5
Letting Go of the Certain
“We must be willing to let go of the life we've planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”
Joseph Campbell
Whether our Call chooses us, or we choose it, at some point, we have to take a leap into the unknown. If we keep one foot on the shore and one on the boat, we will eventually fall into the sea, break in two, or rip our trousers. To avoid this unfortunate turn of events, there comes a point where we need to decide to move forward onto the path of the Quest. The trouble is, once you commit, there is no going back and there is also no guarantee of success. Commitment requires letting go of the familiar, the known, and stepping into the new, the unfolding, the unknown.
Tilicho Lake
In this high place
it is as simple as this,
leave everything you know behind.
Step toward the cold surface,
say the old prayer of rough love
and open both arms.
Those who come with empty hands
will stare into the lake astonished,
there, in the cold light
reflecting pure snow
the true shape of your own face.
David Whyte, “Tilicho Lake”, Where Many Rivers Meet, 1990
Printed with permission from Many Rivers Press, www.davidwhyte.com, © Many Rivers Press, Langley, Washington
In this chapter, we will reflect on how we can see our past experiences as the path leading up to our Quest. We will learn to look with fresh eyes at our lives and at this point of choice. I will help you push through fear, anxiety and doubt and we will work through some of the resistance to change that presents itself in the gap between the Call and the commitment to action.
Out With the Old, In With the New
Like a snake shedding its skin, we need to release what we have outgrown. Some of this decluttering will be easy. It will feel like a release and a relief. However, there will also be things that we are really attached to, that will feel much harder to walk away from or change. When you are thinking about committing to a Quest, you may not even be sure about what you will replace these outmoded aspects of your life with. That's pretty scary stuff. To be heroic, we have to let go of what we have and trust that we will be able to find something better.
First, Learn to See
In order to let go of what no longer works, we have to begin by taking a good hard look at what is. Imagine you have a secret garden inside you. The garden has been forgotten or neglected for some years. Within it there are beautiful and rare plants that have been choked by ivy and fast-growing weeds. Your job is to find these blooms and create space for them to flourish. You decide to observe the garden and notice which parts of your garden get the most sun at which times of the day. You will discover the suntraps and decide where the bench sits. You will notice the animals, birds and insects that call this garden home.
When you discover your Quest, you commit to nurturing your own inner garden so that the best parts of it flourish and you clear out the brambles and ivy that choke its growth.
Close your eyes. Conjure up your inner garden.- What does it look and feel like?
- Where does it start and finish?
- What wildlife and nature live there?
- How do you feel about it?
This garden is a metaphor for your inner and outer life. Questing starts with taking this inventory, looking through the lens of the Call at what currently exists in your life. You may find that you see things afresh because you are now looking at them with a view as to how they fit into the future you want to create. Plenty of your skills, experiences and behaviours will be precious and invaluable for this future you want to create, and some will need pruning or review.
For example, let's say you have identified a Quest to change the way you treat your body. Looking around your physical environment you might notice that what you are eating does not nourish your body. You realize you are not even sure what amounts of types of food are right for your body. You may notice that you are not set up with the equipment you need to begin to nourish yourself differently. You might review your routines, such as how much time you spend in front of the telly. You might notice how much you isolate yourself from others, or how your confidence about your body has affected your relationships and leisure activity. You might take an inventory of how much money you have been spending on food and activities that do not support you in the Quest. And you also notice that you have a strong body – a body that moves and sees and responds. You have a big heart that is committed to change. You have smarts – you can find out what you do not know. And you have people who care about you – offering good support to make the transition. Your habits and choices up to now have given you the results you see in your life. If you are to achieve a different result, some of these behaviours will need to change.
“We begin to realize how limited and self-destructive our lives have been, how many opportunities we have missed because of our addictions or attachments, how many people we have hurt or ignored, how much money we have spent. We count the years and months of wasted, unproductive time …”
Christina Grof, The Thirst for Wholeness
This inventory brings awareness and focus to what is and helps you to start thinking about how to set up a different reality to get a different result. But the first stage, is just to take a good look.
Aspects to observe and consider include:
- The structure of your day or week.
- The choices you make about how and where you spend your time.
- Who you spend it with.
- What your daily environment looks like.
- How you spend your money.
- The quality of your relationships.
- How much of your gifts, skills and motives are given expression in your life right now.
- Looking at your life as it is right now, what can you already see will need to change in your physical world?
- Are you ready and willing to give up or change these aspects of your life to have more of what you want in life?
Inside and Out
“The stories we usually tell only ourselves, make up our self image. Stories about what we are good at and what our limitations are. We can have a story about what our life is about, what we want to achieve, what is most important to us and we can direct our lives to living out this script.”
