Shared Wisdom Guest Post
Featuring Slade Roberson from Shift Your Spirits
Are you struggling to make something happen?
Are you torturing your consciousness for a sense of the right direction, begging the Universe for assistance with a difficult decision?
Are you interrogating your guides, trying with all your might to listen to your heart, but hearing no clear answers?
You know that trying too hard only makes it worse, so you beat yourself up about that too… Spinning your wheels in a Purgatory of Indecision — or maybe it’s a Special Place in Hell just for perfectionists, over-analyzers, and hand-wringers.
Recirculation
If you’ve ever been white-water rafting or kayaking you’ve heard about the dangers of recirculation. This is what occurs when you’re dragged into a hydrodynamic phenomenon where water falling from a shelf of rock goes to the bottom of the river, and, instead of moving downstream, is pushed back up, under, and behind the fall.
Kind of like undertow at the beach — only it never stops. A whirlpool, turned sideways — just like the Wheel of Life — and you’re stuck beneath it.
It’s terrifying. Your fight-or-flight response kicks in and every cell in your body demands that you struggle upwards, toward the air and light — which is against tons of physical resistance.
You don’t stand a chance of kicking or pushing against this.
Everything your body knows about how to swim is challenged. If you keep trying to swim, you’ll drown. This conflict of instinct and training and logical decision-making is taking place in a heartbeat of time, beneath dangerously cold water, against the force of being hit by a bus hundreds of times per second.
If you fight — if you continue to struggle — you’ll die.
If you react to the river’s force as your enemy, it becomes one.
It’s no accident of vocabulary that the captains of your white-water rafting voyage are aptly called river guides. They will instruct you when to paddle forwards or backwards, where to shift your weight… and they will tell you what to do if you fall out of the boat and, God forbid, find yourself recirculated.
The remedy for the situation is actually extremely simple and requires absolutely no exertion of strength whatsoever. The challenge is a mental decision — one that must transcend physical action and the survival instinct of the body:
Do Nothing
Do not struggle; do not try to swim; do not push with your legs; do not grasp with your hands; do not pull with your arms. Do not even think about breathing. Curl into a fetal position and release control.
The river will spit out a recirculated object — especially one wearing a life jacket.
No effort is required on your part, yet doing nothing is the hardest course of action to take.
The Universe — the Flow — is a river and your soul is a flotation device. The mortal vessel — the body — is a machine that will obey the mind and the will.
Is your thinking mind dragging your spirit under and keeping you there?
The Art of Surrender
What happens if you stop pushing the river — get out of your own way, and let yourself be carried in the direction of the answer you seek?
The most challenging action you may ever be asked to perform could be surrender.
For most of us, surrender is simultaneously the easiest and the hardest thing to do. The art of surrender is most critical at times when all other options — even the ones you think are the only way to survive — amount to suicide. Or something worse than doing nothing.
Maybe the turmoil, the churning waters of the Flow in which you find yourself right now, are not life-or-death — you can still breathe, can’t you? If you can breathe, you’ve got everything you need to make it through this moment.
Surrender does not mean you will never do anything again. Surrender doesn’t mean that you “turn it over to God” and that you have no further role to play, or that you won’t be required to wait for your cue and then act with focus, intent, and rested power.
You’ve seen the silly scenes in movies or cartoons, where someone who can’t swim falls in the water and thrashes about in a screaming panic… before realizing the water isn’t deep enough to drown in, and all he had to do was stand up.
You can drown in a bathtub. You could — technically — drown by sticking your head in a bucket, a sink, or a toilet.
Are you acting out of desperation right now? Slapping the water and stirring up drama and screaming and spluttering “Show me! Where is it?! Where’s the answer?! Oh God, I can’t see it, I can’t find it — I’m blind!”
Chill.
You don’t have to change your life right this minute. (You can’t.) You don’t have to decide today. You don’t have to move a mountain right now. The river can move mountains; over time, it can level them and turn them to rubble. But even if it starts immediately, you won’t miss a thing by letting your pillow take your troubles, just for a few more hours…
Stop pushing the river and damning your flow. Wait, gather information — play — and let the Universe show you its hand.
Allow yourself to be carried where you most need to go.
The Universe is change.
You will be moved; it’s inevitable.
You can float and rest, or you can thrash and scream — it changes nothing except the level of suffering that you choose in the interim.
