It Is What It Is
A couple of days ago the 16 year old human being I’m quoting below was whole and healthy. Today he’s in the hospital with a missing arm due to a shark attack off the coast of North Carolina. Listen to his heart.
“I’ve lost my arm obviously, so I have two options: I can try to live my life the way I was and make an effort to do that even though I don’t have an arm, or I can just let this be completely debilitating and bring my life down and ruin it. Out of those two, there’s really only one that I would actually choose and that’s to try to fight and live a normal life with the cards I’ve been dealt.”
This is what surrender looks like. It’s not giving up, it’s simply giving up resistance. With the surrender of resistance to the incorruptible What Is, this young man is now able to put 100% of his attention on dealing with it in every practical way. He has cut psychological suffering off at it’s feet. He’ll be fine, and I totally admire him.
Plus, if he his is ever drawn to becoming a spiritual seeker, I’d put money on him waking up sooner rather than later. This is skillful living.
June 17, 2015 @ 7:31 am
Wow. Thanks’s for posting. I applaud this young man.
I have a meeting next month with the director of continuing education at my local university to discuss the possibility of teaching a class, and I think I just got my title: “Skillful Living: Giving Up Resistance to What Is.”
As always, thank you!
June 17, 2015 @ 3:43 pm
My pleasure. Go get ’em!
June 17, 2015 @ 9:56 am
Really moving; he must be an old soul! And though he lost his left arm, he happened to be left handed, which seems like bad luck on top of tragedy. But reality does what it does.
One thought I had when I read this in the news, however, is that it is not uncommon for victims of tragedy to feel resilient and accepting initially. The shock, the adrenaline, all the support and love, and the sheer necessity of surrender can bring an initial clarity and wisdom, peace and acceptance. But then there’s all the hard work of recovery and adapting, and the attention and support fades, and that’s when resistance and depression and grieving can hit hard. So I’ll keep Hunter in my prayers.
All love (even for the shark?)
Kathleen
June 17, 2015 @ 3:44 pm
Even for the shark, who was just doing its job.
Love,
Fred
June 22, 2015 @ 5:13 pm
I dont know what an old soul is, Hunter must be doing his job too and so is Fred, Kathleen, Irene and Klaas and so it goes. A passing parade of life enfolding.
My add in the local U3A magazine has been approved.
In it I am looking for persons interested in meeting weekly on oneness and I dont really know what I am doing, read a lot of books, given some away.
There are others in my community that are interested in this and approached some of them, no interest expressed.
U3A is mainstream, my last notice in their magazine ”the book of undoing” was to be used, this time hopefully and a bit scary I use ” from stress to stillness” by Gina Lake.
Cheer to you all. Klaas the town clown.
June 23, 2015 @ 12:02 am
Good luck with it, Klaas!