Latest / Conversations with Amoda Maa - Exploring Awareness Through Dialogue and Living Inquiry / Episode 72: The Depth of Surrender | When You Stop Arguing With Life

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Episode 72: The Depth of Surrender | When You Stop Arguing With Life · Conversations with Amoda Maa - Exploring Awareness Through Dialogue and Living Inquiry

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  [Music]
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  You are listening to the Amoda Maa podcast.
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  In this series, Amoda explores her essential teaching through conversation and excerpts
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  from interviews and events.
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  Thanks for listening and we hope you enjoy.
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  Greetings everyone and welcome back
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  to another conversation with Amoda Maa.
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  We're delighted to be offering another exploration
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  here today and in recent weeks,
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  Amoda put out a video about surrender,
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  which had a lot of interest and maybe spoke to quite a few people.
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  So we thought that we would open up the matter of surrender a little bit more, a little bit
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  deeper and see what we can unpack because it's such a beautiful subject, very easily
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  misunderstood and but also calls and speaks to many, many people.
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  So today's, first of all, Emodah is going to read out an article, something that she's
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  written, and then we're going to use that as a springboard to explore, and I'll ask
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  her some questions.
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  Hello, Emodah.
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  Hello, Cavi.
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  And everyone listening?
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  Ah, yes, yes.
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  Okay.
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  Let's drive into this, Amoda.
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  You've got this article, I've got it here, called the soft stop, the invitation to surrender.
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  So if you'd like to take the mic and read it, let's see what we can do.
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  Thank you.
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  Surrender is one of those words that is very easily misunderstood.
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  You may imagine it means giving ourselves up to something, to another person, to a circumstance,
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  to a relationship, or to a situation we do not want.
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  It can sound like defeat, passivity, or the loss of our own authority.
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  But this is not the surrender that belongs to awakening.
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  Through surrender does not ask us to give up our personhood or our innate authority.
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  It does not ask us to become passive, compliant or powerless.
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  It is not a surrender of the unique human being that we are.
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  It is a surrender of the grasping mind.
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  The grasping mind is the mechanism within us that is continually attempting to manage
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  experience.
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  interprets what is happening, decides whether it likes or dislikes it, and then moves towards
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  what it wants and away from what it does not want. When an experience feels pleasurable,
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  we try to hold onto it. When it feels painful or uncomfortable, we try to reject it, suppress
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  it or escape from it. Either way, there is a tightening around experience. And it is
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  this tightening that creates a psychological suffering. Surrender is the
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  softening of that clenched fist. It is not the softening of your personality, nor
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  does it weaken your capacity to discern, choose, speak or act. It is the softening
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  of the inner tension that says this moment should be different from what it
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  It is.
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  We could call this a soft stop, a gentle ending of the habit of constantly interpreting and
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  interfering with experience.
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  The mind is almost always doing this.
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  It comments, evaluates, compares, judges, resists and desires.
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  It moves towards and away from experience almost continuously.
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  And because this movement is so habitual, we rarely notice it.
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  Yet this very activity creates and sustains the sense that there is a separate me standing
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  apart from life, trying to manage it.
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  In this sense, the ego is really not an entity.
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  It is an activity.
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  activity of interpretation and interference. The soft stop does not try to destroy this
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  activity. It does not wage war against the mind or attempt to impose silence. It simply
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  stops feeding the movement. And even for a moment, something becomes available that was
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  hidden while we were busy trying to manage everything. There is simply the moment, this
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  moment, as it is, before we turn it into a story.
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  Surrender is the willingness to meet experience without immediately trying to resolve it. The
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  mind wants certainty, it wants a conclusion, a position, somewhere secure to stand, yet
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  Its surrender offers no such ground.
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  It opens into the unknown, into the eternal now, alive and without resolution.
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  This is where fear can arise.
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  At the deepest level, what the separate self fears is its own disappearance.
