This journey continues and I see the changes in my life happening. A comment from one of the people who read my blog and who saw me last evening was that I even looked more positive. What reward that was to hear. Just those few words are already helping me stay focused today and keep venturing on.
Today's task came so strongly to me last night that even before midnight the words were flowing through my head. I had the great opportunity to listen to a friend recount a recent trip. Flying is not something this friend does often like my husband and I tend to have the opportunity to do, but I could relate to her story. On the return trip, my friend and her husband experienced pretty bad turbulence. As she dug her fingernails into her husbands leg, he leaned over to her and said, "You have to let go and let God."
So today's topic is letting go. As I reflected on her story I thought of all the times that I would ride would someone in a car and how I'd find myself "stepping on the brakes" from the passenger seat as if there were a brake for the car there on my side. How often do we try to control situations in our lives that are not ours to control? When we try to control these things, what happens? One of three things; 1. We can't control the situation at all because we have no say in it; 2. We hurt someone in the long run; or 3. We get hurt ourselves when all is said and done. And when we attempt to control things in our lives it gets tiring. How often have we tried to control a situation to only have the domino effect of other things coming up that then we feel we have to control too? It's exhausting!
As I mentioned briefly yesterday, there are things going on of a rather personal nature with some family members. The issues aren't relevant today as much as how those issues impact me in my life. Throughout my life I have tried to be the peacekeeper in the family...a role my parents passed onto me at a young age. I always had to give in and say I'm sorry. It's a role that drove me to my edge just a few months ago. Yet, part of me still wants to make everything right for everyone. Happy for everyone. Peaceful for everyone. Today's task of letting go will be a very challenging one as I have to keep reminding myself, no matter how much I want to, that I can't control everything. I can't control the turbulence on this airplane. I have to remind myself that eventually things will level out and I have to let the pilot of my life (in this case God) continue to steer the plane. It's hard to see people you care about hurting, to see disarray where you know there should be love. But their issues are not my issues to fix...and I have to be reminded of that today.
Letting go doesn't only involve family issues though. It can be things going on at work or for some people school. It can be how we believe that weather should be. (This morning as I looked out my picture window at the cold snow and got a shiver, I had to remind myself that I don't control the weather...). It can be pain. Letting go also physically improves us. If we are less tense about the situations at hand, our muscles relax, the acid in our stomach lessens a bit, our headaches go away, and we can open our eyes to the good things in life. (And our husbands/wives legs or hands are saved from the ingraining of our fingernails!)
Yet letting go involves a realm of trust. If we aren't giving it to God to take into control, then we are trying to let people control our lives and that's when human error can step in. We are all human and trust can sometimes feel broken by other humans. Maybe trusting in other people will be a future task, but for today it will be letting go and letting God. (For those of you non-catholic or christian, then let go and let the higher power you believe in handle things...)
As I conclude, I am going to leave you with a mantra I use to repeat to myself from my days in attending Overeaters Anonymous meetings and are the first three steps in any AA, NA, Al-Anon, etc type of program: "I can't. God can. I'll let God."
I'm writing this a few days late, but the post was very interesting and applicable. I have to say that I carry a few marks in my leg from those tense moments in the car or plane. You could even be talking about me since my wife and I were recently flying, and we discussed how we have no choice but to trust that the pilots are worthy and not drunk. And since we were told that a lot of them still do fly drunk, we have to realize that the real flyer of that plane is of course, God. Believe me, I know that I was praying plenty for that flight. But even though we had turbulence, I was okay with it all. My wife was however, pale as a ghost for awhile.
ReplyDeleteI recall yesterday, as I sat with some guys, that some comments were being thrown at me. They were said as jokes, but they weren't totally jokes. After about the forth time it happened, it was hard to keep taking it, but yet I ignored it, and told myself to let go and let God. It will be all right, and it will be better. It will work itself out in time. I did nothing wrong to deserve this, and those responsible will see their mistake without me doing anything at all.
Let Go, and Let GOD.