***
Slade Roberson is an intuitive counselor and author. You can read hundreds of original articles and memoirs about spirituality, intuitive development, and the paranormal at Slade’s popular blog Shift Your Spirits. This article originally appeared on his site – please be sure to visit him there.
Thank you so much, Slade, for sharing your wisdom on Soul Speak! It’s an honor to have you here.
WOW. Powerful. How often have I thrashed around and made a big fuss, covering up the simple calm that waits beneath?
“You don’t have to move a mountain RIGHT NOW”–what a glorious giggle that was, realizing I so frequently build mountains in my mind . . . then throw up my hands and say, “It’s too big. I can’t do it.” Thank you for this reminder to let the river do its work–clearing the way so we can do ours.
Hi Amanda!
We’re definitely in the same boat ( 🙂 ) thrashing about on this river of life. And I forget that if I just allow myself to flow along with it, everything will always work out.
I loved Slade’s beautiful reminder.
Love to you!
This has to be one of the best resistance metaphors I’ve seen. In a culture primarily based on doing and achieving, it’s always fantastic to have refreshing reminders like this one. Great article by Slade and thanks for posting it.
Hi David,
It’s so true that we live in a society that praises “doing” rather than “being.”
I loved Slade’s reminder that it’s okay to surrender.
So glad you’re here!
What a great post! I keep running into posts like this – it’s time to listen to the universe and pay attention!! Thanks!
Isn’t it great when the universe sends us signs in many different forms? I love that, and I’m glad you’re paying attention. I am, too.
🙂
I just loved that part about realizing the water isn’t deep enough to drown in! So true of so many of our life’s situations! Very thought-provoking post! Thank you, Slade!
Thank you, Jodi!
It’s so true, isn’t it? We don’t always realize that when we’re flailing about though. A great reminder for sure. 🙂
Great metaphor! I got flashbacks of the times when I was so caught up in my own suffering and trying to control other people and a situation. I felt hopeless and didn’t know what to do next because nothing I was doing was working. So I felt like I gave up. I stopped struggling and I decided to go with the flow. And my life radically changed for the better.
After doing this at a couple all-time low points in my life, I think I’ve learned my lessons. I’m now realizing that I don’t have to create so much suffering for myself. There really is a simpler way to achieve the happiness I was looking for.
Thanks for a wonderful post, Slade and Jodi!
Oh Paige,
Your comment was honestly just what I needed to read. Thank you! I KNOW that my life will flow much more easily when I finally stop pushing and just surrender, but I still resist it. Knowing that you were in a similar place, were able to let go, and things got better gives me so much hope and encouragement for my own life.
Thank you!
Jodi,
This was written for me…Stop pushing the river and damning your flow. I’m laughing thinking about it.
It was written for both of us! I’m glad it got you laughing – that’s such a great release that you have down pat! I love it! 🙂
Wow, what an epic post! I actually had this very experience when I was a teenager. I was thrown from a raft and ended up being dragged into a rapid and held there. And just as you said, I nearly drowned until I finally relaxed. No one had told me to do this. At some point, I just surrendered to death. I remember that I wasn’t afraid. I just stopped fighting. And then, the river spit me out, just in time.
But while I was being held underwater, with the currents thrashing me, I couldn’t think. I couldn’t make a rational decision. There was no time. And it’s liken that when we’re suffering as well. We are so bombarded by the situation that we forget that all we have to do is relax and we’ll be spit out.
Awesome, awesome post! 🙂
Huge hugs!
Melody
Wow, Melody! That’s amazing that you’ve had this experience literally. And the fact that you were able to surrender in that situation is why you are here today. That inspires me so much. I literally have goosebumps. Thank you!
This is an amazing analogy. It was perfect to help illustrate the importance of when to “do nothing”. I love this! It’s so difficult. It flies in the face of everything we’re taught about fighting, getting ahead and achieving.
Going “with the flow” is what puts us exactly where we’re meant to be!
Wow! This post was just what I needed to read this morning. Lately, I have been conflicted about should I still myself or make some kind of move. This confliction was got even louder this morning as I was thinking to myself that I ‘have to be doing SOMEthing, ANYthing”. But then I heard something on the radio and afterwards, read your post and now I know that I must remain still until I am guided into my next steps.
Thank you!