when it's hard to let go...

I've been struggling hard with the "s-word" again....
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S-U-R-R-E-N-D-E-R

I'm no stranger to endings or choosing to let things go. I've been-there-done-that quite a lot the last several years.
So when I received the invitation to surrender again recently, my immediate thought was to question what else I could possibly let go of after all the work I had already done.

But what I've learned is that in most cases, surrender isn't a once-and-done kinda deal. When we carry heavy baggage and have a lot of "old ways" weighing us down, we often have to make the choice to let go over and over and over again. Surrender (or if you don't like that word - letting go, releasing control, practicing detachment...) is a practice. It takes time and patience.

When I finally allowed myself the time to sit down and get really honest with myself about what else I needed to release, the answers came pretty easily. I knew intuitively what I was still grasping on to and where I needed to loosen my grip.

I've already done a lot of work on releasing control and stepping into the flow of life. But sometimes, I still get tripped up by a desire to want to control something again. I start pushing and forcing, trying to make things happen. And that's where my progress stops and I feel stuck and get frustrated. When I find myself here, I need to make the conscious choice to let go, stop fighting with life, and step back into flow. I need to wait for things to unfold and get curious about where life is taking me next. This requires openness to uncertainty, ambiguity, and the unknown. It requires some self-compassion and trust, too.

We have the opportunity to continue to learn and evolve throughout our life. Sometimes we are presented with big callings about where we are being invited to go next. We get a big idea, create a new vision and write lofty goals.
But sometimes, our callings are about what we need to leave behind - even if we don't know exactly where we are going yet.