Uncertainty
Question: By this time next month I will not have enough money to pay my rent, car insurance or to even buy food. Winter is coming. I have read The Secret of Letting Go. I'm doing my best to follow that advice, to let go of fear, but my reality right now is that in this physical world I am not being taken care of. There are no jobs in my hometown. I've applied everywhere. I have no money to move. So what can I do?! As Mr. Howard has said in your book: "I have no idea what is going on in my life." How do I let Life flow through me and guide me when all I can think of is how will I pay rent, etc.? I feel so lost... what am I missing?
Answer: Even though this is a dark, dark hour... do not fall into the temptation of compounding that darkness with despair and discouragement. These negative states want you to fall. They want your life, and you must not give it to them, or any other form of fear. There is a maxim here to follow: do what is in your power, refuse to do what is not.
So... you've expired employment options (as best you can tell). Then do the next thing you can do: contact local agencies and find out what can be done to get you through this coming winter. Searching for this help is how to help yourself now.
On the other side, it is not in your power to control the outcome of any of these efforts... and what will come, will come. But, it is in your power not to punish yourself for what has happened. If you created this situation you now face due to bad judgment or choices in the past, then look at that -- and go past the judging of yourself. Such judgment serves nothing. If there is nothing you could have done to see what you now see coming, then see that... and start where you are with what you can do -- given your circumstances.
We must all face dark, hard times of one kind or another. From these worldly troubles, there is no escape. But we can all choose, if we will, to refuse to agree with the negative thoughts that want to further torment us... and that want to steal from us our capacity to take even simple steps to help ourselves. Persist! Do not give up. Keep your spirit as bright as you know how. If you will work as hard as you can in this way -- while asking God to show you what you need to see and be to make these real changes in your life -- I am certain you will exit this trial by fire a newly refined, better and stronger human being.
Question: With uncertainty running rampant due to the current economic situation, it is easy to fall into despair. Is there a way to rise above it all and know that everything will work out somehow?
Answer: Uncertainty is unwanted because it feels so unpleasant each time it appears in our lives. But, can we be awake enough to see its positively bright side? For as surely as darkness must come before the break of a new day, so it's true: before the new light of higher understanding can have its gentle dawn in us -- we must see that we have come to the end of what we know.
The gradual realization that you need never again try to find yourself in your thoughts about yourself is like one day happily realizing that hitting yourself over the head was the cause and not the cure for your daily headaches. To your grateful amazement, you discover that the inner-pounding you so wished would go away finally came to a stop when you stopped pounding.
This startling realization brings you to a crucial moment in your quest for self-newness. And you must be resolute. As you begin to suspend your habitual involvement with yourself -- which you know you must do in order to let something new happen -- you begin to notice an altogether different kind of disturbing feeling starting to rise up within you. You would never have believed it, but there it is right in front of your inner-eyes. You are actually beginning to worry about what is going to happen to you without your worry. Nothing doing! You instantly catch and drop this fake feeling along with the rest of the inner-impostors. They want you to believe that there might not be life without suffering. And yet, even with all of this clear to your inner-eyes, you are still tempted for a moment to drop your inner-vigilance. Anything seems better than this increasing self-uncertainty. Don't mistake these feelings of fear for friends. Listen instead to what the Truth is trying to tell you.
Have no concern whatsoever over where these feelings of unknowing will lead you. The seemingly intelligent self-concern over your rising feelings of vulnerability is nothing but another false identity. Suspend it as well. Deny its re-entrance into your life. This total suspension of self allows the present moment to flood in unfiltered and uncolored. Something genuinely new is happening and you know it. This newness is your true home. Within it you are safe and out of the reach and grip of familiar but fierce self-creating thoughts and feelings.
Persist with this higher kind of self-suspension for as long as it takes until slowly, but surely, you feel the weighted drag of your habitual self less and less. As you grow lighter in spirit, you will see that this Newness you have fought for is who you really are. Here lies your True Nature. It was there all along -- like the strong, unshakable shelter of a deep mountainside cave that you were at first afraid to enter when caught off guard by a fierce storm. To your everlasting delight, you find within this special kind of newness true refuge. In its strength yours is renewed. All is well. The storms can no longer reach you.
Question: What is it that prevents us from knowing peace in times of uncertainty? How do we break through the barrier between us and true peace?
Answer: Things, people, places, conditions are what most of us pursue to help erase the ache of having no peace in our hearts. If we wish to take the next step in our spiritual development, then we must be willing to acknowledge that the pursuit of these forms, even their possession, has never brought us anything but a fleeting sense of fulfillment.
We have all tried sewing pieces of peace together, thinking through what we must do to rid ourselves of whatever nags at us. You know the dialogue one is ever having with oneself:
"Hopefully this career change will make things better; maybe going to the gym will get my love life going; once I make him understand my point of view. . . ." "As soon as" becomes the chant and the source of our confidence. We all know how this goes. The chattering is as endless as one's fear of feeling empty. And the more of these "pieces of peace" we juggle, the more anxious we become, all the while hoping that life won't break up what we would assemble. Even though this approach has proven itself fruitless, still we cling to the hope that next time things will be different. What we must see is that our lives cannot change until we do -- from the inside out.
The task before us is not an easy one, and anyone who tells you differently lies; but we are not asked to make this journey without a guide. Before us goes the Light of Truth. It reveals the Way by opening our eyes to see among other truths, that the peace we seek is not a thing created by us. We learn that admission into its celestial kingdom is by mutual consent only, even though this peace agrees to no terms other than its own. It makes the rules, not us. Yet we are eventually made grateful for these unyielding laws, for whatever soul agrees to bend its will to these terms of eternal peace not only finds God's peace revealed, but also that this providence has now become a permanent presence within his or her heart.
If we could only become quiet enough to listen anew, we would learn that peace is a gift given freely to each of us, right where we stand. But it is a gift given only when we give up our position that it is in our power to possess peace, as we would all other desires.
Allow your heart to remind you what the mind so easily forgets: there is a peace. There is a shelter. There is a timeless place in each of us that no darkness can shatter or dispel. Make it your one intention to spend your time there. Prefer its ever-present company to that of any promise of peace to come, and watch how your life grows happy and whole in stillness beyond compare.
Excerpted from Let Go and Live in the Now
