WHILE THE EGO REMAINS tortured by the necessity of surrendering control to the silent and often unexplainable hands of fate, the ups and downs of your journey exist as the soul’s most exciting and rewarding course of mastery. The reason why the ego cannot ever successfully surrender is because it is the very thing being surrendered. While the ego works toward surrendering, often viewing the Universe through a lens of reward and punishment, the closest it can get is admitting, “I don’t know how.”
When “I don’t know” can be embraced, it signifies a readiness for the deeper path of spiritual evolution. It’s much like the energy of a relay runner who senses the baton they carry is meant to be handed over to the next runner as they complete their leg of the race. It’s a giving up, and a letting go. Admitting what we don’t know is the ultimate release. When this is experienced from the ego’s point of view, it can often feel like guilt, shame, depression, or a sense of worthlessness.
While the ego views the unknown as a great loss or void, the soul experiences each moment of unsuspecting change as the end of the old and the beginning of something new.
When we are aligned with the soul, we don’t have to be excited about the prospects of devastation, loss, or not knowing in order to remain open to the fate of infinite potential. From the soul’s point of view, people, places, and things are costumes that Source wears, only playing the exact role to help our light come out of hiding. When lost in ego, life is a stressful pursuit of seeking pleasure to avoid the burden of pain. As this occurs, each character is judged by the actions that have been orchestrated on a level of reality beyond the notion of individual choice.
Whether in the aftermath of loss or at the brink of personal despair, a readiness to surrender occurs through moments of “I don’t know.” It doesn’t mean we walk around refusing to understand, shirking our responsibilities, or pushing away the pearls of insight that come to us. It is more an ease of serenity in which we can be honest about our pain while remaining open to a process that goes far beyond beliefs of fairness or right and wrong.
To prepare for the five stages of surrender, please consider the wisdom of the following questions as a way of embracing the beauty of “I don’t know.” As always, merely read each question, whether silently or aloud, and feel into the truth of a more expanded viewpoint.
Why do I need to know what I don’t right now?
What if having a deeper knowing won’t change how I feel?
What if everything comes to mind at the exact moment it is meant to be known?
Am I willing to trust more of what I don’t know than the things I insist to be true?
What would this moment be like if I allowed myself to be open with nothing more in need of being known, resolved, or clarified?
Can I see how even when I’m given a deeper knowing, it only creates a hunger to know more?
When has knowing ever led me to not needing to know?
Will I allow life to know everything on my behalf and bring me each insight on its precise terms and conditions?
Whether you feel an openness and relaxation in response to each question or you get triggered emotionally, embracing the beauty of “I don’t know” offers an initial step out of the prison cell of personal belief.
STAGE 1: THE END OF PERSONAL ABANDONMENT
While some of our deepest wounds come from feeling abandoned by others, it is surprising to see how often we abandon ourselves through the way we view life. It’s natural to perceive through a lens of blame at the moment of emotional impact, but each stage of surrender offers us time and space to regroup and open our viewpoints for our highest evolutionary benefit.
It’s okay to feel wronged by people or traumatized by circumstances. This reveals anger as a faithful guardian reminding us how overwhelmed we are by the outcomes at hand. While we will inevitably use each trauma as a catalyst for our deepest growth, such anger informs us when the highest importance is being attentive to our own experiences like a faithful companion.
As waves of emotion begin to settle, we may ask ourselves, “Although I feel wronged, what am I going to do about it?” Will we allow experiences of disappointment or even cruelty to inspire our most courageous decisions and willingness to evolve?
When viewing others as characters who have wronged us, a moment of personal abandonment occurs. Instead of remaining present to the sheer devastation we feel, a need to align with ego can occur through the blaming of others.
While it seems nearly instinctive to see life as the comings and goings of how people treat us, when focused on cultivating our most Divine qualities, pain often confirms how quickly we are shifting from ego to soul. From the soul’s perspective, pain represents the initial steps out of the identity and reference points of an old reality as we make our way into a brand new paradigm of being. The more this process is attempted to be rushed, the more insufferable it becomes.
To end the agony of personal abandonment, we enter the first stage of surrender by asking the following question:
Am I seeing this moment in a way that helps or hurts me?
