Letting Go . . Again
Some years ago, I accompanied my husband on a business trip to The Cayman Islands, which are known for some of the best snorkeling in the world. He decided to teach me to snorkel by having me jump from a low wall into rough water wearing my snorkel gear. I began thrashing and almost drowned the two of us. We made it out of the water alive, and then noticed a group of beginner snorkelers swimming in a barrier reef that looked like a shallow pool.
That’s where I finally learned to breathe through that ridiculously narrow tube. I don’t do well when I am thrown in over my head. I like to wade in with my feet touching the bottom, if needed, at least at first. This makes it easier for me to let go of my fears.
Once I got the hang of it, my husband would wake up in the mornings, startled to see me standing beside his side of the bed with my snorkel gear ready to go. I had surrendered to the ocean.
That’s what I felt like when I was thrown into India last week. I again traveled with my husband for this adventure. This time for ayurvedic health purification treatments.
Even though this was my fourth trip to India, the accommodations were more third world than I expected. My room was without windows and had a broken air conditioner with no one available to fix it. The electricity went out every day at noon for a couple hours without any regard for the 100+ degree temperatures. And did I mention the roaches in my room, including one climbing out of my toothbrush?
I know it sounds strange to many people that I would even go to India for rejuvenation treatments,but it is the home of an ancient health treatment called panchakarma.
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In the same breath, I might add that India is not for wimps, but it is a great place to burn off karma, stretch your boundaries and let go of limiting beliefs. In my clearer moments, I watched preconceived perceptions wash down the drain.
It’s a country of opposites — beggars, poverty, deeply spiritual citizens and holy people in the Himalayan mountains are quite common.
The scene outsidewas interesting — an empty lot filled with trash, that was burned on a daily basis, filling the air with choking smoke. Right next to the lot, was a small country club with a beautiful swimming pool filled with water, but no swimmers. Indian chants were blasting over a loudspeaker in the lovely park on the other side of the trash lot. The clinic is in a nice neighborhood, so there were no beggars on the streets, nor smoke from cow dung burning at night.
Their standards of cleanliness, however, are different than mine. I won’t even go into detail. Each day I would let go of my notions of what I needed to feel comfortable.
In each moment I had to die to my beliefs of cleanliness, of fine customer service, of being in control of my environment.
India was a gift that gave me practice allowing the death of my ego, the surrender of how things SHOULD be. The little deaths we go through when we fail, or find ourselves in deep water outside our comfort zone, create a more open-hearted, compassionate, enriching life.
For me, I find that coming up for air to find solid familiar space under my feet every once in awhile, supports the practice of letting go.
LETTING GO is a fast track to experiencing strength, growth and freedom. When we choose to try something different, we learn to stay flexible.
Grab change by the hand, maybe get a lifejacket, and swim.
What is your ‘India’? How have you learned to let go? I’d love to hear from you.
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
Every Thursday I post a quote or thought for all of us to ponder. Today’s quote is:
The first step toward change is awareness. The second step is acceptance. — Nathaniel Braden
Wouldn’t it be refreshing if we could somehow not focus on whether something SHOULD or SHOULD NOT be happening to us?
I think making the choice to accept what is and release what was is a spiritual practice. However, it involves all aspects of our lives–intellectual, emotional, and physical. It looks like this…instead of shrinking away from what is occurring in this day and each day, we learn to embrace it.
In her book, Broken Open, Elizabeth Lesser, described spiritual teacher and world renowned speaker/author, Ram Dass searching for words while recovering from a stroke. “I began to fill in the blanks for him. After one such awkward exchange, he turned to me, and out popped one of his one-liners: “I speak more slowly now. Now people finish my sentences and answer their own questions.”
Elizabeth did the same, finished his sentences in response to her questions about his stroke and its aftermath. In doing so, she answered most of the questions herself.
Ram Dass began to see his stroke as ‘fierce grace.’ He said, “For me to see the stroke as grace required a perceptual shift. It was a shift from taking the point of view of the Ego to taking the point of view of the Soul…..What changed from the stroke was my attachment to the Ego. The stroke was unbearable to the Ego, and so it pushed me into the Soul level…faith and love are stonrger than any changes, stronger than aging and, I am very sure, stronger than death.”
How have you successfully dealt with change, especially the fierce grace kind?
PHOTO: Octopus at the Mote Marine Lab, Sarasota, Florida
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
Every Thursday I post a quote or thought for all of us to ponder. Today’s quote is from humanitarian, Lynn Twist, pictured on the right with me in Fairfield, Iowa.
“When a tree falls in Brazil, there is less oxygen in Ohio.”
