On Freedom and Letting Go

Tags

freedom, lettingGo, spiritchat, spirituality

We begin the month of July, having benefited from all the reflections on discussion topics related to #energy in the month of June. The first weekend of July celebrates #freedom in the two countries of Canada (Victoria Day) and USA (Independence Day). So, it is perhaps appropriate that we had decided on #freedom to be the theme of #SpiritChat weekly chat topics for this month.

The first chat topic for this month will be “Freedom and Letting GO”. It isn’t that we haven’t talked about #freedom or #LettingGo before – but I do not believe that we have talked about them in conjunction. I imagine that we all have our individual ideas of what #freedom means to us, and conversations and celebrations can help us revise and clarify the importance of #freedom. So, take a moment and stop reading. Consider the questions:

• What does true #freedom mean to you?
• How does #freedom manifest in your life?
• How does personal #freedom affect your sense of responsibility?
• What is the greatest #freedom – the one that you would not want to give up at any price?

Now that we have clarified our current ideas about #freedom, we can visit with #LettingGO. The idea of ‘letting go’ often creates a sense of loss within us. The ‘sense of loss’ may exist even if we know fully well that ‘letting go’ is the best choice for us. Maybe that is why, when we meet the prospect of ‘letting go’ of some ‘thing’, our instinctual response is to resist. We have tried ‘letting go’ before, but the ‘sense of loss’ that comes in return, is not a good trade. Of course, the ‘thing’ may be any multitude of things – an idea, a relationship, a person, a place, a habit, an emotion, a memory, a perceived virtue, an object of great attachement, and more. It’s all about connection.

The deeper our connection in space and time to the ‘thing’, the tougher it is for us to even entertain the notion of ‘letting go’. The more threads that are woven between us and that ‘thing’, the greater the difficulty in ‘letting go’. So, how do we get to the point where ‘letting go’ becomes a reality for us? One way of getting to that point is when our freedom to live our full life of grand potential is being impacted by our resistance to #lettingGO. This raises a few more questions:

• When was an instance where you chose #LettingGO to enhance your freedom? What was the result
• Are you currently in a situation where you are choosing to live with less freedom over #LettingGO?
• Think of an instance where you helped someone in their #LettingGO process. What did you learn from that?
• What are some non-physical ‘things’ that you could immediately let go of and gain more freedom?

It is when we unclench our fists and let go of our oh-so-tight grasp of nothingness, that we can let the river flow through our spread-apart fingers and experience the joy of freedom. It is when we uncurl our toes and spread them just a tiny bit, that we can feel the earth send us a message of freedom through our bare feet. It is when we begin to let go of all of that which puts shades on our heart in the summer of our life, that we can celebrate freedom.

I hope I have made a small case for the conjunction of #Freedom and #LettingGO. Make your case by joining us Sunday, July 3rd 2016 at 9amET/1pmUTC on twitter in a #SpiritChat conversation with @AjmaniK and the community.

Namaste,

Kumud @AjmaniK

P.S. I do realize that this may be a big family-holiday-Sunday for many in Canada and USA – if you cannot join us live, we will see you next week with more #Freedom! I invite you to answer some questions posed above in the comments, or reflect on them in your journaling. Namaste.

Fireworks ‘Letting GO’ – Photo by @AjmaniK

On Letting Go – By @PanteliT

Tags

lettingGo, release, spiritchat, spirituality

LETTING GO — EMPTY CUPS AND STILL WATERS

Guest Host, Panteli Tritchew (@PanteliT)

One of my favourite Zen stories is about a university professor who goes to visit a Zen Master.

Nan-in, a Japanese master during the Meiji era (1868-1912), received a university professor who came to inquire about Zen.
Nan-in served tea. He poured his visitor’s cup full, and then kept on pouring.
The professor watched the overflow until he no longer could restrain himself. “It is overfull. No more will go in!”
“Like this cup,” Nan-in said, “you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup?”

A Japanese Tea ceremony

Of course, as a university professor, the story especially resonates for me. And it raises an interesting question: If a glass half-full is better than a glass half empty, then how can an empty cup be better than a full cup?

A pessimist sees the glass half-empty, but an optimist sees the glass half-full, so of course we all want to be optimists. But if we detach ourselves from these value statements, full, empty, positive and negative, we realize that the glass is half-empty AND half-full, simultaneously, and the emptier the glass, the fuller the potential.

Everywhere we go, we carry our own stories and our minds are full of our own dramas. In some ways, we play the role of the university professor every day, so full and enamored of and invested in our own stories that our cup is always full and never still. Nothing can get in because everything is spilling out.

Our ideas, opinions and belief systems can enrich us and restrict us, simultaneously. But it is our stories that carry the greatest emotional charge, and the more dramatic the story, the fuller the charge. The greatest charge comes from the stories of hurt. These are the stories that we keep telling ourselves in an endless loop with an infernal drama triangle of characters: the victim (usually us), the oppressor (always someone else) and the hero (sometimes us, sometimes another Other).

We forget that all stories are a work of fiction. Something Happened becomes Something Happened To Me becomes Someone Did This To Me becomes Someone Did This To Me To Hurt Me. The story endlessly repeated becomes richer in detail with each retelling. But it is the story, that gets richer, not our lives.
With each retelling, with each new loop, we keep refilling and stirring our cup. The tea pour over, spills out of the cup, onto the table, onto the floor and all aspects of our lives. Still waters can be a mirror, but turbulence itself is a reflection.

We keep telling the story over and over and it not only informs our identity, it becomes our identity. We not only carry what the Buddhists call “the burden of oneself,” we become “the burden of oneself.” The turtle and the snail carry their shells because the shells are both protection and shelter. Our emotions are a part of our internal landscape that serve a critical role in personal growth and spiritual development, but when we hold onto and carry our pain, our sorrow and our regret, they no longer provide the protection and shelter for which they were intended for we hold them far beyond their ability to serve us.

When we live in the past, we tarnish the present and the future. When we are present to each moment, we realize that each moment is present to us. We can meet every moment and be filled by it, or we can fill and scald the moment with our own drama. Full cup or empty cup?

“I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become.” ~ C.G. Jung.

We have choices.

“If you let go a little, you will have a little peace. If you let go a lot, you will have a lot of peace.” ~Ajahn Chah

Each empty moment is full of potential. Each moment is choice.

– Panteli Tritchew

This week’s #SpiritChat conversation idea, cover-post and questions come to us from my good friend on twitter, Panteli Tritchew. Some of you may know him as an energetic participant in many chats, including #SpiritChat. Dr Panteli will host this week’s chat for us. I hope you enjoyed his beautiful post on the topic of “Letting Go”. Do join in in the weekly #SpiritChat on Sunday, July 26 2015 at 9amET/1pmUTC on twitter. Much gratitude to Dr Panteli, for hosting on my behalf. Thank you!

Dr Panteli is a Faculty Member in Applied Communications and Entrepreneurial Leadership, School of Business, Kwantlen Polytechinic University, Vancouver, Canada. Pleae do connect with him on twitter and/or LinkedIN.