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  There can be a fear that if we stop grasping, stop managing, stop defining ourselves through
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  thought, then somehow we will cease to exist. Yet what begins to fall apart in surrender
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  is not life itself. It is the illusion that life can be contained by our plans, controlled
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  by our will, or made safe through understanding. Life itself remains. In fact, life becomes
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  more immediate and intimate. There is a paradox here. The self imagines surrender to be a
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  falling into nothingness. Yet when the grip begins to loosen, we discover that we are
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  not falling out of life. We are falling into life. Sometimes the invitation comes gently.
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  It may arise beneath a vast night sky, beside the ocean, in the quiet of early morning,
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  or in an unexpected moment of beauty.
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  The usual structures of thought relax, and for a few moments nothing needs to be understood
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  or controlled.
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  We are simply here.
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  At other times, surrender arrives as a storm.
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  Life overturns our plans, something we depended upon disappears.
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  A relationship changes.
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  The body becomes vulnerable.
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  Loss comes.
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  The familiar strategies that once gave us a sense of security no longer work.
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  In these moments, surrender is no longer a beautiful spiritual idea.
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  It becomes existential.
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  there may be nowhere left to hide and nothing left to hold onto.
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  But surrender does not ask us to transcend our humanity.
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  It does not ask us to deny grief, fear, anger or sorrow.
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  It asks us to enter experience fully without turning away.
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  The heart may break, tears may come, fear may move through the body.
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  does not remove the intensity of being human. It removes the resistance to what is already
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  here. This distinction is important. Surrender does not mean we stop acting, we still speak,
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  make decisions, draw boundaries and respond intelligently to the circumstances of our
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  lives. But action can begin to arise from somewhere other than contraction and fear.
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  There can be a deeper listening, a response that does not come from the compulsive need
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  to force life into a predetermined shape. Nor can surrender be forced. We cannot turn
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  into another spiritual achievement. Surrender is more like ripe fruit, falling naturally from the tree.
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  We can prepare the ground, we can be willing to see the mechanisms of resistance within ourselves
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  and become sensitive to the grasping, rejecting, suppression and avoidance that create in a
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  a conflict, we can meet these movements with tenderness rather than violence. But the final
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  surrender is not something the separate self accomplishes. Perhaps this willingness to
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  see is itself a kind of prayer, not, not prayer as asking for something, but prayer as openness,
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  making ourselves available without agenda, and allowing everything to appear within the
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  unconditional field of awareness. This invitation is not confined to meditation or spiritual
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  practice. It is always here. Every irritation, every uncertainty, every disappointment, every
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  moment when life refuses to conform to our expectations becomes an invitation to notice
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  where the fist has clenched and whether it can soften. Not because the situation is necessarily
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  pleasant and not because we agree with what has happened, but because what is already
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  here is already here. Surrender is the end of the argument with this moment. When that
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  argument ends, even briefly, something very simple is revealed. Being itself has never
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  needed our management. Life has always been here, offering itself completely in the silence
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  and in the storm, in beauty and in devastation, in the breaking open and the quiet wonder
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  of an ordinary moment. The invitation is always the same. Can we stop resisting what is here?
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  Can we release the demand that this moment be different? Can we allow ourselves to be touched by
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  life without immediately retreating into interpretation, control or defence. This is
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  surrender, not defeat, not passivity and not the disappearance of our humanity. It is simply
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  the soft stop. And in that stopping, liberation is not something we achieve. It is revealed
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  as already here.
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  I absolutely love that. I absolutely love that.
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  I haven't heard that before.
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  Is this new?
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  We didn't put this out on sub-stack.
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  No, we didn't put it out in this form.
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  it's actually an amalgamation of three pieces of writing that are out there, but I think it's
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  more complete in this way. Perhaps we should put that out there as well.
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  Well, as you were reading it, and actually I have to say I got the tingles of recognition
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  in this, in that this actually so good summed up so many of the nuances of the truths of the
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  accuracy and the depth actually of this work, this teaching, this that you and I offer. And I
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  think it was actually a really more absolutely beautiful, really accurate. I think if people could
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  would just digest those words.
