Letting Go: The Pathway of Surrender (Power vs. Force, #9)

by David R. Hawkins

Is there such a thing as “healthy” pride? When we talk of healthy pride, we are referring to self-esteem, an inner awareness of one’s true value and worth. This inner awareness is different from the energy of pride. Self-awareness of one’s true value is characterized by lack of defensiveness. Once we have consciously contacted the truth of our real beingness—the nature of our inner self with all of its true innocence, greatness, and nobility of the human spirit—we no longer need pride. We just know what we are, and this self-knowledge is sufficient for us. That which we truly know never needs defense and is different from the energy of pride that we are discussing in this chapter.

A higher feeling state than pride is that of love. If we love all of the things noted above (family, country, accomplishments), that means there is no question of their worth in our mind. We no longer have to be on the defensive. When true recognition and knowledge replace opinion, which is part of pride, there is no room for argument. Our sheer love and appreciation for something is a solid position that cannot be assailed.

The more we surrender our negative emotions, the less we will rely on the crutch of pride. In its place, there will be a quality that the world calls “humility” and that we subjectively experience as peacefulness. True humility is distinct from the paradox of “pride in one’s humility,” or “false modesty,” seen frequently in the public arena. False modesty is the pretense of self-diminishment with the longing that others will recognize the accomplishments that one is so proud of, but too proud to brag about openly. True humility cannot be experienced by the person who is said to possess it, because it is not an emotion. As we have said before, the truly humble cannot be humbled. They are immune to humiliation. They have nothing to defend. There is no vulnerability and, therefore, the truly humble do not experience critical attacks by others. Instead, a truly humble person sees the critical verbalization by another person as merely a statement of the other person’s inner problems.

Because pride is sometimes seen as a motivator of achievement, what would be its higher level substitute? One answer would be joy. What is wrong with joy as the reward for successful achievement, rather than pride? Pride carries with it the desire for recognition from others and, consequently, there is a vulnerability to anger and disappointment if it is not forthcoming at some point. If we achieve a certain goal for the pleasure, enjoyment, love of accomplishment, and the inner joy that it brings to us, we are invulnerable to the reaction of others.

Possessiveness and attachment occur as a consequence of pride. Attachment is, therefore, a potential cause for suffering, because attachment brings about fear of loss and, with loss, we go back into apathy, depression, and grief.

Gratitude is one of the antidotes of pride. If we happen to be born with a high IQ, we can be grateful for it rather than take pride in it. It’s not an accomplishment; we were born with it. If we are grateful for what has been given us and for what has been fulfilled through our God-given talents and endeavors, then we are in a peaceful state of mind and invulnerable to pain.

Pride prevents us from recognizing our own limitations and accepting the help we need to overcome them. Our pridefulness isolates us. When

Are we willing to let go of pride and feeling superior to others? When we are willing to let go of the pseudo-security of pride, we experience the real security that comes with courage, self-acceptance, and joy.

The Courage to Let Go The level of courage is very helpful in the mechanism of surrender. In courage, we know: “I can look at my feelings”; “I don’t have to be afraid of my feelings anymore”; “I can handle them”; “I can take responsibility for them”; “I can learn how to accept them and be free from them”; “I am willing to take risks, to let go of old points of view and to explore new ones”; “I am willing to be joyous and share my experience with others”; “I experience myself as willing and able.”

If we are willing to look at that fear, examine it, acknowledge its presence, see how it has inhibited our life, and begin to surrender it, then our self-esteem increases, whether the fear disappears or not.

We all know that it takes courage to face fear. We champion the people who face their fear and attempt to do something about it. Such courage is one of the characteristics of nobility and makes a person truly great. Despite all of their negative programming and despite all of their fear, courageous people go forward in life, with no guarantee and not even the knowledge that things are going to get better. So courage increases our self-respect and brings to us the respect of others. We no longer need to feel ashamed.

In due time, the underlying fears which require courage to overcome diminish to the point that we move on to acceptance.