Tony Wilkinson, The Lost Art of Being Happy
Alongside a review of our external environment and circumstances, we need to take an inventory of our internal “set-up.” This includes the beliefs we hold about ourselves, what we can do and who we are.
We need to be mindful about the stories we tell ourselves. Why? Because our stories create the world we see. Your commitment to your Quest can only come about when you believe that another life is possible for you. You may have been telling yourself tales about who you are and what you can do that are unhelpful and not necessarily true. The Quest may enable you to tell a new story, from a fresh and more positive point of view.
In the children's story, The Ugly Duckling, a little bird grows up feeling rejected and unlovable because he doesn't look like the other little ducklings. He carries this story about with himself and becomes very lonely, isolated and sad until one day, he looks in the water and discovers that he has grown into a beautiful swan. He didn't look like a duckling because he wasn't one.
What's the misunderstanding that you have been carrying around about who you really are?
Each Quest is a journey in self discovery – in surrendering what we think we know about ourselves and the world.
The fact is, your history need not limit your future. You can commit to the possibility of a different, expanded, more exciting or fulfilling life. You can even use the adversity and challenge of your past as a powerful fuel for your Quest. Heroic characters frequently come from a troubled or abandoned background. They turn this pain into focus and determination that enables them to escape their past, to move toward something better.
Your history does not stop you being able to create a new future. It is up to you to decide who you want to become.
In the film Good Will Hunting, we see Will overcome his history and the limitations that others place on him. As a maths genius growing up in the rough streets of South Boston, he experiences abuse and is frequently in trouble with the law. A transformative experience with Sean, his counsellor, helps him to develop acceptance of his past and realize his possibilities for the future. His best friend Chuckie tells him that he is wasting his talent and needs to take charge of his life. Having released his self-sabotage, Will decides to stop being a victim and chooses to leap into an unpredictable but happier future in California with the woman he loves and a deeper recognition of his own talents and gifts.
Like Will, we are going to need to review, recognize and let go of our self-limiting stories and seize the day. When we commit to the Call, we begin to transform our inner world and use any suffering and injustice of the past to fuel our fire. It may take us a long time and a lot of investment to move toward the realization of our Quest. The more we move away from our old story, the closer we get to our new one, until one day, magically, we find ourselves there.
Name a part of your history that you feel angry, resentful or ashamed of.- What where the facts of what happened?
- What was your interpretation about what that situation meant about you?
- How did that make you feel?
- What conclusions did you draw about the world?
- How much, on a scale of 1-10 with 1 being “not at all” and 10 being “totally,” do you still hold those opinions about yourself and your world?
- How useful are they?
“Uncertainty Now Certain”
This 2010 election headline is very fitting to this section. Before you commit to your Quest, you are likely to feel nervous and anxious about the future. Although you may not like where you currently find yourself, you are likely to have a measure of attachment to it. We like the familiar. We can learn to feel at home in the most uncomfortable of circumstances. Even though we are excited about something new and better coming into our lives, we can often panic about the unknown elements of it.
This anxiety is entirely normal. We project out into the future and imagine all sorts of horrors. Or we cannot picture the future at all and feel overwhelmed by how unfamiliar the next chapter will be. This feeling is a sure sign that you are exactly where you need to be to commit – on the threshold – the very edge that we arrive at before we commit. Trepidation is a natural and normal response.
- What anxieties do you currently have about starting your Quest?
- What would help?
A Question of Timing
You may be feeling panicked by the idea of your Quest. Or you may be itching to get started.
Leaving behind what is familiar to you can seem like madness in the cold light of day, for example the financial insecurity of resigning from your job, the pain of ending a close relationship or friendship. How will we live without the comfort of the drugs, the food, the booze? Quests often involve a level of sacrifice and departure before you step through into a new world.
It's important to respect these concerns. Often, when we find our Call, we do not know how we are going to make it a reality. Once the awareness of the need or desire to act comes, you may need to sit with it for a while; allow it to percolate through your system. In fact, it can be quite dangerous to hear a Call and respond immediately without this “settling process.” Action taken without due consideration can reduce our confidence in our ability to navigate our journey. So don't be afraid to take time and to let it take the time it takes.
Max Fraser had always dreamed of being a professional musician in the hip-hop world. His day-to-day existence, working at British Telecom, didn't seem to align with this aspiration. Here he talks about the distance between the Call and committing to the Quest:
“During those three years (between deciding to leave and starting the quest) I put pretty much all my wages into paying off my rent debt. I walked into work. I lived off Kit Kats. I saw it as part of the process for reclaiming my own life. Once you understand that you are in a process you can relax because you know what you will end up with, will be more or better than what you had.”
The Guardian of the Threshold
“The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure, the process is its own reward.”
