FREE OF ME...RESIST NOT, WELCOME

But the mystery of transformation more often happens not when something new begins, but when something old falls apart. We will normally do anything to keep the old thing from falling apart, yet this is when we need patience and guidance, and the freedom to let go instead of tightening our controls and certitudes....It’s the deep yeses that carry us through to the other side.    -- Fr Richard Rohr, "Daily Meditation," July 5, 2020

In my passing thoughts, I am certain that I just want to be free of me. Specifically, free of my petties, of my wants which invariably translate as needs to my ego. It is hard to remember those thoughts are my ego's forever want dressed up as a need. Kinda like the song I'll Go To My Grave Loving You, doubtless I'll go to my grave loving my ego wants...by resisting them. 

As Rohr writes, this is when we need the freedom to let go...we know from experience that tightening our controls and certitudes only nurtures that ego need.

An early blinding flash of the obvious re letting go came from my experience when I welcomed an incoming anxiety attack...and it did not attack. I, of course, thought I'd found a forever cure for anxiety, that I'd never have another just by praying thank you. 

That self-described fix, however, has proved to be temporary, meaning we have to welcome each anxiety attack each time, taking special care not to assume we're in control. To welcome with the idea that this gives us control, is to bring panic quick, hard, and mean...there is no self-control. 

I have found that, in general, when I welcome with God first in my mind and as my guide, often panic (or any other defect) slip-slides away. Ah, a major side-effect: The discovery that our defects of character are not  taken away forever...they are transmuted by grace and by God. 

In short, when we take anything too seriously, it becomes our mental savior, and we are totally under its control. That's when we go for love and laughter...p.d.q.  Face it, when we're being controlled by our own mental conniving, what else is there but love and laughter?

Loose it and let it go. 

Thank you.