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  - I have to say, I kind of agree.
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  And I have to say, as I was reading it,
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  obviously I wrote it, but reading it back to myself
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  and to everyone.
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  It so reminded me if that's the right word
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  or affirmed that actually that, exactly,
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  that seeing, that understanding about surrender,
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  not written in those particular words,
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  but the actual journey of it
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  and the journey within of seeing was exactly
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  what my awakening was, you know, leading up to it anyway.
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  the precursor when I started to see exactly what I've been reading out, seeing those internal
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  mechanisms and then the stop and the stop and the stop and the stop until a much deeper
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  stop came. So yes, it is the essence of the work that is offered here.
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  We did actually a month ago when we did the last podcast. This did reveal itself. This
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  part of this was included because we did talk about the sort of phone build up is not the right
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  word but what was going on in your life before the awakening that you had happened and I remember
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  that kind of you know not directly not as succinctly as this but this did come up.
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  And it is the core, right?
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  It is the heart of not just this teaching as such,
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  but actually so many ways.
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  This is at the heart of the deepest,
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  lived, true spiritual journey.
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  - It's the heart of liberation.
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  You know, we have all these phrases
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  like self-realization, enlightenment, awakening,
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  this than the other, and at the heart of all of those, beyond understanding, beyond, certainly
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  beyond knowledge, is this, there can be no liberation from the sense or the illusion
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  of a separate self, there can be no liberation from separation, you know, there can be no
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  true non-dual realization in the fullness of our being and our humanity without this,
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  without surrender.
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  But I, instead of just, you know, I have a couple of questions that come from this article,
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  but actually what I feel cool to do is to actually just read a couple of passages and
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  then see where they, you know, what they speak to and see if we want to open those up a little
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  bit because they're so succinct.
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  The first thing doesn't really need any explanation, but I'll go back to something
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  else is when you said, "Very simple, surrender is the end of the argument with this moment."
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  Which is, and then so there was something else here.
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  is the willingness to meet experience without immediately trying to resolve it.
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  The mind wants certainty. It wants a conclusion, a position, somewhere secure to stand, yet
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  surrender offers no such ground. It opens into the unknown, into the eternal now, alive
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  without resolution. Now I know that speaks unto itself. It's an entire sort of statement,
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  but what's going on there? What's really, you know, what's actually happening in that?
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  Surrender is the willingness to meet experience without immediately trying to resolve it.
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  Mind wants resolution, conclusion.
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  Let's take an example
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  of a difficult, unexpected, challenging circumstance that takes place
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  and creates fear, anxiety or whatever it may be.
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  The mind or the mind that is still an extension of the sense of being a separate self
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  will either want to find a solution immediately to fix the situation, to make it go away,
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  to ignore it, to immediately change it, manage it, control it. That's on the level of circumstance,
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  that's the actual thing that is happening.
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  And then there's also a feeling, an emotion with that, and that's where it really starts
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  to play out the need for resolution, that if fear arises or anxiety or shock or grief
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  for whatever it is. Immediately there's a unconscious, it happens quickly, unseen desire
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  to get rid of that, because it's so uncomfortable, to get rid of that by suppressing it, by ignoring
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  it by rejecting it, by changing it somehow, controlling it, or by contracting into being
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  a victim of it. A victim of the emotion, a victim of the circumstance. So there's a
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  whole contractive controlling mechanism that goes on. To meet what is without looking for
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  a resolution without resolving it, without resolving it, is to meet it without any movement
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  as such, without looking for an outcome, without just meeting it as it is. And as it
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  is, is the direct feeling that's happened, whether it's anxiety, whether it's whatever
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  it is. But not to overlay that with this shouldn't be happening or I shouldn't be feeling this
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  or I have to change it or I have to suppress it or this is going to kill me or it's like
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  not having an overlay because it's from that. That's the unknown. It's not finding another
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  place to land on, landing on the victim, landing on the poor me, landing on this shouldn't
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  be happening, landing on I have to find the resolution immediately so I don't feel these
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  uncomfortable feelings, they're all landing places and that's what perpetuates the contraction,
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  that's what perpetuates the sense of being a separate me. But to meet it as it is, whatever
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  it is, however it is, without a landing place means that there is a very clear, it doesn't
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  feel clear in the moment, but there's actually a clear space from which discernment, decision,
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  action can take place, not necessarily immediately, but as one remains in that.
