The Power to Let Go and Live in the Now

Our lives are supposed to be consistently challenged but because we resist challenges in our lives and try to keep everything the same, we have become numb and dull human beings. We need to begin to think for ourselves and not let the world think for us. The purpose of our lives was given to us since we were children from the world outside of us. But after years and years of working to get rewards from this world no matter what we get it never lasts or it turns out to be a millstone around our necks. More becomes more pain and fear. So if the challenge is not to become someone in this world and receive its rewards what is the challenge?

Once there was a great woodcarver who could take something from nature and craft it into something wonderful. He captured from nature what was real and true. He had a few students and one day he saw that one of them finally understood what it took to be a good woodcarver. He asked him, what did you learn that made you a fine woodcarver? Everywhere I cut into the grain of wood it was different. Therefore, when I carve the wood, it has to be met with attention and awareness and can't be met without knowing it is different.

The challenges of life is to understand every moment of it is a different grain of it. The whole movement of life is different every moment. But we have sacrificed the sensitivity the moment is giving to us for the seeming satisfaction of familiarity and sense of self we wish to keep intact. This is why we never change. But there is a river of life, and we are meant to be touched by something that is alive and greater than ourselves. We are afraid to admit we don't have a life.

Happiness is not found in the outcome-oriented life. The outcome-oriented life is one where we look at what we did, manifested by our efforts and what we got for it, and then measure ourselves against our expectations to determine if what we did was good or bad. We only know our value by what the world says is good or bad. We are missing out on 1/2 of our lives, the in-coming life.

The good life is never having to think about ourselves again. The wood carver was different. He had to be aware of what he was cutting into so he could understand what he was working with. The incoming moment is now. Getting a sense of self by considering our own images is not life. Real life is not a movement of thought but a convergence of certain kinds of energies and we are intended to be there for the challenges it stirs in us.

A reporter interviewed a man during the manifest destiny who, of his 4 friends, was happy and content with his life. When asked why he was content but his other friends weren't he said, "One man set up his homestead on one fork of a stream where gold was but the stream was seasonal and he couldn't always find gold. Another man set up his farm near the head waters of the stream where the fish were but never could get gold and the 3rd one set up his farm where the run off of the cold snow was but although he had water, he didn't get fish or gold. I waited and watched and saw where all 3 streams converge and made my place there and I received the fish, gold and good water.

We are meant to participate into the convergence of life. Now is the living flow of truth. Our lives are being lived for us, which takes us out of the moment and removes us from what is real. If we are in life we don't have to worry about what we own or what others are thinking about us. Our spiritual hands are full because we are a part of and a place where the heart, mind and body can be transformed. We can't change from an outward oriented life.

When the energies of life pour into a little tiny seed it grows into a tree. The tree is the outpouring of the energies. The energies are what give us real life instead not trying to control our lives. The river of real life converges in the present moment. Learn to let go.

If we want real life, we have to be where real life is happening. We can't have what is if our mind is full of what was. What is, is always changing itself, clarifying and helping itself to go higher. Just to be alive is cutting into the grain. Streams converge where we are and we are changed by our relationship with it. Changing waters take care of everything. The meaning of our existence can't be found in the world as it is. Shift your attention from thought, images and dreams and bring it into the convergence of the river of God's life. Let go and live in the now.