#198 The need to control and letting go (in the moksha pursuit)

I don’t want my father to be mad at me  – says a 12 year old after her father discovered that she is dating someone.

I want my partner to not keep bringing up the past – says a 35 year old woman referring to the extra marital affair. 

I want my boss to be appreciative. She only picks faults with my work – says a disgruntled 42 year old loyal employee.

I only want my son to focus on his studies and stop wasting time on these video games says an irate 50 year old mother.

I want my daughter living abroad to stop telling me what to do and what not to do – complains a 75 year old father living alone in India.

What the teenager, the partner, the employee, the mother, the father say, sounds valid. Reasonable. Right?

Yes and No. They is a play of control and letting go.

Let me tell you a funny one –

I want all of you my dear podcast listeners to tell me how you are benefiting from the podcast.

Can you share what learning you are applying in your life? Would I like it if some of you do? Yes. Is it a condition? Not at all.

Why? I don’t control you nor do I want to control you. You are free and I respect your freedom.  You are free to be who you are.

One of you argues, it is different with close relationships when expectations creep in….Not necessarily. Let me explain.

It is natural to have some expectations in any relationship. The father does not want the daughter to cross boundaries where the boundary that he has articulated is to not date someone at 14 years.     

And so, it is good for the parent and child to articulate and understand what is acceptable and what is not acceptable. Both are clear.

Despite the boundaries being clear, the 12 year old who believes that she has invented love and no one can love like her still flouts the boundary and continues to see the boyfriend.

Now what?  There is tension in the air. The daughter wants the father to change his mind. The father wants the daughter to change her mind. Both are trying to control each other. They argue constantly which they had never done before. The wife and the brother look at the father and daughter like they are watching a tennis match.

If the father and daughter were to shift to one level deeper things would be different. The 12 year old daughter is becoming aware of her individuality and sexuality. Her need to be seen,  desired and loved is being met. She enjoys being special to this one person who is not family but who still likes her and accepts her. Can the father recognize that his little girl is becoming a young woman and look at how he might be different with her? After all, all relationships evolve and change anyway.

The father has the need to protect the daughter from possible hurt. When the daughter widening her hurt eyes brimming with tears, says, Don’t you trust me, Dad? I will not do anything that any of us has to regret..the father fumes and says, ‘But I don’t trust that guy.’ Both the father and the daughter are trying to reduce the suffering of the other but end up trying to control the other and increase suffering for each other.

Can the daughter recognize that her father ‘s concern is valid and comes from a good place? Can both father and daughter see the need underlying their hardened positions? The need for daughter to be protected from hurt is as important as her need to be loved and accepted by someone other than family. If they are able to see this, they can come onto the same page to see that both needs are met in some way.

Perhaps the daughter keeps her parents informed and even introduces the boyfriend to the parents while the parents continue to be encouraging about her studies and her as a person. Let the parent-child relationship not become just about the boyfriend situation.

Opening oneself to the question – What does this person need and how can I help this person? might be a better question to consider and explore rather than rattling out a list of dos and don’ts which anyway fall on deaf ears.    

The need to control often is born of inner pressure related to ragas and dveshas.

 The situation has to be different from what it is. No person around me is okay as he or she is. My children need to change, the education system needs to change, my boss, my partner definitely needs to change, the political system has to change and so on. I also need to change.

Now that I am a Vedanta student, I need to have more adhikaritvam, work on my ragas and dveshas, bring Karma Yoga into my life, not be too materialistic etc. Sounds familiar..right?

It is true that in the pursuits of Dharma, Artha and Kaama, we either try to acquire or reach or purify or create something that is not there. Whether it is svarga or an x amount of financial assets or your version of a happy family, there is apraaptasya praaptih. What is apraaptah, not gained, you try to gain and have praaptih. The efforts in those directions are valid.