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  Because the mind that really with become is habituated to resolution one way or another.
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  And so to me when you speak of this, it's not the question in a way is not what is surrender.
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  It's actually looking and seeing that what you're talking about is without immediately trying to
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  resolve it, the next paragraph actually goes straight into this is where fear can arise.
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  Because the mind that we've come to give all of our allegiance to is habituated to resolution
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  one way or another, resolves to, I hate this, I don't want this, less fit this, less run away
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  from this, which then becomes, I'm a victim of it, or I've got it under control, etc, etc.
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  and the mind wants certainty. Yes, you've said that. And so seeing that is what you're talking about.
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  Seeing the mind that wants to resolve it into some kind of certainty.
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  And that can open the door. I guess what I'm saying is I think people are,
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  You know, we as beings are so habituated to resolution one way or another,
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  that that does open the door to uncertainty. That's why you're saying, "Sit with it and sit with it."
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  Are you saying, "Sit with it?" Or are you just saying it one more time?
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  One has to find out one for oneself how trying to
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  let's put it this way, overlaying what is with some kind of mind narrative whether it's
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  this shouldn't be happening poor me I'm going to die it's going to kill me I have to fix it it
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  it has to go away, I shouldn't be feeling like this, why do bad things keep happening
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  to me. Any of those overlays, and there are myriad variations of that, one has to see
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  for oneself that that creates more suffering and does not create an intelligent resolution
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  response to the situation. When one is ripe for that seeing, then there's another possibility.
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  And it's at that point that the issue, if you like, of or the invitation of surrender comes forwards.
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  But I just want to say, and I think you might have alluded it to it. I'm not sure.
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  It's not then, well, how do I surrender?
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  Because that creates its own set of problems.
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  The question is not, I know surrender might be the more intelligent way,
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  but how do I surrender?
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  So, then we're applying mind, we're applying separate self to the same,
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  it's the same mechanism.
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  So it's not how do I surrender?
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  It's, am I willing to just be with what is?
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  And yes, that is a kind of sitting with it, being with it, let's say being with it.
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  Just be with discomfort.
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  Be, hang out, hang out.
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  I keep saying hang out because it is like a hanging out.
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  Hang out.
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  Don't find a safety seat.
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  Hang out.
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  with fear, hang out with uncertainty, hang out with anger, hang out with whatever
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  texture is moving in this is appearing. Hang out in not knowing, not knowing.
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  And it's from that place that the that is surrender in itself, yeah? It starts, it
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  starts the surrender of that mechanism, the grasping mechanism of mind. It starts it.
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  You don't have to think about how do I surrender? Wrong direction of attention. Just hang out
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  with what is. It's not going to kill you. Hang out. And in that, the contractive self
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  starts to soften, starts to open. You might not feel wonderful, you might not feel at
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  peace. It doesn't matter. Just hang out and wait, hang out and wait and don't give allegiance
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  to the mind's narratives. We each have that possibility and we each have to do that for
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  ourselves, there is no how. You know, there is no formula, we have to be ripe for this.
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  And then what happens is that a certain space opens up, spaciousness within, you stop being
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  a separate self trying to manage reality. And reality actually meets you, the intelligence
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  of life actually meets you. And then the textural field of intense emotion will change because
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  it's always changing and a deeper insight or a deeper understanding or an opportunity
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  or an action starts to come forwards, but it doesn't come from the contracted self.
