The Art of Surrendering
Today I’m back to writing after taking some significant time off during one of the most uncertain times in history.
This year has already been one hell of a rollercoaster ride with a pandemic-induced recession, and global crisis and it’s only March. On top of that, it feels like everyone has been dealing with their own personal turmoils (myself included) which has made it incredibly difficult to go about as “business as usual.”
There have been plenty of times in my life when there’s been a snowball effect of challenge after challenge and 2022 is no different.
On January 1st, I set goals to start the year off on the right track. I was manifesting new job opportunities, creating vision boards to become “That girl” and dreamed of travel plans with the hopes of COVID-19 restrictions relaxing. The world was turning over a new page and we were all eager to leave 2020 and 2021 behind.
By January 21, those plans were crushed. I lost my grandmother and aunt on the same day to illnesses they had been battling simultaneously. Not one, but two rocks of the family were suddenly gone.
I stayed at work- drafting documents with pressing deadlines in between calls from relatives and fighting back my tears. I’m thankful to my managers who were decent human beings assuring me that I could take time with my family, but I urged them that the work helped to distract from the grief.
Why did I decide to torture myself? I instinctively want to be in control when everything is exploding around me. Control is the result of being attached to a specific outcome because we believe we know best. Despite trying to stay positive and see every situation as a lesson, there are times in our lives when we have to relinquish that control.
Which is why I’ve been M.I.A. I’ve been seeking refuge in silence without putting unnecessary pressure on myself to be a part of the social media mix or to keep up with what everyone else is doing. There is an art to surrendering control by being comfortable with the uncomfortable.
This isn’t anything new. I’m no psychologist. There are countless sources these days talking about acceptance and surrendering. I’m just finally experiencing this for myself.
It’s been an eye-opening journey understanding that acceptance doesn’t mean that we can’t address the problems in our lives. We can still ask for an apology from someone that’s hurt us. If your car breaks down, you can still ask someone to fix it.
Surrendering doesn’t mean accepting everything as it is. Rather, it’s accepting things we can’t change. Like the end of a relationship. A failure. The death of a loved one. Resistance will never work in these situations. We can’t always change our reality but there is wisdom knowing when to surrender.