Now, on the level of courage, there is greater power and energy. We have the ability to give to others, because other people are no longer being looked at primarily as a means of help, survival, or support. When we are in the state of courage, we sense our own inner power, strength, and self-worth. We know that we have the capacity to make a difference in the world, not just gain something from it for ourselves. Because of the inner self-confidence, we are much less concerned with security. The emphasis is no longer on what people have, but upon what they do, and have become.

With courage, there is the willingness to take chances and to let go of former securities. There is the willingness to grow and benefit from new experiences. This involves the capacity to admit mistakes without indulging in guilt and self-recrimination. Our sense of self-worth is not diminished by looking at areas that need improvement. We are able to admit the presence of problems without being diminished. As a result, energy, time, and effort are put into self-improvement.

On the level of courage, we really start becoming conscious. It dawns on us that we have the freedom and the capacity to choose. We no longer have to be the victim, and freedom in the psychological, emotional, and spiritual sense is possible. Therefore, much less rigidity is present, and because of flexibility and the capacity of concern and genuine love for others,

realization that better states of mind are possible. The level of courage knows that it is not necessary to endure the pain and suffering of the negative emotions or their interference with the satisfactions of life. In courage, we are no longer willing to pay the cost of negativity. We are concerned about the effects of our negative feelings on the welfare of others with whom we are closely associated. Most people who have learned the letting go technique will continue to use it until they have reached this level of consciousness. On this level, their major life problems are now under control. They are experiencing vocational satisfaction and success. Material wants are supplied. Major problems in relationships have straightened out. They are no longer consciously experiencing pain and suffering, and there is satisfaction from having grown and developed in certain areas.

On the level of courage, our capacity to love is now much stronger, and it has the power to support and encourage others, lending strength to that which is positive and constructive in them. Assisting their development brings us the pleasure of watching their growth and their increasing happiness. This capacity within us can grow ever stronger. It can become ever more powerful and self-rewarding as well as more beneficial to others.

These are the moments of breaking through into the experiencing of our real inner Self. The memory of those moments is never forgotten. When they first start to happen, we don’t know what they mean. We think they are “accidental.” “Just due to chance.” We attribute the feeling to external events such as the beauty of a sunset, a symphonic passage, or a loving gesture. But, as we investigate further, we find that these were only the circumstances that allowed something else to happen. They were not the cause. They allowed a certain stillness of the mind to take place, and because of that stillness, we were allowed a moment in which we were able to experience something other than the chatter of our own mind with its incessant, restless play of sensations, feelings, thoughts, emotions, and memories. In the moments when time seems to stand still, we get a glimpse of what is possible. These moments are so rewarding that they are treasured for a lifetime. When they occur, something is experienced that is very impressive. Could it be that, beyond the turbulence of the world and our own mind, there is silence? A realm of peace that is always waiting?

In the state of desire, by contrast, we speak of being “in love,” as the source of happiness and love is thought to be outside of ourselves. When we are in the lower energy level of desire, we are looking to be loved. It seems to be something we “get.” On the level of acceptance, however, our lovingness radiates out naturally from the essence of our being, because many of the blocks to its awareness have been surrendered. We

the state of acceptance, it is possible to forgive our own past, as well as that of others, and to heal past resentments. It is also possible to see the hidden gift in past events about which we have been resentful—including their possible karmic significance. From this level, it is possible to create a different context from which to view the past and thereby heal it.

work. It is easy to see what is destructive and what is optimal, without judging anything as “evil.” There is the elimination of guilt, which accompanies all judgments against others and ourselves. We then see the meaning of the statement, “Judge not, lest ye be judged.”

In acceptance, we are free to be in the present. Once we have accepted our own true nature and the ways of the universe as they are reflected in our world, there is no longer regret about the past, nor is there fear of the future. Fear of the future no longer exists when the past has been healed. This is because in the usual ego-oriented state of consciousness, the ego tends to project the past upon the future, and a past that is viewed negatively becomes fearful when projected upon the imaginary future. Our letting go of the lower energies of guilt, fear, anger, and pride has alleviated the weight of the past and cleared the clouds of the future. We face today with optimism and are grateful to be alive. We see that yesterday is gone, tomorrow has not yet come, and we have only today.