An interesting thing starts to happen when we get committed to a particular course of action. We start investing our time and energy in it, trying to make change happen. Over time, we notice that we’re becoming ever more convinced about the rightness of what we’re doing or that our way is the right way.

The identity of the one who wants to make things happen, the karta, the ego, ahankara gets stronger and so does the identity of the bhokta, the experiencer. This happens for a Vedanta student too.

But our approach needs to change when it comes to the Moksha pursuit. Through our pursuits of Dharma, Artha and Kama, in which we strive to become better and have more, we have hypnotized ourselves to believe that nothing is okay as it is.

Really? Is nothing okay as it is?

The moksha pursuit is to stop trying to get somewhere else.

It is to embrace the fullness and sacredness of reality as it is. As it always has been.

As I have always been.

And so, for the rest of the episode we stop trying to concentrate or to develop some insight or to get one more tool for improving oneself.

Just become aware of your own presence right now. Often one is encouraged to be aware of thoughts or feelings or sensations. Right now just become aware of you.

The one who’s present in your story about yourself, through all events.

Just for now, I give up the future means I let go of the idea that there is any better moment waiting for me.

Just for now, I give up the idea that I will be more ready.

Just for now I allow myself to feel whatever I am feeling.

I allow yourself to fully embrace this moment which means to fully accept and allow this moment to be exactly as it is.  

The moment is my experience of this moment. Whatever I am feeling right now, allow myself to  feel this way, with no attempt to feel any different.

There is no idea that there’s anything wrong with the feelings that are present.

There is no belief that I should feel more relaxed or that I should feel more peaceful.

These are just the feelings that are there.

They are a part of the human experience.

We include the entire gamut of human emotion without seeking a specific emotion.  

Embracing this moment also includes whatever is arising in my mind, whatever my thought content is, and might be an absence of thought for periods of time.

There might be some mind chatter, returning again and again to the same thoughts.

I don’t have to have a better mind or a different mind or a pure mind.

Allow the thoughts to be as they are. I am not giving any interest or attention but just allowing it to happen.

Just for now, nothing needs to change at any level.

This moment includes whatever sensations are occurring. Whether there’s discomfort or agitation or pleasant, peaceful contentedness in the body, whether there is noise coming in from the neighbourhood or it is quiet, nothing needs to change.

Just for now, nothing needs to change for you to be free.

Nothing needs to change for you to be who you are.

Nothing needs to be different than it is right now.

Nothing is missing in this moment.

As these words are said, some of us can see the truth of this and some of us will have reactions.

In this moment, whatever our thoughts, they can all be accommodated without going towards or running away from them.

Our thoughts are not opposed to what is.

Our emotions are not in against the limitless that one is.   

Our sensations don’t need to be overanalysed.

Just for now there is no need to evaluate, judge or label myself or this moment.

I drop the need to see myself in a particular way.

I drop the need to feel any particular way.

Just for now I drop the need to control my reactions.

Just for now I allow life to be as it is. It is ok to be as I am.

Staying with this practice even for a short time creates a a foundation for us to hold our ragas and dveshas and all our beliefs much more lightly.

The orientation of something needs to change in my life is juxtaposed with this practice of being free inspite of the play of thoughts, sensations and emotions. There is nothing wrong with me and there is nothing missing in life.

Even for a few moments a day, by listening to these words, I can appreciate freedom that is my nature as I am without doing anything.

The being that is ever present in all the becoming. The being that is present as I embrace and include every aspect of my life circumstance.

By no means am I suggesting that one must adopt this stance of letting go of control in all situations. Please understand that we require different approaches in life. There is a time to step in and create change and there is a time to see that one is the changeless. In time one can drop the binary and appreciate the changeless through creating as well as experiencing change.  It is not an either/or choice.

One can definitely appreciate this stance of being with what is, which is a relaxed stance for a Vedanta student. 

Being relaxed is being with what is.

Being with what is, is being awake to the reality that is the limitless that is you.