A Four-Word Practice that Leads to True Personal Wholeness

by Guy Finley

Key Lesson: Honesty heals; lies hurt. In these four words lives all one needs to know and practice, that is, assuming one wishes to be whole, harmless, true and loving.

Let Go and Rise Above What Holds You Down

Each time we see the need to let go of something -- a bad habit that drags us down, an unsatisfactory relationship, a career choice that can't complete us in the way we dreamed it would, or maybe unrealistic expectations of ours about others that eventually spoil our partnerships with them -- whatever it may be: what is it that's actually happened in these moments of honest self-examination? See if this simple answer doesn't describe our situation.

Aren't we being "asked" to give up an existing relationship in order to make room in our lives for something higher? Of course we are. Then why is it so hard to act on our intuition? After all, who doesn't want a life that's better, brighter, and truer? Here's why we hesitate to make this exchange, as so many of us do: the real challenge in such moments is that what we must choose in favor of can't be seen by our physical eyes!

Inherent in any true spiritual surrender is this one inescapable fact: we can't hope to realize the actual nature of that new and greater relationship we seek until we have released the old one.

When it comes to letting go and growing beyond who and what we have been up until that time, the deal is non-negotiable: first comes our gradual awakening to what no longer works for us, followed by the inner work to release the same. Then, and only then, dawns the discovery and realization of what is -- in all cases -- a new and higher order of our self; our life is transformed. Confidence, contentment, and compassion become our constant companions.

To the point: letting go follows our realization thatholding on is of no further use! In one way or another, we start seeing how all of our old tried-and-true solutions have proven themselves to be "false friends."

Whether wanted or not, we stand at the threshold of that unfamiliar and innermost territory called the "dark night of the soul"; we now know that of ourselves we can do no more for ourselves. And so we wait there in our uncertainty, caught, as it were, between two possibilities, neither of which is wanted. In one hand, there is the "rock" of not wanting to go through what we know must be done; in the other is "the hard place" of seeing that no other options are available. Our one great fear is that if we do let go, our fate is sealed. We will fall into that dark, yawning abyss before us called "not knowing what will become of us" -- a forbidding place from which we believe there may be no escape! But this is a false assumption based upon an equally false perception. It's a lie produced by the false self to keep us from answering the call to it leave behind. Here is the truth of the matter, which you will know from yourself each time you dare to let go: You do not fall. Instead, you rise!