Have you ever felt the sheer glory of living?
I’m talking about full-to-bursting kind of love. Joy that gets you dancing on the street without a care for who’s watching. You feel as if you beam light out of your eyes and radiate happiness for a mile.
No matter what happens, you know life will flow and everything will be all right.
Surrender has a bad rap. People think all it does is make you vulnerable. With a heart wide open like that, all you get is a broken heart – again and again and again. Right?
Let me be up front: Yes, that part can happen. But, if you want life to flood you with unimaginable joy, you have to brave the pain and embrace the happiness.
Surrendering to joy comes in stages. You don’t have to wear your heart on your sleeve all the time, and certainly not with everybody. Sure, there are leaps of faith, but to start feeling the happiness you want, you can start small. It doesn’t even have to be with people. You can let in animals, nature, music – simply embrace the beauty in the moment right now.
Then, as you feel more confident, go further:
Open your senses wide and feel the flowers, the energy of the storm, the rays of sun spilling over the clouds. Let the thought of today’s adventures make your mouth water. Be taken by the ecstasy of living.
Fall in love. Enjoy your food. Allow sex to be full-body, divine communion. Create from your soul and share with the world. Feel pleasure. Live your dreams.
Ingest life and overflow with joy until you leave a wake happiness behind you, full of people smiling without knowing why.
The more you open, the bigger your ecstasy becomes. And, you’ll also get better at knowing what to surrender to next.
Your heart will be broken along the way. Of course it will – life is just like that. You’ll be angry, sad, depressed (though you might find yourself, oddly enough, enjoying that part too). You’ll feel victimized. Hurt is part of living.
You don’t have to dwell on those things. The next moment could hold a surprise burst of laughter, deep compassion, an epiphany. Tomorrow might have another clue to what the hell your purpose is in this life.
You see, surrendering opens you to the great moments, too. That’s why you do it. When you truly open wide, those rough patches fade in favor of happiness. When your heart gets broken, let the light of joy, love, ecstasy and wisdom fill those cracks with a brilliance you would have never discovered otherwise.
You can choose what you carry onward. Let the pain fade. Choose happiness. Choose ecstasy.
I think it’s worth it. Do you?