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  And we have to find out for ourselves.
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  It's slightly off-script, not that we've got one, but it's surrender actually at a kind of
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  bifurcation point. What I'm thinking about is the metaphor of the chickpea that's in the
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  the pot boiling bubbling away, still hard and everything. And then at a certain point,
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  naturally, it yields its flavors. The flowers, the flower that's opening, doesn't just open
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  all at once. It actually would do it to my knowledge anyway. It speaks politically to
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  me. Petal by petal is hanging out there. Like you said, it's hanging out. These are a kind
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  of almost natural bifurcation points where inevitably, inevitably surrender happens.
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  That's why it can't be talked about as any sort of how-to.
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  It naturally happens with the kind of way that you're talking about hanging out at the
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  edge of discomfort.
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  Because I go back to what you talked about in the last podcast and I would encourage
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  people to go back and have a listen to that one because actually you did talk about the
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  for some reason you just without it being comfortable or uncomfortable or any kind of
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  interpretation you just you some reason hung out at that juncture without moving
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  towards and without moving away and that's the ripeness that you're talking about.
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  Yes, life offers us that opportunity in every circumstance, especially the ones that we
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  don't like or don't want.
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  So it is in that sense, it's a sort of petal by petal opportunity or ripeness.
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  We shouldn't look for the idea of surrender or the idea of the soft stop as the final doorway
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  or resolution to enlightenment, to liberation.
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  then that puts a lot of agenda into it. So it's not that if you finally get what surrender
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  is, then you're going to be liberated from the sense of being a separate self or ego identity.
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  It is an ongoing invitation, but if we take up that invitation as life offers us these
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  opportunities, unwelcome opportunities perhaps, or quiet opportunities, then it becomes in
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  in some ways a new way of being with life, of meeting life, that eventually may bring
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  us to deeper and deeper layers of undoing the structure that the self, the separate self
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  seems to stand on, the dream of the separate self, the dream world, the matrix world.
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  starts to unravel those structures. And in that way, it is like the chickpea in the pot.
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  It has to be cooked and stirred and added spices too. That's life and its challenges and its
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  heat and its difficulties and its discomforts. And eventually something just goes...
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  I agree and I like that again. I'm most enthusiastic about this, the subject, this whole podcast,
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  because to me, in my own personal life, surrender is the way. It's a way. It's a way of living.
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  It's not a destination. Surrender is a way of living. And that means it's alive. It's alive
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  all the time because life is alive. We are alive as life in life. And here it is, experience coming.
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  I'd prefer every experience of my life to be really fantastic.
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  So, then surrender is like not very interesting and not a conversation piece and not really
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  anything that I have to consider.
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  But life is nuanced and impermanent filled with all of these variables, isn't it?
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  So, life, so surrender is the way, is a way.
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  But even when life is fantastic, whatever they have been.
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  Yeah, it could be fantastic.
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  If anybody could tell me.
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  But even if only good things happen and good opportunities, good things, blessings, rewards,
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  I don't know what that is, but even if that were the case, there'd still be grasping mind
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  because the mind would then grasp onto that and create it into an identity.
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  I've arrived, I'm blessed, I'm lucky, I'm elevated. A sense of importance comes, a sense of pride
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  comes, a sense of specialness comes. And a sense of, I know what the outcome is, because if I have
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  this, then I'm going to be, I don't know, comfortable, or I'm going to be secure, or I'm going to be
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  recognized, or I'm going to be whatever it is, famous, whatever it might be. So it still has that
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  landing in a conclusive place, we still come to a seat in which the separate self sits,
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  and that in itself will create suffering. We can't sit in that place forever because then we have
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  to hold onto it, then we have to manage it, then we have to not lose it, then we have to control it,
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  then we have to turn it into some badge of identity. So it's no different. So if something good comes,
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  It's the same. It's not like we have to do some kind of strange process of surrender.
