by Vishnu | May 19, 2019 | Books, Letting Go, Spirituality
“There comes a day when you realize turning the page is the best feeling in the world, because you realize there is so much more to the book than the page you were stuck on.” Zayn Malik
I hate endings.
I hate when the movie A Star is Born ends.
I hate when a lunch date ends.
I hate when a pot of Indian sambar in the fridge ends.
I hate when a cup of tart frozen yogurt I’m eating ends.
And, for sure, I hate when a relationship ends.
Like I said, I hate endings.
And when you hate endings, you try your hardest to hold onto the ending.
If it’s a movie, you can replay or rewind it.
If it’s a pot of delicious tofu curry, you can water it down and have more of it.
And if it’s a relationship, you can do one of two things.
You can prolong the end by trying your hardest to hold onto it, avoiding your partner’s attempt to break it off.
Or…you can simply end it and continue holding onto your relationship in your heart and soul.
You can hold onto the relationship in your mind and consciousness, replaying the highlights of that relationship over and over again.
When my relationship ended, I did all these things.
I stayed in the relationship way too long. We did every single thing we could to avoid breaking up…until it got to a breaking point.
And I continued to imagine that this relationship still existed even after I’d gotten out of it.
I replayed our trips to Lake Tahoe, our honeymoon to Kerala, our first trip to Las Vegas and Disneyland, our many conversations on Skype, my secret trip to India to visit her months after we met.
I continued replaying these memories because they felt good and when I had these memories, I felt good.
Like I mentioned last week, memories of the past are soothing and comfortable.
The past is like a cup of hot chocolate or a warm blanket as you sit by the fireplace on a rainy night.
Who would ever want to let go of these warm and comfortable memories?
Yet, to move on with my life, I had to find ways to do exactly that.
I had to let go of these memories so I could move on with my life!
Although it took years of reading, therapy, spiritual discoveries, meditation, learning and understanding, this concept helped me break through and shift away from the past.
It was this teaching about impermanence by the Buddhist teacher and poet, Thich Nhat Hanh:
“We are often sad and suffer a lot when things change, but change and impermanence have a positive side. Thanks to impermanence, everything is possible. Life itself is possible. If a grain of corn is not impermanent, it can never be transformed into a stalk of corn. If the stalk were not impermanent, it could never provide us with the ear of corn we eat. If your daughter is not impermanent, she cannot grow up to become a woman. Then your grandchildren would never manifest. So instead of complaining about impermanence, we should say, ‘Warm welcome and love live impermanence.’ We should be happy. When we see the miracle of impermanence our sadness and suffering will pass.”
This helped me realize that change and impermanence can be good things.
If life didn’t have endings, we couldn’t have beginnings.
Without winter, there would be no spring.
Without darkness, there would be no light.
Without night, there would be no dawn.
Once I learned this lesson from Thich Nhat Hahn and other spiritual teachers, I started looking at life in a different way.
I could slowly loosen my grip on my past relationship and my marriage because, in its dissolution, I would find discovery and the blooming of new relationships and love.
Growth, understanding, compassion and inner change will fill my life.
In the messiness and complications of a sad ending are the seeds for so many other things to come out of my life.
It was the moment when I realized that practicing law was no longer the thing for me to do.
It was the moment when I realized that I didn’t have to buy into and live the consumerist American dream that everyone around me was living.
It was the moment when I realized that profound spiritual lessons and truths were awaiting me.
So, really, the end was the beginning of change, understanding and growth.
The end was truly the beginning.
This was how I slowly transitioned to present-moment living.
A slow and growing realization that death and endings are the foundations of birth and beginnings.
The idea isn’t to stay stuck on a page. It’s to let go of things that no longer work so you can read the rest of the book.
As the above quote reveals, you can get to the good parts of the book only after you finish the parts that have kept you stuck.
Bottom line: So many good things can come your way but you won’t find them if you don’t let go of the past.
The beautiful thing is, you have the power of choice. You get to decide how to view the impermanence and changes that enter your life.
The Step of Choice is the 4th step in my new book, The Sacred Art of Letting Go (on sale June 6, 2019).
This is one of the biggest lessons I’ve learned during my journey towards letting go of the past.
And, yes, this letting-go process has a few more steps.
In fact, I discovered 12 steps from spiritual teachers, which I share in The Sacred Art of Letting Go.
I discovered them as I walked the path of getting over my relationship.
Spiritual teachers and writers have talked about them for centuries. I wanted to put, in one place, all these concepts I had experienced and learned.
That’s why I wrote this book.
It reminded me about what it takes to let go. It also serves as a guide for you if you’re in a place where you’re having trouble letting go.
The book is called The Sacred Art of Letting Go: Walk 12 Steps with Spiritual Masters to Let Go of Past Relationships and Find Peace Today.
I want you to read this book. Learn from it and grow from it.
Not only do I share my personal experience but I show you how the spiritual teachers and masters of our time help us deal with breakup and change.
I know this book can help you move along your journey and free yourself of the prison of your past. It can help you move on to the life awaiting you.
Pick up The Sacred Art of Letting Go: Walk 12 Steps with Spiritual Masters to Let Go of Past Relationships and Find Peace Today when it goes on sale on June 6th, 2019.
by Vishnu | May 6, 2019 | Letting Go, Love and Relationships, Present Moment
I loved living in the past for years of my life.
