Surrender: When you stop fighting the storm

The plan was made – in my mind. A great picture drawn with beautiful colours. Garnished with confidence. A big spark of anticipation – but not too much expectation. The goal in the heart, but not obsessively in mind. Also left enough space for the universe to do its thing (visualization for advanced so to say :)).

And it was only a small thing: The Superwhips in Acroyoga should finally work. Everything seemed promising. The last few trainings got better and better. And then that day: a catastrophe. I keep falling and falling and falling again and again. Rièn ne va plus. But something happened instead: in acroyoga a small microcosm opens up into the macrocosm, which extends like a network from the small to the big picture:

We humans love to plan. Having no goal would be boring too. And basically nothing speaks against it if you don’t focus to hard on one thing, but swim in the flow of life and thus realize your wishes.
But with the flow it’s sometimes such a thing. There are stones and rapids, sometimes the river becomes a trickle, sometimes it gushes over the banks.
And then this day comes, this hour or second and life puts this fat stone right in front of your imagination, which just got so smoothly flowing. Wumms, with a loud bang, desire and reality collide. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a big or small thing: Has the pandemic thwarted your plans again? Are you planning the next step in your relationship while your boyfriend or girlfriend tells you that it might be better to break up? Didn’t a meeting go the way you wanted it to? Or is something going wrong at work? Or have you planned a nice Easter picnic in the sun and now it’s storming and snowing outside again?

Life is like April weather: unpredictable. Even if we manage to bring more and more sunshine into our lives and no longer react so sensitively to the bad weather, sooner or later there will be a tough storm. What do you do when a storm comes up or a boulder blocks your way? Basically we only have two options: resist or accept what is.

Resistance: the ego’s favorite game. It makes the ego so strong. Not with me! You can get angry or sad, you can attack aggressively or you can sink into depression. And vengeance, oh yeah: The ego loves that. Judging and blocking aren’t bad either. Don’t let anything get near you. The ego feels better right away. The problem: Unfortunately you don’t. Because resistance always comes with pain, sooner or later.
Why? Quite simply because resistance keeps us in the situation we are resisting. We focus with all of our energy on what we don’t want. And that makes us prisoners in a small room, of all places, in which we didn’t want to be. Once we are in this room, it is often difficult to see that there is still something else outside.

Then how do we find freedom? Through surrender. Definitely easier said than done. Because there are still our feelings – or those that one likes to suppress – that stand in the way of surrender. Surrender often has a bland aftertaste at first. Sometimes it feels a bit like giving up, becoming small. But these feelings come from the ego that wants to fight and resist. Ultimately, surrender is just the opposite: accepting what is is not giving up. It’s not becoming small, it’s becoming big and opening up to a greater possibility. Growth.

If something really affects me – and that is a sure sign that I have a topic with it – then everything inside of me screams out when I try to accept the situation as it is. Resistance seems much stronger and more natural. But in the long run it only weakens. It’s like fighting the storm with your fists. Tired of Fighting? Do you want to use your energy more sensibly?

Then let’s try it with real surrender: Accepting what is, does not mean having no more goals, abandoning your desires or even approving and accepting when something bad has happened or someone does something that is not good for you. It simply means: Accepting what is right now. It already happened, you can’t change it. When you fight against the present, you are trapped in the past. But by accepting what ist, a door opens: by accepting your present, you can create a new future. Maybe your goals will change, maybe not. When you are like the river that flows around the stone, new possibilities open up. Maybe even ones that you haven’t even thought of.

The stones and storms are not there for nothing. Often they show us, what is still blocking the direct path to our wishes and dreams. And what happened now in acroyoga lately? Did the Superwhips still work? Nope. I’ve fallen and fallen and fallen. And falling is a terrible thing for me in general. But that’s probably what it was all about: if I want to do Superwhips, I have to learn to fall first. And now I even enjoy falling a little. Is that why I strayed from my goal? Nope, it just takes a little longer than planned. Is that why the universe failed to grant my wishes? Nope, it just took a different path that probably has a deeper sense. As in the small so in the large: Trust the process, flow, surrender to what is … and see what life brings you.

PS: For those who don’t know what Superwhips are: As soon as they succeed, I’ll post a video here – and maybe one of the falling ones too :))