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  It's just simply not knowing, "Oh, wow, here it is." And here it is. And there's a kind
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  of innocence in that, but not coming, not overlaying it with another narrative, maybe
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  a positive narrative, but it's still a narrative nevertheless, because everything comes and
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  goes anyway.
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  - Absolutely excellent answer.
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  And I wholeheartedly hear you in that.
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  And that is a fundamental truth of the way of surrender.
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  I really do, actually the way of the Tao as well.
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  - Yes.
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  - Do we have as it is the way that is in farmer?
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  - That's it.
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  I was going to say, beautiful story of the Zen farmer.
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  Maybe you can tell us what that is.
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  - The farmer lived in the days
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  when there was frequent fighting between small kingdoms in China. The farmer had a son who
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  was tilling a small field with the help of his horse. One day the horse ran away.
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  The neighbours heard about this and came to the father's house to commiserate. "We are
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  so very sorry," they cried. "This is a very bad situation. You have such bad luck."
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  The farmer simply said, "Maybe."
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  The next day the horse came back and brought with it half a dozen other wild horses.
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  The neighbours came round again, this time to rejoice.
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  This is such good news, they said.
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  What tremendous luck.
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  The farmer said, "Maybe."
• 5:35
  On the third day the sun fell and broke his leg while trying to ride one of the wild horses.
• 5:36
  The neighbours came again, crying and wailing about what bad luck it was.
• 5:37
  The farmer said, "Maybe."
• 5:38
  The next day the king's people came to recruit strong healthy farmers into the army.
• 5:39
  When they found the farmer's son with a broken leg, they left him alone.
• 5:40
  The neighbours came again and gave a huge sigh of relief.
• 5:41
  They said, "It wasn't such bad luck after all,
• 5:42
  and that everything had turned out well."
• 5:43
  The farmer said again, "Maybe."
• 5:44
  Farmer was the epitome of the dau,
• 5:45
  which is neither this nor that,
• 5:46
  but not in some kind of overlay,
• 5:47
  but actually it involved success, like you said,
• 5:48
  or great bounteousness, but also great hardship,
• 5:49
  you know, where he had to face the prospect of his son being,
• 5:50
  going off to fight and to die in the war. And both of those were met with actually the surrender,
• 5:51
  the same surrender, which is we'll see. Not we'll see with any kind of strategy or anything inside it,
• 5:52
  but we'll see because there's a deeper intelligence at work. I think that's what is being pointed to
• 5:53
  a certain extent. There's a deeper intelligence at work.
• 5:54
  That's right. The cycles of time and the cycles of change will always come. And when we get
• 5:55
  pulled by, "Oh, this is it. This is great. Now we're saved." Or the other way, "This is a disaster,
• 5:56
  and now we're lost." Now we're blessed, or now we're punished. Then that's where the suffering is.
• 5:57
  Whereas to remain as the centre of the Tao, and allow all things to pass, to come and go,
• 5:58
  whether they're circumstances or whether they're our own thoughts, brings great wisdom and true strength.
• 5:59
  So in this sense, there's a kind of equanimity in Surranda. There's a kind of seeing in Surranda.
• 6:00
  this great equanimity, this neither this nor that, to see the pull towards the good,
• 6:01
  apparent good, and the pull towards the apparent bad or negative as the same pull.
• 6:02
  And to see those without moving is equanimity, and that equanimity is also surrender,
• 6:03
  which takes it out of the realm of doing.
• 6:04
  Yes, it is the soft stop. It's not an equanimity often
• 6:05
  gets interpreted somehow as a kind of cold neutrality detached. I don't care, it doesn't matter. I'm not
• 6:06
  touched by this, but that's not really what it means. It's simply the soft stop, the soft stop
• 6:07
  of the pendulum of mind, the pendulum of this is terrible to, this is, you know, the best,
• 6:08
  you know, and the attachment of the Self to that. It's the soft stop. And therein is
• 6:09
  the intelligence of life. Therein is the creative potential.