It was like split pea soup or chicken noodle soup or some other kind of soup that instantly makes you feel at home.
Imagine being curled up in a warm blanket on a rainy night, slurping on your favorite soup in your favorite cabin in the woods.
After soup is a cup of hot chocolate and smores.
Your feet are roasting by the fireplace and because the Wi-Fi is down, all you can do is read your favorite book on the Kindle.
You wish this moment could last forever.
This is exactly what it’s like to live in the past.
Some of us do this for a weekend, some for a few weeks at a time and others for years at a time.
Why stay stuck living in the past for inordinate amounts of time?
This is a beautiful, relaxing and peaceful place.
In this place, you don’t have to grow, stretch yourself or do anything else.
You can enjoy your past relationship for months or years.
You can take refuge in the memories of your past, replaying them over and over again.
You can find comfort in the certainty of what happened.
The future is unknown; it involves risks and all kinds of growth. You never know how the story will end.
But living in the past, you’re the queen!
You’re royalty.
You’re in charge.
You bring up the memories you want and you replay them over and over and over again.
You assign blame, you take on blame. You assign guilt, you take on guilt. You take on sadness and regret and shame.
You play in the sandbox of sadness and struggle.
You bask in the sunlight of anger and resentment.
All these things I’m describing feel good. Who would ever want to leave that place?
You get to be the victim of a love gone wrong.
And you get to be the hero who made it through the rain.
We are all like Adele in the past, with our lovers forgetting about us or taking advantage of us or cheating on us.
All we can do is pick up the phone, say “hello” and dream about how things used to be.
“Hello…from the other side…I must have called a thousand times…to tell you that I’m sorry for everything that I’ve done…”
In the past, we create our own reality.
We tell ourselves our own stories about what happened.
And we choose how long we sit and marinate in the misery and pain we have had to suffer.
What you’re missing out on if you live here.
Unfortunately, as wonderful as it has been to live in this place, you and I have been missing out on the lives waiting for us out there.
When we were babies, for example, we fell many times in our quest to walk. However, we didn’t give up.
Each attempt involved hope, risk and, ultimately, reward.
In our childhood years, we constantly ignored the consequences and took a risk, pursued a passion, went after a dream.
We pushed it to the limit, not knowing or caring about our previous experiences.
We had a blank canvas on which we could paint the life we wanted.
Yet, after this last heartbreak, you just want the safety and security of your bed.
You don’t want all the things the world can offer you.
You don’t want adventure, risk or the freedom to explore.
You don’t want newness or excitement or possibilities.
You sure as hell don’t want another relationship or to date or to open your heart to anyone.
You just want peace, quiet and calmness.
Maybe you want to move back home with your parents and be with them as you all age.
You want love from furry animals that will never betray you and always stand by your side.
You may have chosen to live like a hermit for years.
I did…and I know how comforting and welcoming this place was.
Yet, I’m now realizing that as I was warming my feet next to the fireplace of the familiar, you and I have been missing out by living in the past.
You’ve been missing out on soul expansion and growth.
You’ve been missing out on heart passion and joy.
You’ve been missing out on all the things the world has to offer.
You’ve been missing out on jobs, relationships, travel and the opportunity for your life to be so much richer than the safety of your cocoon.
You’ve been missing out on opportunities to find the “real you” and to realize your life’s potential and destiny.
The past was safe but having lived there for what seems like ages has robbed you of the richness and potential of what can unfold in your life.
Is it time to move on…and how?
If you’re ready to leave the warmth of the cocoon, seek your purpose and live the life that’s waiting for you, you can do this today.
‘Is now the time to move on?’ is a question only you can answer. However, know that when you answer this question, you are affirming a choice.
You were not in grief and stuckness because of time but because of choice.
It’s time to move on when you deem it’s time to move on.
You move on just like I did.
You move on by taking small steps to find your bearings.
You move on by releasing anger towards your ex and letting go of the pain of the past.
You move on by forgiving the people who hurt you.
You move on by forgiving yourself.
You move on by releasing the past stories you’ve been telling yourself and, instead, choosing a new story.
You move on by learning from people who have been in the same place you are. You find out what they did and then you do that.
You read and learn from the experiences of others.
You experiment until you’re able to let go of the past and find peace today.
In a book I’ve written for you, I’ve summed up my own efforts and experiences.
The book is called The Sacred Art of Letting Go: Walk 12 Steps with Spiritual Masters to Let Go of Past Relationships and Find Peace Today.
Not only did I walk this journey but I confirmed each of the 12 steps of that journey I took on the wisdom of spiritual masters and teachers.
These are not just my steps of walking back from the past to present-moment living. Rather, these are actions that teachers, old and new, have prescribed – everyone from the Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hanh to Deepak Chopra and Ram Dass.
As comfortable as it may seem to remain in this space of living in the past, at some point you must give up this place and return the keys to its rightful owner: the past itself.
You may not have a new place to live yet but the future promises soul expansion, heart growth and new opportunities to fulfill your destiny.
A little uncomfortable but so worth it.
You can pick up The Sacred Art of Letting Go on June 1, 2019 on Amazon.
