A wonderful insight from GAOG and Steve Beckow. When the tsunami of love begins, and we expect it soon, how are we to respond to it?
What I’ve been led to believe is that the most important thing to remember to do is to surrender to it.
Let’s think about this notion of surrender for a moment. I’m not talking about a physical act of surrender. I’m not saying surrender your house or your car or your job. I’m saying surrender your resistance.
And this is the important thing for me about surrendering.
I can surrender everything temporary but I cannot surrender anything permanent. Perhaps think about that for a moment. I am safe surrendering any resistance that comes up because what can be surrendered is temporary and what cannot be surrendered is permanent.
What is temporary? Everything illusory is temporary, what the Buddha called “anitya, anitya, anitya” (changing. changing, changing).
What is permanent? Only the Self. (If you choose to see the Self as the No-Self, that’s fine. Whatever is ultimate is ultimate, no matter what name we give it.)
That which changes is temporary; the Changeless is permanent.
Therefore if resistance to the tsunami of love comes up, I know that I can afford to surrender it. And if in the act of surrendering, that which I attempt to surrender cannot be surrendered, then it must be permanent. (Of course the permanent will probably never be experienced as resistance.)
That makes it a “no-brainer” for me. If I feel any resistance during the tsunami of love, I intend to surrender that resistance, to let go of it.
What Lao Tzu (Djhwal Khul) said long ago is material here:
“The Way is gained by daily loss,
Loss upon loss until
At last comes rest.
“By letting go, it all gets done;
The world is won by those who let it go!
But when you try and try,
The world is then beyond the winning.” (1)
I say this now to cement the point in our minds so that our response to the tsunami requires no thinking but is automatic. Once the tsunami hits, there may not be time to write an email to someone and ask for advice.
Please keep in mind as well that the tsunami will come in waves. A major wave and then an interval to assimilate and rest. And then another wave, etc.
So if a period of calm comes, it doesn’t mean that you have “lost it.” The successive waves and calm are to be expected.
Footnotes
(1) Lao Tzu, The Way of Life. The Tao Te Ching. trans. R.B. Blakney. New York, etc.: Avon, 1975, 68.