A key to making Love unconditional is the willingness to forgive. With forgiveness, events and people are re-contextualized as simply “limited”—not “bad” or “unlovable.” With humility, we are willing to relinquish our perception of a past event. We pray for a miracle to see the truth about the situation or person, and we surrender all of our opinions about the matter. We look at the payoffs we’re getting from keeping our perception of what occurred, and we let go of each little payoff: the pleasure of self-pity, of “being right,” of being “wronged,” and of our resentments.

Eventually, we surrender the very idea of forgiveness. To forgive someone implies that we’re still seeing the person or situation as “wrong” and, therefore, in need of being forgiven. True surrender means letting go completely of seeing it in such a way. When we surrender our perception completely, letting go of all judgment, then the whole situation is transfigured and we see the person as lovable. Since all judgment is really self-judgment, we have liberated ourselves in the process.

On the level of unconditional love, we love everybody and everything—even Adolf Hitler. We look at him as a person who was taken over by negative energies, and we’re willing to forgi...

every feeling sooner or later runs out, if we just keep letting it go. Moving temporarily to a small

Finally, all of the resistance to the despair was totally and completely let go. Instantly it vanished. The despair, which had been overwhelming and nearly unbearable, vanished in an instant! In its place, there was profound peace beyond description. It was infinite in its dimension, curiously powerful and totally unassailable. There was a profound inner stillness, and all perception of time stopped. Instead of “time,” there was only the motion of the phenomena of the world occurring.

Acknowledging and letting go of suppressed feelings progressively reduces a person’s personal stress proneness, thereby lowering the vulnerability to stress-related problems and illnesses. Most people who learn and practice the letting go technique notice a progressive improvement in physical health and vitality.

Reactivation of pro-health body responses is also seen in non-medical interventions, as in the correlation of meditation practice with a reduction in stress and depression. Research done on college students, for example, found that meditation led to a decrease in their inflammatory stress reaction, which was linked to the alleviation of their depression. The study found that students who participated faithfully in a six-week meditation training experienced improved immune system functioning. The students in a control group, who received only educational information about stress without the inner technique, showed little to no physiological or psychological improvement (Pace et al, 2009).

The most notable stimulus for our understanding is, however, the immediate weakening effect of a negative thought or feeling. A negative thought or feeling instantly weakens the body and creates an imbalance of the body’s energy flow.

As negative thoughts or belief systems are surrendered, they no longer have the power to deplete our energy.

This is a basic law of consciousness: We are subject only to what we hold in mind. The body will respond to what we believe. If we believe that a certain substance is bad for us, then it will usually test weak with muscle testing. The same substance will make another person who believes that it is good for them strong. What is stressful to us, therefore, is primarily subjective. Muscle testing is responsible to unconscious belief systems as well as conscious ones. Testing often reveals that a person unconsciously feels or believes the opposite of what they think they consciously believe. The person, for example, may consciously believe they want to heal but unconsciously be attached to the payoffs of illness. A simple muscle test reveals the truth of the matter. The

It is we ourselves who create stressful reactions as a consequence of what we are holding within us. The suppressed feelings determine our belief systems and our perception of ourselves and others. These, in turn, literally create events and incidents in the world, events that we, then, turn around and blame for our reactions. This is a self-reinforcing system of illusions. This is what the enlightened sages mean when they say, “We are all living in an illusion.” All that we experience are our own thoughts, feelings, and beliefs projected onto the world, actually causing what we see to happen.

Most people are preoccupied with survival in all its subtle forms, and so they reflect primarily fear, anger, and a desire for gain. They have not learned that the state of lovingness is the most powerful of all survival tools.

In our experience, the conscious use of the mechanism of surrender is more effective in addressing chronic stress-related illnesses. Illnesses begin to heal spontaneously because the underlying emotional cause has been removed, and further treatments often become unnecessary.

