I just finished reading The Surrender Experiment by Michael A. Singer. He also wrote my favorite book The Untethered Soul. The Surrender Experiment is his life story about all the events that took place in his life. He talks about how he became aware of his thoughts through meditation and surrendered to whatever situations life presented him with.
This book has taught me to surrender to the flow of life. It was so interesting to read about all the events in his life and how each one led to the next without any force or frustration. It showed me that it is possible to live life in such an easy way. Life will always bring you to the next step.
Here are a couple of lines that I highlighted and really liked:
“Do whatever is put in front of you with all your heart and soul without regard for personal results. Do the work as though it were given to you by the universe itself—because it was.”
Throughout the book he talks about putting his personal self/ego to the side (including his personal wants, thoughts, emotions, doubts, beliefs, etc). Meaning that the Universe (or God if you want to call it that) brought this to you for a reason and maybe you (your ego) doesn’t want to do it but it was brought to you for a reason. You are going through this experience for a reason.
“I recognized all this negativity as my mind’s initial resistance to change. I immediately let go and surrendered to the reality of the situation.”
I now think about this ALL THE TIME! Whenever I am in a situation and I feel myself tense up or get worried/anxious I take a breath and I tell myself that this is the initial resistance to change. Relax and surrender to what is unfolding in front of you.
“Perhaps change only takes place when there is sufficient reason to overcome the inertia of everyday life. Challenging situations create the force needed to bring out change. The problem is that we generally use all the stirred-up energy intended to bring about change, to resist change.”
WOW! Yes! When you are complacent and comfortable in life it is very hard to want to change. Change is good. Challenging situations force you to change in many ways. Now, whenever I encounter a tough situation I consciously know that this will bring about some change in my life whether it is emotionally, physically, mentally, internal or external.
“What I saw was that no matter who we are, life is going to put us through the changes we need to go through. The question is: Are we willing to use this force for our transformation? I saw that even very intense situations don’t have to leave psychological scars, if we are willing to process our changes at a deeper level.”
I have learned that it is soo important to become AWARE of your thoughts and emotions. Being aware of your thoughts and processing all of your emotions is so powerful. The Universe (or God or Life) is putting you through everything that YOU need to go through in order to be the person that you are meant to be. I find that so comforting. Whatever you are experiencing good or bad, is shaping you. It is important that when you do experience something bad/hard/sad that you deal with those emotions and don’t bottle them up.
“Life was molding me each day to become who I needed to be in order to handle tomorrow’s tasks. All I had to do was let go and not resist the process.”
Take a second to think about that. All of the events in your life have led you to where you are today. An event that takes place today might be amazing for you now but if it happened 4 years ago you wouldn’t have been ready for it. I like to think of it like grade school. You have to finish first grade in order to move on to second grade. It’s the same in life. You have to go through this experience in order to prepare you for the next one. So whatever you are going through just surrender to it and follow the flow of life.
I highly recommend this book! I think you should read The Surrender Experiment first and then The Untethered Soul. Amazing!