While moving through our bustling modern world filled with to-do lists and personal needs, the invitation to Surrender can be a challenging thought to entertain. So many of us are still striving to heal from challenges we have experienced including
issues of abandonment, loss of love and loved ones, and an array of traumas and abuse. All of these moments are places in our lives, and psyches, where we have felt unseen, invisible, unimportant. Cellularly, we remember times when misaligned power dynamics were used in a way that led to contraction. What if the practice of trusting another person, or opening to something larger than ourselves, forms pathways that ultimately lead to our healing and expansion? Like a gesture
of giving over that opens us up to something unimaginable, allowing us to discover freedom within the act of letting go.
As a yoga teacher, I encourage students to make acquaintances with the poses they dislike, and as a healer I invite clients to be present with the places in their bodies where there are sensations of discomfort, places of disconnect, or numbness. By allowing these places to be felt, we can then bring them back to life. Our aversion is often a sign that there is something underneath the layers waiting to be uncovered, embedded in those layers are potentials for healing.
We explore this while learning about the divine feminine. Each goddess displays and embodies her archetypal attributes, spanning from strength to devotion, from transcendence to revolution, from abundance to letting go. Often there is one that
we are naturally more aligned with, whether it be ferocity, love, or wisdom.
We find ourselves attracted to a particular goddesses’ trait, or perhaps we already embody them in our own life. We may feel a sense of camaraderie with a particular expression of the divine feminine, also known as Shakti, and we like it. I definitely have "my girls" and attributes that I am attracted to.
Humans get accustomed to the routine of doing what comes easily and what feels comfortable. We travel the path of least resistance. We ask ourselves "Why would I want to do that, to make myself uncomfortable, when I don't have to?"
We tell ourselves, "I don't need to explore those aspects of my being, really I am perfectly fine how I am."
Why would I want to let my guard down after working so dang hard to build it up?
Why would I want to expose myself, vulnerable, tender and risk being hurt?
Why would I want to soften when I have been mistreated, undervalued, and unloved?
If I give over, what's in it for ME?
Women of the western world we have individually, and collectively, worked diligently to establish themselves and have our voices heard and thoughts valued. While striving to bring optimal balance back is so important, perhaps there has also been a loss of the beauty within true feminine power.
The essence of Sita shows us selfless love and service and invites us to step through the door to surrender. It is through her unwavering devotion and trust that her whole existence becomes an expression of that love, though service. Surrender as a path to opening...submission as a form of trusting in the universe.
Historically in battle, we have been trained to think the act of surrender is weak or that to surrender is to give up. When held in a conscious container, giving over supports our strength. The strength we have been working so hard for comes more easily when we let go of the need to control. We resist it, we fight it, we clutch and hold on for dear life, but in doing so, we lose connection with the divine feminine that we embody.
How can we dissolve our endless individual needs in service of the greater?
Can we remain available and open, can we still embody our authenticity without expectation, without need?
Sita is also a goddess of the earth, of fertility, of spring. She embodies love without conditions, and she holds the qualities of heart melting love we should hold for ourselves, for another, for the earth. She endures, she suffers without resentment, she grieves and in her grieving she purifies through her tears. There is a purity though giving love. What stands in the way of you giving that love to yourself or another? What part of you resists it? Are you afraid of losing yourself if you give over to another?
If you are ready to begin to access this part of yourself that innately trusts and remains open regardless of the fluctuations of life, working with the element of Surrender is a great place to dive in.
-Raphaela Fritz
2/26/2023