Excuse Me, Are You Sitting on My Shield?

Remember the Serenity Prayer line about controlling the things I can, and releasing the things I can’t control?

Sometimes I suck at it – just saying.

Not all the time. Mostly, I’m actually pretty darn good. I know when to back out and back off, even when it’s something fairly personal or close to my heart or beliefs. It’s taken a lot of practice, let me tell you. This did not come naturally or easily.  I come from a good Stearns County farm family. My parents worked really hard to carve out a life for themselves and their kids, and to be people we can all be proud of. They succeeded, at least to this point and they’re both well into their 80’s, so I feel pretty confident calling this one a win. I was raised in a small town and people kind of knew everyone’s business whether they were part of it or it just happened to feed into the local grapevine. People cared about other people’s stuff. Stuff they had nothing to do with, or could do anything about, or were even welcomed into, but they cared. 

I am finding amidst the current climate of COVID-19 that my ability to ”let go and let God” is faltering. 

I was doing really well in the beginning when everyone was all up in arms over the pandemic. I sat still in my meditation spot, with my morning cup of coffee and a connection to Spirit which helped me find peace inside. I knew and honestly still do, that we will be fine, we’re figuring it out, and life will go on. I get it. But what I’m struggling with is the seeming expectation on the part of others to take a side. Regularly, I am in situations with people who obviously have a fixed idea of what the “right side” is to be on, listening to them talk about why they’re side is right, spout their data ( I use this word lightly since never before in my life have I seen so much data subject to personal opinion – but that’s another rant). So, I’m sitting, I’m listening (kind of), and at some point there comes an expectation where I agree with them, and I use Spirit as the authority as to why/how they’re right and everyone who disagrees is wrong.  

I’m out. 

Here’s my struggle. I’m not out in a way of being completely non-attached to their stuff. I’m finding myself more and more detached, instead of non-attached. Yes, my friends, there is a difference. Non-attachment is a state of complete caring without choosing. That is, “I think you’re great, and I wish you the best, go at it” and meaning it. Detachment is stating you have no attachment, but really feeling like you do, either immediately or later, it doesn’t matter. So detachment is more like, “I think you’re great, and I wish you the best, go at it” and then having thoughts like “but it’s never gonna work” or “I think you’re doing it all wrong”, or “I worry about you constantly” or your conversations and thoughts are directed towards the thing that you said you weren’t attached to. If you walk away and are still thinking about it/them, you’re still attached. If you’re talking about it/them to other people, but you said that you’re leaving it alone. You are still looking over the proverbial shoulder while pretending you’re not. This is detachment. 

So I find myself more often in a place of detachment, to the point where I don’t even want to be thinking about those conversations, but my mind just won’t let them go. 

I know this is a time of transformation energetically. I know there are lots of things moving and changing in the cosmos and it’s creating lots of amazing things for the future. But now, it’s kind of a struggle in my head. 

So, I sit in my favorite chair, I look out at my garden with cup in hand, and I ask “what the fuck?” and they laugh…not because they’re jerks, but because my Guides love me and know I’m crazy. And I hear “you’re in the fire.” I get this image of myself without any shields out in the world being pelted by whatever walks by me (which by the way is kind of how I’ve been feeling). Somewhere in this transmutation of something old, I walked out of my shield and am having to walk from one place to another without cover? This doesn’t even sound right to me. I’m always covered, I’m always held, I’m always blessed, even when it’s not easy, or fun, or how I want to feel. “Your ego is shifting.” This gets my attention. “The ego is transforming also, and so is in the struggle too”.

All I want to do is vote the ego off the island and create a new alliance. 

“Surrender”. It comes like the wind through me. “Give up, and in giving up, rise up”. I can feel it immediately. In my good old caring about everyone’s business, Ii was losing my sense of connection to myself, my true inner self, and so I felt alone in some horrible storm that seems to be never ending. Surrender. A deep breath flows through me. “I quit” never felt so good. 

It’s so easy to get caught up in everybody’s everything, especially times like these. It’s hard to stay out and truly stay out. It’s easy to get caught up in detachment when non-attachment is what we’re truly yearning for. Simply a way to say, “you do you” and set down our armor, and walk away. Or stay for wine, it doesn’t matter. It’s not about leaving the person or situation, it’s about us leaving our attachment or ideas or feelings of what we think it should  or shouldn’t be.

While I was busy getting frustrated with others, I was being a version of them I didn’t like. I was in their business (attached to what they were saying and some of the judgments) being upset that they were getting all up in mine (I was judging them for judging, and feeling the discomfort of the pressure that I felt they were placing on me). 

In the Untethered Soul by Michael Singer it says “it’s not about letting go of the thoughts and emotions. It’s about letting go of the pull that the energy itself has on our consciousness.”  I’ve been uncomfortable because I was giving my energy, through my thoughts and emotions, to the issue instead of being mindful of where that energy was going, and how to move into a space where I could recognized what my mind was doing with me. 

It sounds so easy! 

So the practice continues. No, I’m not starting over, I’m starting from where I left off. There is no punishment in self growth, that’s the good news. Spirit wants us, loves us into progress and evolution. There is no detention, there is no start over, you don’t lose a turn, or anything like that. I get to pick myself up, dust myself off, and just keep going. 

Now, with less others, and more self…and one more cup of coffee.

Blessings Galore,
Anne

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