• 6:10
  This is a heart of spiritual teaching as we said at the beginning because when you speak,
• 6:11
  I think of Arjuna, I think of Buddha, I think of Jesus' teachings, I think of the Zen farmer,
• 6:12
  all of this is around the same thing.
• 6:13
  like the essential component or the essential underwriting of it, the soft stop is not me
• 6:14
  stopping. It's a soft stop of something seeing that movement.
• 6:15
  So can I, before we, I know this has been beautiful, but I actually want to bring in
• 6:16
  this question because I know that people want to hear at least about how difficult surrender,
• 6:17
  And I know we've spoken to it, but I will speak to it specifically, when life brings
• 6:18
  real loss, uncertainty or upheaval.
• 6:19
  Surrender can feel much harder than it does in simple meditation.
• 6:20
  Yeah?
• 6:21
  In meditation, it's one thing.
• 6:22
  But in real life, when there's loss, grief, hardship, pain, etc, etc.
• 6:23
  What does it look like?
• 6:24
  We have answered this really in the midst of those human experiences because I know people
• 6:25
  want to hear about the human experiences.
• 6:26
  So let's just explore that for a few minutes.
• 6:27
  And I have the second question on the back of that.
• 6:28
  Just I think some of the, you know, conversations we've had here are actually pointing to this
• 6:29
  very issue or this very question, which is in the midst of, let's say, great loss of some
• 6:30
  kind. It really isn't about just sitting back and going, "Ah, just this." It's about
• 6:31
  not arguing with the feelings that arise, with the tears, with the grief, with the heartbreak,
• 6:32
  the uncertainty, not arguing with that and meeting that with tenderness, allowing that.
• 6:33
  That's where very often, most often, that's where we attempt to suppress those feelings,
• 6:34
  to reject them or to add another overlay that I'm very bad, I'm being punished for
• 6:35
  actually feeling this, for having this feeling arrive, but if we could only meet
• 6:36
  and be and hang out with and be tender and kind with the feelings that arise,
• 6:37
  that is the essence of surrender, just being with what is. If tears come, let them
• 6:38
  flow. If heartbreak is here, be tender in that. It's really allowing everything that is appearing
• 6:39
  in your experience to be. The argument softens. It really is that. It's not knowing where those
• 6:40
  tears will lead, not knowing where the heartbreak will lead, not tightening around it.
• 6:41
  It seems so simple on one level, it is simple, but because almost everyone has been conditioned
• 6:42
  in some way to believe that these feelings are going to kill us, that they're really
• 6:43
  bad, that there's some kind of punishment from God, from life, from a higher power,
• 6:44
  that we're not good enough for having these feelings, that we're unworthy, that we,
• 6:45
  yeah?
• 6:46
  it becomes quite entangled in those belief systems. But what if everything is an offering
• 6:47
  if you like from God itself, which it is, from life? Everything is a doorway. There's
• 6:48
  nothing wrong with any of it because tears will wash away what's been held, what's
• 6:49
  been wounded, let's say, grief will open the heart even wider. Loss will reveal, if we're
• 6:50
  open to it, what cannot be lost and what is of true worth, and so on. So really, it's
• 6:51
  the same invitation. Can we just be with what is? Can it be soft? Can we stop arguing
• 6:52
  with what is, can we stop arguing with the feeling? It really transforms everything eventually
• 6:53
  because there's nothing to be, you know, nothing to resist in that. Everything has an
• 6:54
  intelligence in it. All feelings have an intelligence in them.
• 6:55
  I'm going to actually not veer off into that other question because I think that's actually
• 6:56
  a really beautiful place to leave it.
