Whilst growing my daughters inside me, perhaps my greatest lesson was that their lives were growing with very little help from me. So long as I nourished myself to nourish them there wasn’t all that much I physically had to ‘do’. I was an incubator; a haven for my children to grow. Similarly my girls didn’t have control over their environment, these tiny people’s instinct instead was to trust the duration of the process. Perhaps the biggest leap every living creature takes in their life is one we don’t remember at all, the journey from womb to world.
There is a lot we can learn from a birth event. Trusting completely in the next step as the baby moves away from their safe environment, birthed into the world where their infantile state is a vulnerable predicament, yet there is an innate knowledge that they will be okay.
Somewhere along the way we lose that faith we are all born with and begin to sit awaiting the next curveball life has in store for us. Many of us even try to control our lives in such a way to dodge those things flying at us, but life is funny like that, more often than not if something is destined to happen, it will.
So when will we learn to release the illusion of control we like to think we have over our lives? How many times do you push against the grain to avoid a certain outcome which turns out is inevitable anyway? It’s exhausting holding expectations to events, goals, projects even people because we think we will feel satisfied by the outcome.
So what lessons can we take from the womb and apply to our world (the greatest womb of all). I believe every person on this planet is here for a reason, which means the world must be holding a space for people to be. But we’ve become suspicious and cynical that we’ve forgotten how to surrender to the process of growth – the same process going on inside the womb.
It can be overwhelming hearing we have been too focused on the external world that we have neglected to tap into what’s going on for us internally. I mean how many of you are feeling, “how do I even begin.”
I’ve got you. Here are five steps to surrender:
- Breathe: Breath is like a reset elixir for our mind. When we take the time to stop, inhale, count to 3 and exhale, we return to our bodies in the present moment (the only moment we have any control over)
- Affirmation: The words we say to ourselves matter. Remember the old saying “if you don’t have anything nice to say don’t say anything at all”? How long have you let Negative Nelly talk you out of things, or Comparison Carol let you believe you are not good enough. It’s time to release that dialogue and reprogram the mind to serve us instead of being slaves to our thoughts. Here are just some examples:
- I am just as safe and held in the world as I was the day I was born
- I have purpose
- My body is the physical vessel through which I am carried in to experience the world around me
- I am grateful for my health
- I am grateful for the people in my life and I am deserving of the love they give me
- Question the value of your contribution in the moment: Next time you’re feeling a lack of control, instead of expressing unrealistic expectations on the people around you, consider who this is serving and the value of this contribution to the situation.
- Trust: Once you have conquered the nasty voices in your head you’ll begin to realise that by surrendering control you actually have ultimate control. When we trust we can accept that which is coming to us rather than resist it. This includes the not so comfortable or pleasant experiences too. Life always returns to equilibrium, so next time things feel monotonous and heavy, TRUST that lighter more enjoyable experiences are ahead.
- Re-focus perspective: Energy flows where energy goes, so if you’re obsessing over something how can you adjust the lens to see the bigger picture. Take this for example, you’re awaiting a secondary interview for a job you’ve been shortlisted for, and you form a mental list of all the reasons you won’t get it. Rather than spending time preparing productively, you’ve just expended useless energy perpetuating negative thoughts. It’s likely the things you’ve convinced yourself you lack will show more than the qualities you possess that got you the call back in the first place.
With these five new habits in play we slowly return to the trust we had for the world to hold us when we were born. We come back to that all knowing belief we had as an infant that yes the unknown is scary, yet it is necessary. You’ll begin to notice when we shift the narrative, that life happens for us not to us and if we stop grasping the reigns of control, the world will hold us if we just let it.
If you still need a little coaxing to begin this journey Insite Mind is a space of resource, implement journaling or affirmation cards into your day. Jump over to the shop to see our range.