Lynn is the bestselling author of The Soul of Money and co-founder of the Pachamama Alliance. I had the privilege of taking a long walk with Lynn and my visiting friend and New York Times best selling author, Marci Shimoff, on the walking trails along the lake in my hometown of Fairfield, Iowa. Lynn was visiting our town because she was receiving the Mayor Malloy’s humanitarian award. I found Lynn to be the most genuine down-to-earth yet global thinker I’ve ever met.
Lynn has spent more than three decades working in positions of leadership with many global initiaves including: ending world hunger, protecting the woldks rainforests, empowering indigenous peoples, inproving health, economic, and political conditions for women and children, and advancing the scientific understanding of human consciousness.
She has had many teachers in her life. In addition to being trained by Mother Theresa, some of Lynn’s great teachers are the people she meets in third world countries. For instance, she traveled to Ethiopia during the 1984 famine that killed 1 million people. (more…)
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
Don’t Judge Too Quickly… We Won’t. – The best bloopers are here
Do you find yourself judging others and situations before you can blink an eye? Take a deep breath and see life from a different perspective before labeling. It’s so easy to judge and to do it quickly. I just have to share these short & funny video ads, because it so perfectly exemplifies that what you may believe at first glance is not true at all!
Next time, before you jump to conclusions, think of these ads.
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
During the month of December, in my classes and sessions, we’ve been focusing on love relationships and how beliefs affect them.
How do you answer these questions? take a moment to free write your responses.
What prevents you from having a great LOVE relationship in your life?
What do you believe about love that prevents you from having more love in your life?
What prevents you from believing you can have the love of your life?
I also wanted to share an email I recently received because I thought it might be helpful in explaining the work I do and the power of questions.
Please feel free to make comments about beliefs and relationships or ask questions.
Q & A:
Dear Lenora,
Just recently I’ve been reading about the Option Method, and was wondering if you could answer a few quick questions for me…
The philosophy behind the option method seems to be one of moral relativism. Would you agree? It says that nothing is really wrong or right, but you should simply do what you want in order to achieve happiness. It says that loving someone is about accepting them and wanting them to be happy. So if my wife cheats on me, should I simply accept that sex with another man is what she needed to be happy? Should I not expect her to feel bad, or let myself feel sad that this took place? And should I always simply do what I want, even if it means other people are hurt?
Also, the option method really pushes the idea that you choose to be happy or unhappy. It states that outside events don’t actually make you happy or unhappy. I believe that attitude does play a role in how you feel, but surely you can’t deny that certain things can cause unhappiness. If my entire family dies in a car accident, for instance, it is almost impossible to believe that I can simply choose not to be unhappy after such an event.
Thanks,
S.T.
Dear S.T,
The whole idea of acceptance is not that you allow yourself to be mistreated. It is NOT grin and bear it, nor RESIGNATION. Acceptance is a perception of reality where neither approval nor disapproval play a part. Judgments and criticisms do not motivate others to do better in a healthy way, and this puts you in the place as judge and jury. How bad do you want someone to feel so they do better? I know that guilt and unhappiness can motivate, but I think happiness and peace are more amazing motivators. Judgments have created so much hate in our world.
I think true peace comes when you are in acceptance of what is. It DOES NOT mean you are stagnant and take no action. Of course we have ideas of what is right for us. For example, I still discriminate who I spend time with. I have values that are very clear. I choose what kind of friends to spend time with, so even though I may accept someone as they are, I still can prefer not to be with them. The difference is that I don’t have to make them BAD and list all of their ‘faults.’ I can just prefer it.
You asked ’should I not expect myself to feel sad.’ You can explore your feelings to clarify how you’re feeling and why. What is it about? As humans, we experience lots of emotions. If there’s some way you’re feeling you don’t like feeling, check it out. You may decide that it’s fine to be sad. How long and how sad? Grieving is different than having the accident make you give up for the rest of your life.
We often react to a situation by judging that it is bad, and that we believe we must feel bad. No other way to be. Is that true?
When you do what you want you probably consider many things before implementing the decision. If others will be hurt, do you still want to do it? OR would you rather not do it because you want them to feel okay? That’s still a ‘want’. I have done thousands of private sessions over the last 16 years, and so many people have stayed in a relationship or a job, because they were afraid of breaking the mold or having others be hurt by their decision. In reality, they often were hurting the other person more by staying in the job or relationship because they were miserable, and resented their loved ones or colleagues. I cannot pretend to make the decision for anyone, nor do I advise. I only ask questions to hopefully create clarity and an open heart.
The most productive way to uncover your own answers is to explore them in an Option Method dialogue session, not just discussing theoretical possibilities, but real to your life.
Blessings,
Lenora Boyle
Lenora's Italy Retreat blog | Lenora's Change Limiting Beliefs Website
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