| Canadian poet, author and gardener, Patrick Lane, says in his memoir, “Surrender is what got me to these moments in the garden, this acceptance of what I have and what I am.”
In “There is a Season,” (the most exquisitely written book I’ve read this year) Lane describes how at 62, having been an alcoholic and drug addict for 45 years, it was the process of surrender that moved him out of the morass. |
And isn’t it the case that surrender is what releases us? Surrender, not “doormat surrender,” which is a pathological from of self-loathing, or locked in shame, but active surrender. This is the kind of surrender that releases all those we perceive owe us something; releases those we so desire attention from; accepts the inevitability of being misunderstood and rejoices in the achievements of others. This surrender unbinds ourselves so that we are able to reengage.
The surrender that accepts our minds, our bodies, our faces, our habitus’–all that we use to make contact with our world–is adult surrender…and is our life raft.
It sounds very good — have you ordered Christmas copies for your not-yet-surrendered friends?
Ah, well, that’s an idea.
But on the surrendered front, by virtue of bump and grind association, friends, are always in the process of surrender. Don’t you suppose?
Oh so true.