From the standpoint of ego, life is a play of me versus you or us versus them. But from the soul’s perspective, characters are like instruments that help develop and uncover the melody of our highest vibration. Even when the friction of conflict seems to divide people, as souls we are working together to play out the exact roles to clear, activate, and awaken our true radiance. The more aligned in Source energy we become, the easier each moment of transformation tends to feel. This doesn’t mean we are immune to disappointment, heartbreak, or devastation. Instead, we are keenly aware of how often life is giving us the chance to grow and expand. A willingness to be stretched and re-created into a more refined form is a testament to the fiercely liberated nature of our soul.
To the ego, the soul’s willingness to grow under the threat of any circumstance seems foolish, shortsighted, and insane. This is because the ego can only interpret that reality as worry, anticipation, and regret.
During such stages of incubation, there is little to no awareness of taking responsibility for our view of things. This is because we are often too overwhelmed by the pain of loss and the anxious despair of unavoidable change.
Throughout the first stage of surrender, we respect the gravity of our feelings, acknowledge each thought, belief, or conclusion as having a right to exist, and welcome each experience—no matter how surreal, one-sided, or distasteful it seems. This occurs by relinquishing any tendency of personal abandonment by focusing on whether we are helping or hurting our experience by the way we view it.
While people, places, and things come and go in their own rhythm and trajectory, they are woven in and out of our reality as instigators of change. The more willing we are to show ourselves unwavering emotional support, the less likely we are to make the actions of others the reason for our pain.
STAGE 2: DISSOLVING ATTACHMENT
Surrender is a willingness to become unstuck. All too often, the barrier to such clarity, peace, and freedom is an attachment to things looking or acting in a specific way. While it is wonderful when the inevitabilities of life match our deepest desires, we are not meeting each moment in freedom when we need it to exist solely on our personal terms and conditions.
When we are attached to an outcome, understanding becomes argumentative, communication creates conflict, and benevolence turns to blame. As attachments dissolve, we are able to wholeheartedly embrace the depths of our own experience, while honoring the truth of others, no matter how drastically it differs from ours.
In ego, we insist on being right in the minds of others. As the soul, we allow everyone to be heard without needing anyone to change their position or viewpoint.
In order to advance to the next stage of surrender, it is important to unravel the three prime attachments that bind us in ego. They are explored by considering the following question:
What am I afraid to admit, lose, or gain?
Asking such a question is a way of seeing through the facade of symbolism. It is the difference between the way things are and what they personally mean to you. While an apple pie from the store can have a similar aroma to one your grandmother made, if you take a bite of it, that doesn’t mean you are actually eating a slice of her pie. As we wake up from the dream of symbols, everything is given the freedom to exist without becoming a representation of personal meaning that perhaps we alone have created.
Relationships are always a perfect example. While a marriage symbolizes the commitment between two partners, it can only be an establishment of connection for as long as both people are willing. When one no longer feels the way the other one does, it can signify the transformation or even the dissolving of a relationship, depending on how it’s symbolized. If a partner defines our existence, what happens to our existence if that partnership ends?
In ego, realities crumble as symbols change. It can be disillusioning to discover that what something has always symbolized for us may mean something entirely different to someone else. It often leads to moments of profound exasperation, where the person you knew and loved has now changed, for better or worse. Instead of honoring the pain of loss or supporting their changing of ways, we tend to grasp onto each symbol to keep it intact as a way of avoiding the devastation of an unraveling ego.
As a way of dissolving our attachments to symbols—so we can meet reality as it is—we set aside the tendency to tell ourselves what things mean: We can dare to experience each moment without drawing conclusions. What if the ending of a career didn’t have to symbolize a threat against our livelihood? What if the dissolving of a relationship didn’t mean the death of love? What if betrayal didn’t indicate anything less than about us? What if another person’s opinion had nothing to do with how we view ourselves or them?
In the heart of surrender, we come to see that we tend to oppose outcomes or deny circumstances because of how they change, limit, or distort our sense of self. When rooted in ego, our inner value comes and goes like emotional weather patterns of ever-changing circumstance. From the soul’s point of view, we are not angry, hurt, or disappointed due to each outcome, but because of what we believe is true about us, as a result of each occurrence.
This is why the second stage of surrender asks, What am I afraid to admit, lose, or gain?
To explore the second stage of surrender at an even deeper level, please consider the wisdom of the following questions:
What am I afraid to admit will be true about myself when and if things don’t go my way?