Amelia Earhart, aviator
We resist the Call for all manner of reasons that come down to a fear of change. The Call has awakened new knowledge in us. Just like Eve eating the apple in the garden of Eden, we can no longer go back claiming that ignorance is bliss. But we have not necessarily made the decision that the Call is something we are going to pursue and so we sit in the “meantime.” The meantime is where we know what must be done, but are not yet ready to take action to make it happen.
We need substantial amounts of courage and faith to help us to take the first steps and actions that will begin our Quest. Some of us may be surrounded by support and encouragement. Most of us will encounter some resistance. This can come from within – in the form of our inner critic, and without, in the voices of those around us.
Portals into other worlds are usually well guarded. They require passwords, the solving of puzzles. Cerberus, the three-headed hellhound of Greek and Roman mythology, stands guard over the gates of Hell.
You might not have an angry mythical dog in your way, but you will have your own obstacles to overcome before you step over the threshold. Let's look at your strategies for dragon slaying.
Dragon Number 1: The Fear of Failure
We all have a fundamental fear of failure. It could be an anxiety about looking bad or silly in public. Or a worry that we will be “exposed” as a fraud or imposter. Or that we will fall short of our own expectations or those of others.
Certainly, if we never tried anything new, we would be likely to fail less. But who wants to curtail their explorations, adventures and experiences just to be on the safe side?
More often than not, we have more regrets for the things we lacked the courage to try, than for the things we had a go at that didn't quite work out. The most successful people in life have learned to get comfortable with failing fast and frequently, so that they can quickly assess what strategy or approach works best to take them toward their goals. Imagine the lack of entertaining competition we would be without in the world if no one was willing to fail. Every sport has to have people who don't win in order for the game to exist. Murray can't “win” Wimbledon without others “losing.” No motor racing, no football, no Olympics, no horse racing, no TV game shows. If we never stepped over, out and beyond our fear of failure, we would never reach the new world we want to inhabit.
Meeting Your Inner Critic
While we logically understand this, the hysterical voice inside our head doesn't. The inner critic is like a monkey on your shoulder. It's the voice that says that what you are planning is foolish and beyond your reach.
In its attempt to help us stay safe and not be exposed or at risk, it puts limits on what is possible for us and it likes saying: “No.” “Can't be done.” “Drop it.” This is because it hates uncertainty and the unfamiliar.
And it's right to be worried. The leap of faith that is required to start us off on a new path is scary. It doesn't come with a guarantee. All through your Quest there will be barriers and challenges. You will still need to amend and alter your course. And you might get to the end of it and find it is not as great as you had hoped. Gulp.
So first of all, it is worth acknowledging the voice of the fear of failure. Recognize that it has your best interest at heart.
If your commitment to yourself is to go on a journey of discovery, you cannot “fail.” You can only go on the journey and have the experience you have. You cannot “fail” for example, to take a trip overseas. You do or you don't do, and then you experience the results.
Imagine your inner critic is a hand puppet. Lift your hand up and look at it. Now animate it. Give it a voice. Have a conversation.- What kind of sniping things does it have to say about you and your Quest?
- What do you have to say in return?
- Is there anything in what it has to say that could be useful to you?
Dragon Number 2: Fear of Upsetting Others
Uh-oh … someone is not going to like this
Most people are moderately approval seeking. We want the people around us to love, accept us and recognize our motivations and desires. So when they begin to push against our Calling, it can take quite a lot of courage to speak up for ourselves or to carry on regardless.
The people around us may not like our choices. They may feel we have wasted our education, or betrayed their trust. They may think we are leaping into the unknown without good reason; that we are running away from our responsibilities; that this is not the way things are done.
When I was working as a careers coach for young adults in India, I met a lot of young people who were really struggling because what their family expected them to be was not what they longed to do with their lives. This is your life. You must claim it. To not do so will lead to resentment, anger, depression and pain. This is one of the initiation trials testing the commitment to your Call. Know that it is normal.
Your Quest is not about right and wrong. It is about your personal perspective and aspirations. It is OK for other people to have a different perspective. Their insight may be valuable, their point of view may be understandable. But it doesn't mean you have to agree with it or become defensive. Nor do you need to attack them for their views.
When you listen to their views, try to remember that they love you and want you to be happy. So as you listen, you may find that this changes what you hear. You do not need to defend yourself.
The next time someone pushes back on your choice to commit to your Quest, try and really hear what it is that is making them concerned. Work out where they are coming from.- “I really appreciate you caring enough about me and my future to share your thoughts with me.”
- “What I got from what you said was …” then describe what matters to them or what is on their minds.
- “From my perspective this is really important because …”
Ultimately, you have this one life. It's not a rehearsal and it is not a play. You do not have scripted lines or roles. Take Jordan, from Series Nine of The Apprentice. For the uninitiated, The Apprentice is a reality TV show where aspiring young business people battle it out for the chance to work with the British business magnate, Lord Sugar. In the final you get to meet their families and get to know them as people. Jordan's brother says: “The Poulton family boys, we all go into the services. Military, armed forces, police, navy, that is what we do.”
