Control AND Surrender

     Reinhold Niebuhr's 'serenity prayer' makes a lot of sense:
"Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference."

     However, our society's materialist dogmas assure us that we can, or it's just a matter of time when we'll have the knowledge & technology to control everything. AND we have to, because our happiness depends entirely on the quality & quantity of matter we accumulate. So we work desperately to accumulate stuff because materialism also tells us that life is random & meaningless. However, this nonsense is just our left hemisphere's inability to see the fact that it cannot control everything: https://channelmcgilchrist.com/  
     So it often takes a major traumatic event for the left hemisphere to surrender control, and allow the right hemisphere to re-establish balance & help us live wisely in the real world.

     "Consider reflecting on what the word surrender means for you. It does not mean resignation or giving up, but rather it suggests letting go & trusting the moment, whatever arises. An attitude of surrender invites a sense of strength & ease. It suggests having faith in something beyond your limited self, something that helps when you’re living with forces beyond your control."
     Olivia Ames Hoblitzelle. “Ten Thousand Joys & Ten Thousand Sorrows. A Couple’s Journey through Alzheimer’s.” Penguin, 2008.

     "Something very beautiful happens to people when their world has fallen apart: a humility, a nobility, a higher intelligence emerges at just the point when our knees hit the floor. Perhaps, in a way, that's where humanity is now: about to discover we're not as smart as we thought we were, will be forced by life to surrender our attacks and defenses which avail us of nothing, and finally break through into the collective beauty of who we really are." Marianne Williamson

     “With age comes wisdom. But sometimes age comes alone.” Oscar Wilde

      As we age, especially as retirement rolls around, diminishing physical & mental competences, illnesses, and death of friends & loved ones suddenly starts to feel very real & very personal. How little control we actually have hits like a brick. Dylan Thomas' "Rage, rage against the dying of the light" is, at one level, something we can empathize with, while at a more mature level, it's a pathetic, useless response to this stage of life.  Compare it with the wisdom in Reinhold Niebuhr's 'serenity prayer.' See: "Successful Aging" http://www.johnlovas.com/2011/12/successful-aging.html

 

      “We suffer to the exact degree that we resist having our eyes and hearts opened.” Adyashanti 

     “The greatest treasure comes out of the most despised & secret places… This place of greatest vulnerability is also a holy place, a place of healing.” Albert Kreinheder, “Body and Soul: The Other Side of Illness"

     Even though many approach old age "scared shitless," wonderful possibilities are available (unless we rage or wallow): http://www.johnlovas.com/2021/03/fascinating-overlap.html

      I HIGHLY recommend this informative, well-written book to help free those who are beginning to realize that their worldview & self-concept is a prison, rather than a safe house:
      Michael Pollan. “How to Change Your Mind. What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence.” Penguin, 2018.

     "… people who have a deep conviction and belief in a transcendent reality are better able to disconnect from the idea that the body and its ails are ‘all there is.’ By connecting to a higher power – however one experiences this or chooses to define it – we bring forth our inner sense of innate wholeness. We are able to see ourselves as spiritually perfect, even when suffering ill health. This promotes our ability to reconnect with our implicate patterns of health.”
     M.J. Abadie. “Healing, Mind, Body, Spirit.” Adams Media Corporation, 1997.

 

http://www.centredart.net/marcel-gagnon/