Yesterday I came across a nice metaphor for the moment-to-moment act of surrender: when you resist reality, you are like a dog walking around with a ball in its mouth. Keeping the ball in your mouth requires constant tension and contraction, a vigilant defense against outside interference. To surrender is to let go of this tension and defensiveness. To let the ball drop out of your mouth.
The ball, as you might have guessed, is your idea of how things should be.
Since I’ve started paying attention, I have been blown away by the amount of balls in my mouth how much of this resistance I carry around by default. I seem programmed to seek something to resist. Duke isn’t walking fast enough. I don’t like the essay I wrote. I don’t feel like taking this phone call. On and on and on.
All of these micro-resistances are marked by an all-encompassing contraction, an enveloping tension of the body and mind. I want to say that it’s subtle, because I’ve walked around with it for most of my life, but it actually isn’t subtle at all. It’s quite jarring—especially when I release the resistance and get a glimpse of what it’s like without it.
This is all new to me, and I have questions: What are the cumulative effects of decades of tension? What does a life without that tension look like? What happens when I drop the ball?
What if I were to leave it on the ground?
"What if I were to leave it on the ground?" A beautiful question Alex.
You would be at peace with what is.
Unless, of course, your monkey mind kicked in and started judging yourself for leaving it on the ground.
It is my experience, that "being at peace with what is" is a transformation won, one moment at a time. Over. And over. And Over.
Great observations! I'm no expert in this, but the body does seem to hold tension. I spent a few years as a massage therapist, which made me more aware of where my aches and pains were coming from (slouching, jaw clenching, carrying a heavy purse, etc).
When I was 30, I started going to a therapist who specializes is ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy). She would constantly ask me during our sessions "Where do you feel that in your body?" Emotions tend to show up in our body as physical sensations, but if you've spent a long time tuning your body out, you don't notice. People grind their teeth, press their tongue against the roof of their mouth, clench their feet, or tighten their shoulders without knowing it.
Some people go so far as to say certain emotions are connected to certain parts of the body. Supposedly shame lives in the pelvis. I don't know if I would go that far, but I do think freeing up your body helps you free up your mind.