I feel like I have been locked in a life long struggle. Battling what is, in an attempt to make what I want come. I think back to my earliest memories and can see that this was how I arrived in the world. Demanding and insisting that the world change to meet my needs. I think I come from a long line of people who had this same internal drive. This same orientation to life.
The first half of my life was spent insisting and demanding that the world and its people change to suit my needs. That whatever was happening, needed to change to suit my ideas and plans. I never one time thought that I should change, that my needs and wants should change to meet the current situation.
Once I was placed on a spiritual path, I began to see the folly of my thinking. I could see how exhausting my way was in this world. How hard my path was because I refused to accept what is, instead always demanding that "what is" be what I want.
It has taken several decades to shave off all the layers of will that have encapsulated my life. It is an ongoing process. A lot of introspection and inventory required to see how warped my way, in fact, was. At first, I could see it but not really change it. Then I could make slight alterations, but would eventually arrive at a place where I was still shaking my fist at the universe and stomping my foot.
It has been a slow erosion of my will and way. Slowly, day by day, I can see that my default manner is not aligned with spiritual principles. It is a case of self will run riot...still.
However, I can see it now. I can see when I am in that place where I just want what I want when I want it.
Yesterday was one of those days. I just had this itch and it needed scratching. However, I (thanks to a global pandemic) was not able to act out in a manner that provided any real satisfaction. Instead, I walked the beach with the restlessness and intensity of my feelings. I lay them upon the setting sun and watched them vanish with the light.
I did this because I have learned that while universal will may not always be what I want or desire, it is going to win out in the end and my resistance to it is really futile...and exhausting.
There are so many things I would change right now in my life and in the lives of those I love if I were given a chance. But I lack power to do that. I cannot cure a global pandemic. I cannot produce a partner. I cannot ease the financial and emotional angst of my friends and family. I can only just accept what is and try to find some peace within that space.
I have come to find that my will is best used when I align it with what is happening. To do the inner work to find out how I can best accept what is happening and make peace with it. Railing against, fighting, straining, denying are all ways in which I lost the preciousness of the current moment. The current moment doesn’t give two fucks if I like it or not. The current moment occupies all the space and takes all the air if I am truly present for it.
It has taken me a very long time to learn that if I just take a deep breath, accept what is while acknowledging that I don’t really like it and move forward with the grain rather than against it, I get peace as a by product.
I have spent a lot of time chasing things and people that were not for me. I kept walking up to the plate and striking out over and over again, only to wait my turn at bat to try again. Finally one day I realized that I was not a baseball player. That there were so many other roles to play at the stadium. I could be a hot dog vendor, umpire, linesman, fan, announcer, janitor. All I really knew was that I was not a good baseball player. And so long as I insisted upon being something I was not, I was going to keep striking out and being supremely frustrated with my life. It was a revolutionary moment when I realized that I could just stop. I could put down the bat and stop swinging. I could stop chasing all the things that came with being a star athlete and look around and see what I was really intended to do instead.
Scary stuff to walk away from what you think you want without having any good idea of what to do next. But that is where I found freedom. In the not knowing. I have no idea what I am supposed to be, do or become. I have only become sure of the path I take to find out. I empty myself of will and am refilled with something greater than myself: universal will. My only job is to allow myself to see that beating my head against the proverbial wall doesn’t serve me or anyone else. It matters not that I don’t know my purpose. It only matters that I follow the path. Path first, purpose later.
This idea that I am not in charge brings me immense peace today. I do not have to know, jockey for position, claim any knowledge or skill. I just need to do the very, very hard work of keeping my will in check and to observe the unmistakable signs that my will is in conflict with universal will. Then I only have to stop, surrender and just be still. My next move, idea, plan, love, job, thing always comes in divine timing which is never going to be in Erin timing. Ever.
