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

by David R. Hawkins

A far better alternative is to take responsibility for our own feelings and neutralize them. Then, only positive feelings remain to be expressed.

“They made me angry.” “He got me upset.” “It scared me.” “World events are the cause of my anxiety.” Actually, it’s the exact opposite. The suppressed and repressed feelings seek an outlet and utilize the events as triggers and excuses to vent themselves. We are like pressure-cookers ready to release steam when the opportunity arises. Our triggers are set and ready to go off. In psychiatry, this mechanism is called displacement. It is because we are angry that events “make” us angry. If, through constant surrendering, we have let go of the pent-up store of anger, it is very difficult and, in fact, even impossible for anyone or any situation to “make” us angry.

Focus on the feeling itself, not on the thoughts. Thoughts are endless and self-reinforcing, and they only breed more thoughts. Thoughts are merely rationalizations of the mind to try and explain the presence of the feeling. The real reason for the feeling is the accumulated pressure behind the feeling that is forcing it to come up in the moment. The thoughts or external events are only an excuse made up by the mind.

By continuously letting go, it is possible to stay in that state of freedom. Feelings come and go, and eventually you realize that you are not your feelings, but that the real “you” is merely witnessing them. You stop identifying with them. The “you” that is observing and is aware of what is happening always stays the same. As you become more and more aware of the changeless witness within, you begin to identify with that level of consciousness. You become progressively primarily the witness rather than the experiencer of phenomena. You get closer and closer to the real Self and begin to see that you had been duped by feelings all along. You thought that you were the victim of your feelings. Now you see that they are not the truth about yourself; they are merely created by the ego, that collector of programs which the mind has mistakenly believed are necessary for survival.

The ego is not our friend. Like “master control” in Tron (1982), it wants to keep us enslaved by its programs.

Every activity or desire will reveal that the basic goal is to achieve a certain feeling. There are no other goals than to overcome fear and achieve happiness. Emotions are connected with what we believe will ensure our survival, not with what actually will. Emotions themselves are actually the cause of the basic fear that drives everyone to seek security constantly.

In making this choice, it is well to look at the payoff we get from hanging on to the residuals of a painful experience. What are the satisfactions we are getting? How little are we willing to settle for? Anger. Hatred. Self-pity. Resentments. They all have their cheap little payoff, that little inner satisfaction.

So the question is, “How long do we want to go on suffering? When are we willing to give it up? When is enough enough?”

Greatness is the courage to overcome obstacles. It is the willingness to move to a higher level of love. It is the acceptance of others’ humanness and having compassion for their suffering by putting ourselves in their shoes. Out of the forgiveness of others come self-forgiveness and the relief of guilt. The real payoff we get is when we let go of our negativity and choose to be loving; we are the ones who benefit. We are the ones who gain from the real payoff. With this increased awareness of who we really are comes the progressive invulnerability to pain. Once we compassionately accept our own humanness and that of others, we are no longer subject to humiliation, for true humility is a part of greatness.

Blaming others or ourselves is simply not necessary.

To overcome blame, it is necessary to look at the secret satisfaction and enjoyment we get out of self-pity, resentment, anger, and self-excuses, and to begin to surrender all of these little payoffs.

“How long am I willing to pay the cost? What were the karmic propensities to begin with? How much blame is enough? Is there a time to call an end to it? How long will I hang on to it?

Simply put, we are either positively or negatively influenced by the company we keep. It is unlikely that we will overcome an inhibition if we choose to be in the company of others who have our same problem.

First, it was far more energy-saving to foster relationships with positive people. Secondly, one of the laws of consciousness is that “like goes to like”; bitterness attracts bitterness, whereas love attracts love.

The mechanisms whereby this comes about were so beautifully exemplified in the movie, Tron, in which the very function of “master

Desire, especially strong desire (e.g., cravingness), frequently blocks our getting what we want.

Rather, the reason to let go of selfishness is simply because it is impractical. It doesn’t work. It’s too costly. It consumes too much energy. It delays the accomplishment of our goals and the realization of our wants.

The way people appear to us from this space is that everyone is actually doing the best they can with what they have at the moment. We see that all of life is evolving towards its perfection, and we are in sync with the laws of the universe and consciousness.

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.

Women in our society are more intuitive than men; they are generally more consciously aware that their thoughts and feelings are known by others. True psychics, of course, are merely people who are experts at intuition.