• 6:57
  In affirmation of that, again, I don't know, just is evocative of having no more fear about
• 6:58
  how we feel is so incredible to realize that we have so much fear about what we feel is
• 6:59
  amazing. But I do think it kind of comes with part of the territory of being human. And I remember
• 7:00
  reading, going back to Rumi and Shams of Tabriz, his master and teacher who
• 7:01
  was everything, became everything to Rumi. And as far as the story goes, and I know this one a
• 7:02
  little bit better, it was a little more simplistic. But when Shams, his teacher, his master, who
• 7:03
  It was fulfilling something in Rumi. He disappeared whether he was killed or whether he just disappeared
• 7:04
  as part of the Rumi journey. We'll never know. But Rumi was bereft. I mean like grief, like the
• 7:05
  grief of a loss of a lover. And it tore him open. It tore him a sander. And in that tearing,
• 7:06
  and I've always seen the image of Rumi tearing himself open because it's such a visual poet
• 7:07
  that he tore himself open and he didn't resist that and he didn't. He allowed it to swallow him up
• 7:08
  and some of the Persian culture speaks to that, that our unafraid of their grief, their unafraid
• 7:09
  of their joy, their unafraid of their sorrow, they haven't got any problem with it. And in the tearing
• 7:10
  himself open so that something much deeper happened within him. And in that journey,
• 7:11
  something was realized that Shamsa Tabriz, his master, his teacher, was in him as him.
• 7:12
  And he merged with his master and both him and the master merged into one. It was the
• 7:13
  final surrender of a life lived absolutely, religiously and devoutly. But this one came
• 7:14
  on the back of the grief because his master had disappeared. So that really speaks to
• 7:15
  me to what you're saying.
• 7:16
  Absolutely. Well, we, you know, when, when love in the form of form, in the form of another,
• 7:17
  is lost from the world of form, then we go seeking for that or
• 7:18
  bemoaning that or heart breaks open for that loss.
• 7:19
  At some point, perhaps if we allow that breaking open, we realise that that love was never outside
• 7:20
  of us. It was always in us. The form may be gone from view, but the love that was inspired by that form
• 7:21
  is still in us. It's only when we contract into a poor me that the love is actually lost,
• 7:22
  because then we're not. There isn't love. There's just contraction and poor me. But if we remain
• 7:23
  open to that loss, to that heartbreak, then the love is still here. The river of love continues,
• 7:24
  whether it's the death of someone or the end of a relationship of some kind.
• 7:25
  Well, that brings us to the nature of our relationship and the relationship that we have with our
• 7:26
  little dog because it's very much that kind of relationship that probably one of us, you or I,
• 7:27
  will. We'll go first. I know we talked about it and we're very open with it and we're very
• 7:28
  recognized that some of that tearing open may well happen, but to love anyway, that is surrender.
• 7:29
  Love is this kind of love. This is surrender. It takes many forms or it has many words or many
• 7:30
  ways of speaking to it, but to love knowing that all is impermanent and
• 7:31
  that's not an external thing, that's part of the gamble. To me, that's the part of the gamble of
• 7:32
  surrender as a way of life and love as a way of life. This is very beautiful. The invitation
• 7:33
  is always the same. Can we stop resisting what is here? Can we release the demand that this moment
• 7:34
  be different? Can we allow ourselves to be touched by life without immediately retreating
• 7:35
  into interpretation, control or defence? This is surrender, not defeat, not passivity and not the
• 7:36
  disappearance of our humanity. It is simply the soft stop. And in that stopping, liberation is not
• 7:37
  something we achieve. It is revealed as already here. Beautiful. That brings us to the end of
• 7:38
  this particular podcast. We thank you so much for listening or watching. Please subscribe.
• 7:39
  share this if you're moved. And do join us again, come and be with us in person if you
• 7:40
  ever get the chance, either online, preferably in person. And Amoda, thank you so much
• 7:41
  for sharing your depth, your wisdom and grace. And any final words?
• 7:42
  I think that's it for today. The beautiful conversation.
• 7:43
  Beautiful, thank you so much. Namaste to all of you and we'll see you again soon.