What am I afraid is true about me that makes me feel ashamed and causes me to overcompensate in life just to prove that belief wrong?
What’s the most painful thing I believe about myself when no one is looking?
What defines my sense of self that I am the most afraid to lose? Who do I think I’d be without it?
Whether a disease, enemy, debt, or any type of adversity, what’s the worst thing I am afraid to face?
What conclusions would I draw if I were to encounter it?
How does life change when I see each thing as an individual creation, instead of what it personally symbolizes or means to me?
As each person, place, and thing becomes a living expression of Source energy, instead of a reflection of our most limiting ideas, we are able to meet the truth of reality, whether appearing to serve our needs or conspiring against us. From this space, we no longer use the actions of others to inspire self-criticism, while allowing gains and losses to come and go without a desperate grip.
STAGE 3: MOVING BEYOND LIMITING BELIEFS
As part of the five stages of surrender, the Golden Question asks: What if the worst things that ever happened to me were the greatest opportunities I have ever been given?
Such a huge shift in perspective allows enough space for our experiences to breathe, instead of being stifled by the symbols projected upon them. Each time it’s considered, the Golden Question helps us face life without a need to confine it as an image, or wedge it into a frame of thought.
As we become more aligned with Source, what may have been true before doesn’t have to be true now, since reality takes shape and form on a path of ever-growing expansion.
Whether you and another person are meant to grow together or inevitably drift apart, it is a timeless journey that has already been written across all galaxies. Whichever version or timeline we encounter is solely dependent upon how much ego has dissolved and how profoundly our soul can expand. This is precisely why other people are spiritual allies along the soul’s journey. Whether depicted in mind as friends, foes, victims, or victimizers, they have been delivered into our reality to inspire profound shifts.
In order to reap the most rewards from each encounter without denying the importance of our deepest feelings, we dare to see through the imprinting of our most limiting beliefs.
To explore reality outside of the distorted view of limiting beliefs, please consider the wisdom of the following questions:
What have the actions of others caused me to falsely believe about myself?
What was the most hurtful thing anyone ever said or did that caused me to feel unworthy, unwelcomed, or unsafe?
What has my past led me to conclude?
What person, place, or thing triggers the most limiting response in me?
Why do the actions of other people have the power to determine my experiences?
What would my life be like beyond the notion of right or wrong?
Am I afraid that without the false protection of limiting beliefs, I’ll be a bigger target for pain, rejection, and misfortune?
What evidence or ideas do I use to justify hiding, shutting down, pulling back, or turning away?
As such questions are considered, it is natural to feel the inner grip of attachment beginning to dissolve. It is where the inner landscape of our energy field opens up space for the RAW qualities of the soul to emerge.
STAGE 4: THE GRACE OF DEVASTATION
In order to fully align with the wisdom and grace of Source, it is important to trust its guidance on an unconditional level. Whether it’s following a gut instinct or just being willing to open ourselves up to change, the more we trust the light of our own divinity, the easier it is for the soul to expand. Even when the circumstances of reality seem to be imploding with magnificent precision, trust offers opportunities to explore our deepest surrender through greater leaps of faith.
Instead of trusting Source, despite how elusive, invisible, or intangible it seems to be, we often align with the most limiting beliefs, ideas, and choices that maintain the torment of emotional pain. When the fate of our expansion needs to break open greater space and perspective, it spares no expense in dismantling each blockage of imprinting that we so often perceive as ourselves.
In order to allow the grace of our most devastating hardships to bring us into communion with Source energy, instead of confirming our most limiting beliefs, the fourth stage of surrender can be explored through the following question:
Am I willing to be devastated in order to reveal the deepest truth within me?
While it’s natural to desire something new, it’s a far grittier undertaking to allow the old to be dismantled as a way of creating fresh space. We may not need to be devastated at every turn, but as long as we are willing to be completely blindsided, uprooted, disappointed, and in some cases even betrayed, we are offering absolute faith to our deepest truth.
Such devastation may require unsuspecting change or the unsavory actions of others, seemingly without any degree of remorse. Whether in response to a job loss, divorce, the diagnosis of an illness, or even the loss of a loved one, this is not done to hurt us in any way but to flip the ego’s reality upside down, just to reorient points of reference into the soul’s perspective.
Each and every time the grace of devastation enters our reality, we have an equal opportunity to either cement the falsehood of limiting beliefs or to allow limiting beliefs to melt away by walking through the fire of our most epic disaster.