Well that is nice for you young Poulton, but one look at Jordan and you can tell he is not the athletic type. His gift is different. In fact he gave the Marines a try, but very quickly established it was not for him. He then went on to excel as a very able entrepreneur. We shine where we shine. We all have our own heroic natures. And there is no one else like us. Anyway, it is quite unusual to have a family that always understands and supports your Quest. I am 35 and my jeweller father and lawyer stepmother still say they don't really get what I do.
“Rarely do members of the same family grow up under the same roof.”
Kahlil Gibran
That's OK. We can love each other and embrace the difference.
OK, now you are scaring me
“I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.”
W.B. Yeats, He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven
You need to be responsible about who you tell about your Quest, especially at these early stages where the temptation to stall is high. If you know that someone close to you is likely to clobber your sprouting Quest without good reason, consider keeping it to yourself. The Quest, your vision for a better future, for a larger version of you, is in a delicate phase. Be careful with it.
- What are the thoughts that come to you about why you cannot accept your Calling?
- Whose thoughts are these?
- Are they necessarily true?
- What will the impact be on your life if you refuse your Call to accommodate these voices?
- Are you willing to live with this?
Dragon Number 3: Fear of the Unknown
As human beings we are designed for survival. We are born with a very useful in-built fight, flight or freeze mechanism. This means that in times of stress or panic we release huge amounts of adrenalin and make a quick decision about whether to get our spear out, run away very quickly or freeze and try to become invisible to our foe. This is a healthy survival response and is almost impossible to control as it is governed by instinct and survival mechanisms developed over thousands of years of evolution.
However, as it is fairly unlikely that you have recently encountered a bear in your weekend wander around the shopping centre, I am confident in betting that a lot of the time the fear that stops you isn't about survival. It's much more likely to be about what might happen in the future. We call this:
So often, we are stopped by what we think is going to happen if we take an adventurous step. We are afraid we will fail, look stupid, get hurt (emotionally or physically) or lose what we already have.
Sound familiar?
The trouble with these fears is that they only focus on one possible outcome from your action – a bad one. But lots of other outcomes could be true as well.
What Else Could Be True?
If we can train our minds to look beyond the first fear-based possibility we see, we can open ourselves up to creating more of the results we want and less of those we don't. We can use our fears to help us focus on what we need to manage or transform. Fear tells us more about what the outcome needs to look like and what we really care about.
In the book, Everyday Legends (2006), Jamie Oliver, now a world-famous British chef, talks about his fears in starting his restaurant, “Fifteen” (www.fifteenfoundation.org.uk). Jamie had a vision to train unemployed young Londoners as chefs. We now know there is a happy ending to this tale, but Jamie didn't when he started. He was a nervous hero in unfamiliar territory, just like us:
“From the outset I had loads of worries. Above all I felt totally vulnerable because I was letting 15 strangers into my life. I was going to see more of them than I would my missus, and they might have turned out to be horrible! I also worried about money, how the public would judge me … I knew that this could really break me.”
Seven years on the Fifteen restaurant chain and apprenticeship concept has proven very successful and continues to grow.
What actions can you take to reduce the likelihood of your future events taking the turn your fear dictates?
When you find yourself daunted and you notice it is holding you back, here are three top tips:
Remember that fear and excitement are very close and similar feelings – could this be a sense of excitement rather than fear?
Learning to Have Faith in Life
You and I, we are control freaks. We want to be in charge. We want to know what is going to happen next and what the outcome will be. We want to be sure of this before we even start. But life does not work this way.
If we trusted life to give us the lessons and experiences we needed, we would be able to relax and let go of resistance. If we believed that everything that had occurred in our lives was designed to help us in some way, perhaps we could trust and relax a little more. To do this, we need to question whether it is really true that we are always in control and in charge; and to begin to wonder whether things we might think of as a problem might actually be a gift for us, if we were to look at them a little differently.
As we make progress towards commitment, we can learn to trust that the answers will begin to show themselves. The next step, the right choice, the first action. These will all become clear if we allow ourselves to have a little faith.
- Can you accept the challenges in your life as though you chose them?
- Would you be willing to accept the challenges that your Quest throws at you?
- What would trust in the process look and feel like for you?
Chapter Summary- Committing to your Quest means leaving the familiar behind.
- Some things will be easier to let go of than others.
- We need to get really honest about what no longer works for us.
- Observation and review are important prerequisites to commitment.
- We need to pass through the threshold guarded by our own inner critic.
- We may have to battle with the concerns, fears and anxieties of others.
- The more we can learn to trust life, the more we can accept both our past and the unknown future.