unity, there may have to be hours and hours of practice…

Sweaty, painful, frustrating and scary practice, at times.

So many ways in which to sabotage your Partner’s moves, missing your steps, resisting that daring move, cursing and swearing under your breath - or perhaps out loud and in your Partner’s face;

so many moments of wanting to give up, to throw in the towel and just go off to dance by yourself, to be in control of all of your own moves…only to find yourself feeling lonely and exposed and like an outcast…

This is our Life. One big, Cosmic Dance. Practice.

Do you like your performance? Do you feel at ease?

Or does it feel strained and awkward? Clumsy and clueless? Forced and unnatural and utterly unpredictable, unsupported, lonely and scary and confusing?

Sit with those questions for a moment before reading on. Where are you really at in regards to Trust?

Do you feel as though you have a Dance Partner in Life, or are you dancing, or stumbling, alone?

Do you even want One??

Have you ever thought about the possibility of being able to gently lean on a Loving Counterpart and let them whisk you through Life in a way that makes all the twists and turns feel like exhilarating fun - instead of risks and dangers to fear and avoid and struggle through?

We don’t often think of Life in this way, as our Partner in Creation, do we. Or of Trust as something we have to practice, suffering through bruises and insults to our ego before we get to fully “earn” and enjoy it…

Well, I am thinking of it like that now. And of how often I find myself forgetting that I have a Partner, trying to find my own stride in a Dance that was only ever designed and intended as a Partnered Dance…

I am thinking of all the many times I have felt so intensely overwhelmed by life, worried, stressed and not seeing a way out of the corners I so often found myself wedged into;

of how many times I simply tried to close my eyes and ears to the music I did not want to face;

of all the painful illusions of feeling my feet weighed down, tethered and grounded in chains, rather than finding their easy flow and rhythm and grace;

and of the power and beauty of contrast, which has taught me so much about appreciating those moments, fleeting or extended, when I feel myself lifted, gently and joyfully, beyond anything my own feet could have carried me to of their own will and stamina.

Those are the kind of moments Surrender and Trust invite and provide. Don’t be shy on taking them up on this offer - there is plenty and more for everyone!

WHAT ABOUT ACCEPTANCE? WHERE DOES ACCEPTANCE COME IN, AND WHAT IS IT?

Acceptance is finding Grace in stumbling, in missing a beat, in finding ourselves on our knees at times, and getting back up to join the Dance once more, humbled and enriched by the experience rather than embarrassed and defeated.

Acceptance is tasting the bitter and the sweet, the sour and the salty, without a need to label or condemn either one as good or bad, better or worse. They just are what they are, and Acceptance is just the Witness, acknowledging their existence. That is all.

Acceptance teaches us surrender of judgments, to let go of our ego’s obsession with sweating the small stuff, to give up our misplaced identification with our pains and sorrows and misfortunes.

Acceptance whispers words of wisdom to any heart that’s listening - “Let It Be!”

Acceptance allows us to breathe slowly - through the tight spots and the tears, through laughter and through loss, so we may keep our equilibrium and find equal peace through the rough rides and the joy rides. Because, in the end, it is all just a ride, and whether we enjoy it or not is very much up to us.

Acceptance is the Eye of the Needle in the Center of the Storm, the Pivot-Point around which our Sacred Dance revolves so much more effortlessly if we let it…

We don’t have to really like what we see or experience. But if we can learn to accept What Is, we can be at peace with it, regardless. We will get into how not to confuse Acceptance with giving up and settling for less a little later on.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN AUTHENTIC DIVINE TRUST, SURRENDER & ACCEPTANCE, V.S. A FAKE SENSE OF POSITIVITY?

If True Trust and Surrender feel like being in Love with every single moment of the Dance, as though your feet have wings and time retreats back into the ethers from which it sprang, a contrived sense of positivity and optimism is like showing up to the Dance Floor on mind-altering drugs;

you may think you’re having fun, that you’re letting go, but underneath it all, your heart is pounding in its chest, expecting to be dropped & start spinning out of control at any moment;

your armpits are sweaty, not from the exertion, but in response to your anxious & hyper vigilant nervous system;

your eyes are squeezed shut, conjuring up memories of all the Happy Endings of your favorite TV shows, so you don’t have to be present in this moment, looking at a Dance Partner you pretend to know and trust, but don’t really…

And because you’re “under the influence” - anywhere from mildly to severely dissociated - you hardly even notice any of those nagging discomforts, wanting to believe you’re having the time of your life…

Does that sound familiar, too? I know I’ve had dances like that…I’d prefer not to repeat those experiences too often if I can help it. And I am learning that I, that we, can help it - with a healthy dose of detached observance and awareness. Hence this article; we will take a look at how to later, in Part II.

