What if you didn’t need to change a single thing, except how you think about it?

I’m sitting here with the sun streaming in my window. I can hear the kids outside yelling and laughing and Sumati’s running around with them.

All is well … and it’s easy to be happy and content and grateful when it’s like this, isn’t it?

Or is it just a matter of practice?

When life is lovely it’s easy to be lovely. Yet, how often will life look the way we want it to?

Not often enough, unfortunately.

So we struggle and strain and we control and effort, all in order to try and make life something we want it to be.

And in the tradition of living 200% – making life as you want it is a great idea. I saw something on the social media the other day … #loveyourlifeorchangeit – and what a fine sentiment.

But the control and strain and overthinking everything? That’s not much fun at all, nor is it useful - like we were talking about last week.

The addiction to control and change is THE problem for so many of us – that’s what creates so much struggle and frustration and dissatisfaction.

Here’s what I see to do about it:

Wisdom in action is clearly seeing what you can change, and what you can’t.

Anyone who invests in a practice of awareness will know how often our minds get upset about something that was in the past or in an uncontrollable future.

Whether that results in worry or anger, we so often buy into over-thinking the uncontrollable: we lose energy and time to things we can’t change.

Enter the solution — the spiritual practice of surrendering to what is.

Surrender isn’t being a walk over or being weak, it’s releasing control so you can be true to what the moment actually requires.

So if that’s action and words, they get done.

If that’s complete acceptance, that gets done.

In the beginning, given our habits of trying to control and push what can’t be controlled, complete acceptance gets done a lot more. So be ready for that.

Now –

How do you accept?

How about not changing a single thing, except the way you think about it?

Appreciating the beauty and the Good that is already around you is fine start.

And you know I’m a fan of the question:

“Is this happening TO me, or FOR me?”.

What a wonderful assumption, a wonderful attitude: that life is trying to give us what we need.

What IF life was trying to show you what you needed?

Change your thinking to match that and instantly your shoulders drop.

All we have to do is give up what we want for what we need – which, it must be said, is no small thing.

There’s considerable spiritual maturity in embracing the path that you need to be on, to be open to be guided by your own wisdom in order to live your best life possible. And that, like all true adventures, will involve a certain amount of uncertainty.

Now is the only place of certainty, anywhere. This is it. Let go, get here.

You have to trust that by letting go of trying to control the future, now will turn out as good as, if not better, than you could have planned it. That control and strain and struggle is not part of being your best.

But … start with a little letting go and you will see that trust comes through. You see surrender works.