We may not know why things are happening or where it’s all going, but in order for the soul to lead the way, the ego must be shaken from its grip of control. The more we are willing to align with Source, trust in the gift of our journey, and welcome devastation without requiring difficulty in order to grow, the easier all aspects of life transform from the inside out.
From this space, we develop long-lasting sacred partnerships in which two people can merge and harmonize with each other, without constant emotional triggers, limiting beliefs, or patterns of conditioning dividing one heart from the other.
STAGE 5: EMBRACING ADVERSITY
As we discover the freedom to meet each other as expressions of our own divinity, we find the safety, comfort, and courage to remain open, even when pain or panic are begging us to run away, withdraw, check out, or shut down.
When everything is here to help you, despite how callous, unbearable, and insufferable life seems, the most unwavering faith to our deepest truth always leads us home, no matter how displaced we may be for any amount of time. From the viewpoint of ego, the plight of adversity confirms that since things don’t seem okay, they can only continue to not be okay. Only the ego says no to the pain and despair of unavoidable loss.
And yet, from the soul’s perspective, nothing is required to feel or be in any other way than how it unfolds. This is because the soul is the inherent trust existing within the oneness of Source energy that becomes more of an instinctive experience as your journey of surrender deepens.
While the truth of Source energy is ever present and eternal, any tangible form, including the ego, can only exist in a dimension of time. If it exists in time, it’s always bound to change. No pain or loss can truly last forever, but in whatever way is needed for it to let go it will be relentless in the ego’s unraveling.
To clarify another outdated belief of the old spiritual paradigm, you are not the one who lets things go. You are the one who is let go of.
Once the ego is dissolved by the unavoidable winds of change, a renewed space welcomes into our reality fresh experiences and greater perspective.
To step forward into the forefront of the soul’s journey, it is essential to take the next leap into stage five of our deepest heartfelt surrender. It can be accessed by considering the following question:
How can I view adversity in a way that is more loving, supportive, and wise?
Simply by considering this option, we are aligning with the soul by serving the needs of our experience. Once we recognize the limiting beliefs that have kept us so stuck, we can use the power of our ever-expanding awareness to consider viewpoints that support our innocent nature rather than undermine it.
In order to embrace adversity as an entry point into stage five of surrender, please consider the wisdom of the following questions:
What is life like when everything is reward without belief in punishment?
Is life really punishing me or just not giving me what I want?
What if not getting what I want for a temporary amount of time is a gift in disguise?
What if my struggles transformed relationships and realities, creating higher levels of intimacy and fulfillment?
What qualities are being refined when adversity occurs?
Is it possible that I’m only meant to survive each adversity to help me see myself in all my magnificence, power, and glory?
As we end the plight of personal abandonment and allow the grip of attachment to dissolve, we dare to meet each moment beyond the framework of limiting beliefs, no matter how much devastation or adversity we are meant to face. From this space, we allow the old paradigm of reality to be set ablaze, so the inner phoenix of our true angelic potential can triumphantly ascend from its ashes.
To help embody the insights of the five stages of surrender, please consider the wisdom of or repeat aloud the following statement:
I accept that my transition from ego to soul occurs through my deepest heartfelt surrender. Instead of blaming each circumstance and character for the expansions they inspire, I relinquish each weapon of defense, so I may embrace how everything is here to help me.
This occurs by seeing each moment in a way that helps instead of hurts me, finding the courage to admit what I am afraid to admit, lose, or gain, considering how the worst things that ever happened to me were the greatest opportunities to evolve and embrace my deepest truth even if it means being devastated, while viewing each moment of change in the most loving, supportive, and wise way.
From this space of heartfelt surrender, I am able to honor things as unique expressions of Source energy, where life can ebb and flow without shaking my sense of self-worth. As this occurs, I am elevating my vibration, as well as uplifting the consciousness of humanity for the well-being of all. And so I am released.
Whether we are feeling more relief, inner peace, and harmony than ever before, or still making our way through the integration of each stage, it is our willingness to surrender to life on its precise terms and conditions that manifests the beauty, power, and perfection of our highest potential. Maybe there appears to be a brighter light at the end of the tunnel, or maybe there is just too much darkness for one person to bare. In either case, there always remains a deeper reason for why things happen for the fulfillment of a mission that you incarnated to complete.