**Another symptom of dealing with a deep lack of Trust - in ourselves, in Life, in Spirit - can be the ubiquitous attitude of “It Is What It Is”.**

How many times have we heard this phrase, or used it ourselves?

But wait…doesn’t this sound just like the sage sagacity of Acceptance I just espoused?

Sure does! And, if this utterance truly springs from that Well of Wisdom, wonderful. No problem here. Keep on Dancing.

But when, like so often the case, the saying is tinged, laced, peppered or underlined with a deep sense of “I just can’t be bothered”, “I don’t want to be bothered”, and “I sure as heck don’t want to take responsibility for changing what’s bothering me”…then it would be wise to take another look.

Because this is a sure-fire sign that we are trying to cover up a deep vein of pain, leading all the way down into the bedrock of old stories like, “I am impotent & weak”, “I am at the mercy of life’s injustices”, “life is futile”…and even deeper still - “I’ve been betrayed and abandoned in an inhospitable place with no way out…and I don’t want to face it.”.

Looking at it in this harsh light hurts…but it also leads us down into the heart of a gold-mine of illumination, Self-Realization and profound transformation and freedom - if we dare look, and follow that lead into Surrender…

This is what we will explore in Part II -

how to get to the old wounds that keep us from fully trusting life;

that cause us to seek and hang on to any shred of control we can delude ourselves into;

that have us cover up deeply seated fears & discomforts with many types of masks, including a forced sense of Positivity.

Wounds that stop us from fully enjoying and being present in each Moment.

But before we go there, let’s ask ourselves why we should even want to go there…

WHY IS IT SO IMPORTANT TO EMBRACE TRUE SURRENDER, TRUST & ACCEPTANCE - NOW MORE THAN EVER?

First of all, the obvious - life is just more fun when we’re allowing ourselves to go along for the ride! When we trust our Spiritual Counterpart & enjoy each Moment of the Dance in Present Tense instead of through the lens of past troubles and traumas…

And I believe that we are now rapidly shifting into a Paradigm that has us embrace Fun (with a capital F!) as an integral & essential ingredient of life, that teaches us to watch out for times when we are not having fun & to recognize these as indicators that the rain is not quite as right as it could be.

I believe we are moving out of a predominantly masculine approach to life, which has us pushing and striving and competing, pillaging and exploiting in the name of instant, personal gratification; and that we are now being called to learn to balance it out with a feminine expression of receptivity, creativity, nurturing, support & win-win attitudes.

I believe we are now moving into a cycle of Life on Earth where it is becoming easier, not to mention imperative, to remember our spiritual nature, to remember the Unity of everything that is, as we are coming out of a cycle of extreme individuation & material focus.

In short - we are learning a whole new Dance Move, getting used to a changed & upgraded Dance Floor as well as a whole set of new Dance Companions…and perhaps most importantly, we are remembering our patient, discarded Spiritual Counterpart, our Divine, Omnipresent Dance Partner, standing on the sidelines, waiting for us to invite It back in to our most private & intimate, graceful whirl through this illusion of time & space…

So, why do I feel it is so important to spend time looking behind our “happy” (and certainly, our “unhappy”) masks & all our impoverished, ultimately limiting, inauthentic impersonations of self?

Because, once we become aware of the compensating limp, we can trace it back to the original injury. Once we know we are injured, we can focus on healing.

We now have a Choice - keep limping, slouched around our pain, or correct our posture, find that Inner Spring of Radiant WellBeing & Guidance, and start soaring above the litter that would trip a more heavy-clad pair of feet…

It comes back to that - we do have a Choice!

Not necessarily in what kind of music Life will present us with, but whether to enjoy our improvised, sometimes faltering, other times gracefully floating dance-steps, feeling the loving, supportive arms of our invisible Partner around us; or to keep resisting it, perhaps sitting out that dance altogether & insisting there is no-one worth dancing with, or for…which typically spells “N-o F-u-n”.

As promised, Part II will offer some insights & suggestions about how to notice and & tend to our invisible injuries.

We will also touch on some potential causes behind questions like,

“What if I don’t believe in a Higher Power watching over me?”

“How could I possibly trust something that has never shown up for me before, that doesn’t even acknowledge I exist?”

“What if I am still dealing with ancient trauma around betrayal & abandonment? How do I dance with that??”

I hope you will stick around and join me in Round Two of our current dance together…

"Divine Trust, Surrender & Acceptance" Part I