There’s another layer of surrender that is constantly revealing itself.

***

In the journey to surrender we all face dissonance that gets our attention – that special recipe that is prepared just for you – or for me.

My journey to surrender involved universal themes (Love, Money) that played out in my life in a uniquely painful and challenging way.

The most profound awareness that came to me prior to complete surrender was the realization that I was the author of the nightmare I was living. It was my desire for control that created the nightmare.

A nightmare I perpetuated all with the goal of experiencing unconditional self love.

I came to the point where I realized I didn’t understand self love.

Didn’t know how to experience it or even what it was.

I realized: “I don’t know.”

***

The path to surrender has been obscured in recent months – especially around my core lesson (self love) as it relates to intimate relationships.

***

I’ve been asking myself: what does it mean to surrender in an intimate relationship?

Does it mean I surrender to my truth, and give voice to it without apology? Or surrender my truth, and not give voice?

Does it mean I surrender to my sweetheart’s truth, my parents’ or my siblings’ truth, and accept that as an overlay – my new truth? If so – that’s never felt good to me!

I want to CONTROL! I want to exert my ideas, my standards, my needs and desires.

I want to serve and love, and connect and support. And I want to be served and loved, and connected with – seen – and supported – in ways that feel good to me.

Two themes here: ME and CONTROL.

***

I’ve been living this in several different relationships in my life – and I haven’t been able to find the right balance. The dissonance has been coming up in lots of different ways.

My response has been to try to think my way through it – to try to figure it all out.

Silly me – haven’t I learned this lesson over and over again?

This is like a dog chasing its tail.

We think we can figure out what the problem is, understand it, solve it, and make things better.

Yet there is no real problem – only the illusion of one.

The more exploration of the illusion one does, the more compelling the illusion. Yet no answer is forthcoming: the problem is impossible to get to the bottom of – it can’t be understood – therefore it can’t be solved – therefore I can’t make things better.

Which in the end is true: I can’t make things better through control.

***

Yesterday the clouds cleared around this question and the path forward became as clear as the mountains that rise towards the sky just out my back door: wherever you attempt to exert control, Ken – there is an opportunity to surrender. Not to your truth, or the other’s truth, but in recognition that “I don’t know.”

***

Despite all my efforts to find a fully resonant path free of dissonance forward, I can’t figure it out. The truth is: I don’t know.

This opens the door to a profound experience of surrender. And as I surrender, I make room for Divine grace in my life – however it will express.

I am giving up control … again.

***

Witness:

God, I don’t know.

Though I think I know what I want – and how I want it to show up, all my efforts to affect these experiences and outcomes – all my efforts at control – have simply led me to more pain and frustration and suffering for me – and for those I love.

I see all the ways I have tried to exert control in my intimate relationships for my entire life.

While I have seen and experienced the limitations of my ideas and strategies, I’ve never fully recognized my behavioral patterns as attempts to control.

I’ve always seen the other (or others) as attempting to control me.

[Funny how clear the mirror is, eh?]

Yet my drive, my ideas, my attempts to control have done nothing other than create dissonance.

At times it’s been minor – at other times, it’s been significant.
My intimate relationships are a mirror for what is happening at the depth of my being in my most intimate relationship: with the Divine.

I’m not happy with that reflection – and I don’t know how to fix it.

I realize I can’t fix it.

I surrender my desire to control my intimate relationships to you. I surrender my desire that I have a particular experience – or outcome.

I recognize that I don’t have the first clue – and I am done with this dance in the illusion of control (separation).

I was confused, I thought I was in charge.

Now I remember I am not in charge.

Whereas I’ve been looking outside myself seeking to control others, I am now turning inward in the recognition that I have been playing in a mirror to avoid looking inside myself for areas where I think I know, rather than getting out of the way and allowing your grace and presence to flow.

I now step into the unknown again. I am throwing out my map. I don’t know where I’m headed – and I certainly don’t know how to get there.

I surrender control again.

You’re in charge God.  Show me the way forward, and I will follow.

Wherever you lead me.

***

Don’t let me pretend that that’s easy for me. It’s not.

Just the act of writing you this email about this topic was hard. But not as hard as living with all my attempts at control in my intimate relationships.

Perhaps sharing my own journey can give you the opening to look at areas of your life where you still want to exert control – whether it’s in your intimate relationship, with your business, your purpose, your thoughts, or something else.

***

This is the transformation we’re going through collectively and individually right now.

We’re moving from controlling/manifesting consciousness into conduit consciousness.

It’s a wild ride and the paradox is on display – there’s no ignoring it anymore:

When you give up control, you open up to a deeper experience of your Divine power.

The caveat: although this is true, if you give up control to have a deeper experience of your Divine power – you haven’t really given up control.

Sometimes that’s funny.  Sometimes it’s really frustrating.

Surrender is one aspect of life where there’s no faking it.

***

What tension in your life is asking for you to release control?

How will you respond to it this coming week?

That’s it for this week … From My Heart.

Peace,

Ken Stone
The Soul Archaeologist
Experience the Divine Within
www.KenWStone.com