Have you ever experienced a time when you felt as though your journey had become all up a hill? A journey that seemed to never end? Maybe your hill was very steep and rocky with few places to rest along the way. This hill seemed to be magical because it appeared to grow and become more difficult to navigate even as you climbed. In this time you may have questioned all that you believed in, especially the logic or insanity that brought you to this hill! You may have even found yourself thinking of all the “should have,” ” would have” and “could have” reasons that “might have” changed your current situation.
On this hill, you may have found yourself feeling very disillusioned and weary beyond your ability to move any further, unable to see any end in sight. It’s a real misconception that the journey to Spirituality is all light and joy. Often the expectation of what the “journey” should be like brings us to this hill time and time again. In becoming Spiritual there is an increasing experience of light and joy but the process of the “becoming” can be an up hill endeavor. Why? The hill experience (I’ve named it Surrender Hill), is the part of the journey where it is necessary to lighten our load of anything that has kept us from the experience of light and joy. In fact, this hill usually appears in our lives when we have asked to experience more light, joy, love and prosperity etc.
In order to conquer this hill there must be a willingness to give up all the regrets, resentments, fears and guilt that we have allowed ourselves to carry. When these emotions dwell in the mind they erode and alter the peace and joy available. In the process of surrendering these feelings, self- forgiveness is a very important ingredient. Without self-forgiveness there is a real tendency to hang onto all of these “dark emotions” because there is a belief that our past must be “fixed” first. Unfortunately, no matter how diligently, persistently, and willfully we try to accomplish this, it won’t happen. The past is gone. The only place that our past exists is in our mind and Surrender Hill is a wonderful place to leave all of our “dark emotions” behind and allow love and joy to take their place.