The rate of emotional growth reported by those who use the mechanism of surrender is related to the consistency with which they surrender their negative feelings, and there is no relationship to age.

This approach is rewarding in all decision-making. When we first clear out the underlying feelings, the decisions are more realistic and wise.

Think of how often we have changed our mind and regretted past decisions. That is because there was an unrecognized and un-relinquished feeling behind the decision. When the action that was decided upon is taken, the underlying feeling shifts. Then, from the viewpoint of the new feeling space, the decision turns out to be wrong. This happens with such regularity that most people develop a fear of decision-making, because it turned out to be wrong so often in the past.

One surprising observation about the mechanism of letting go is that major changes can take place very rapidly. Lifetime patterns can suddenly disappear, and long-standing inhibitions can be let go of in a matter of minutes, hours, or days. Rapid changes are accompanied by an increased aliveness. The life energy set free by the letting go of negativity now flows into positive attitudes, thoughts, and feelings, with a progressive increase of personal power. Thoughts are now more effective. More is accomplished with less effort.

It’s one thing to analyze the causal basis of depression and quite another to enter fully into the depth of hopelessness by letting go of your resistance to the feeling. By allowing the full feeling of it and by letting go of every sensation, every thought, and every little payoff you are getting from it, you are free.

The goals of letting go are far beyond those of psychotherapy. The ultimate aim of letting go and surrendering is total freedom. The goal of therapy is readjustment of the ego to a more healthy balance.

The objective of psychotherapy is to replace unsatisfactory mental programs with more satisfactory ones. In contrast, the objective of letting go is the elimination of limiting mental and emotional programs. It is the attainment of an unconditioned mind and, ultimately, transcendence of the mind itself to higher states of consciousness of love and peace. In

The goal of letting go is the elimination of the very source of all suffering and pain.

Ultimately, all negative feelings stem from the same source. When enough negative feelings have been relinquished, that source reveals itself. When that source itself is let go of and dis-identified with, the ego dissolves. The source of suffering, therefore, loses the very basis of its power.

Each of us has a limit to the amount of negative feelings we have stored up. When the pressure behind an emotion has been let go, that emotion no longer occurs. For instance, if fear is constantly surrendered for a period of time, eventually it runs out. It then becomes difficult or almost impossible to fe...

Before reading on, it is advisable to sit quietly and make an inner decision to let go resisting higher levels of functioning. This means to make a decision to stop denying the higher levels to yourself, and to make a decision to let go of all blocks to happiness, success, health, acceptance, love, and peace. By doing this, the deed is already done, for you have set the whole experience into a context that will automatically begin to unfold.

The higher our inner self-esteem, the less we need the approval of others.

Fear results in chronic anger and makes us prone to attack and to inner emotional chaos. Pain and suffering occur, with periodic despair and proneness to emotional upset. The ego-mind, which sees everyone as separate, is envious of anyone else who appears happier, more successful, or with a better relationship, a better body, or better connections. Soon, because of a lack of inner clarity about goals, there is confusion leading to self-pity, envy, and further resentment. Self-condemnation gets endlessly projected onto the world, taking the form of condemnation from others, which increases further the guilt and feeling of smallness.

The low self-esteem results in criticism of self and others, constant competition and comparison, analyzing, contempt, intellectualization, doubt, and fantasies of revenge. When all of those mechanisms fail, there is the recurrence of apathy and feelings of hopelessness and victimization. In such a state, we become progressively alienated because there is so much of ourselves that we must hide. Our behavior leads to isolation from others and an imbalance due to over-valuation of the areas of life that do seem to work.

To handle this area, we have to realize that almost everyone has these fantasies. Playing ostrich with them, thinking that they are wicked or that we are guilty, will not resolve them. We have to come up to the level of courage and look at our worst feelings, admit that they are part of the condition of being human, and remember that we are only held accountable for what we do with them. It is obvious that these negative feelings take an enormous emotional toll on our own inner selves. That reason alone is sufficient to warrant looking at them and letting go of them.