sur·ren·der
səˈrendər/
verb
- 1.cease resistance to an enemy or opponent and submit to their authority."over 140 rebels surrendered to the authorities"
synonyms: capitulate, give in, give (oneself) up, give way, yield, concede (defeat),submit, climb down, back down, cave in, relent, crumble; More
Surrender is pretty powerful word and not one I like to think about very often. Give up, hand over, lose, abandon oneself, I would rather not, actually. I like to win, take control, and dig in. Surrendering is not something a competitive control freak like me is usually up for. You will not typically see me standing on the hill waving a white flag, it just wasn't how I was made. Or was it? Why is surrendering such a bad thing? Why does it have to feel like I am "losing"?
To say that I have a lot going on in my life right now would be an understatement. The visual I keep seeing is myself in quicksand grabbing onto a rope that keeps breaking just as I am about to break free. Every where I turn there is something else that needs to be handled or fixed or taken care of. It's like I am Olivia Pope on Scandal, except I am not. Work is consuming my life, life is consuming my life, everything but the things I enjoy are consuming my life. Have you ever tried to ready a house to be put on the market? I don't recommend trying it at all. I think it would be more fun to be thrown into a tub with a bunch of snakes and hope for the best. Ok, that is a little dramatic and I would probably die if that happened, but you get the idea. It stinks and it is hard. Really hard. I spend most of my free time trying to make my house perfect, cleaning it, fixing it, staging it and it is never ending. This week, two days before the photographer was set to come and take pictures for the listing, my hot water heater decided to reenact the eruption of Old Faithful, right in my basement. When I discovered the eruption, I really thought that was it for me. There was no possible way I could take on ONE MORE THING. I felt totally defeated. I also had a tiny (huge) meltdown to which my father was lucky enough to share in (that will teach him to answer his phone...). On the plus side, just two short hours earlier I was super stressed about being ready for the photographer to come Wednesday...now I wouldn't have to worry about it. Small victories.
So back to surrendering. The day the hot water heater flooded my basement, I remember thinking, I give up. I quit. I cannot do this anymore. It's too much. It wasn't a good kind of surrender though. It was an I am defeated, tired and hopeless surrender. A maybe I should just light a match and burn this place down surrender. I was feeling so anxious I wasn't really sure how to not combust.
Today my Mom sent me an email she received and it was all about surrender. It talked about the bad surrender, the one I was currently feeling. The one related to pride, fear of falling apart and our attempts to control life. It also talked about the good side of surrender, the sweet side. How the art of letting go is truly the braver and more courageous choice, because you are choosing to have faith in God's plan for you instead of trying to bully your way into what you think is your end goal. This is not easy, but I know it is possible. I know that my desire to control all the chaos and disorder in my life right now is only making me feel more chaotic and anxious. I know that the more out of control I feel the farther away from God I get, yet I know the answer is moving closer to Him.
So today I choose to start releasing my grip on my fears. I choose to fill up my cup with love from those around me and mostly His almighty and grace filled love. I choose to give myself a little grace and time to dig out of the mound of tasks that lay in front of me. I don't want to miss out on the many amazing things that are happening around me every day, because my eyes are closed and head is hung in defeat. This may be a trying time in my life, but it is not a time that is defining or defeating me. I will close with a scripture I have been thinking a lot about lately. This isn't the first time I have used this scripture in the blog and probably won't be the last. It is a reminder to surrender and trust. To have faith in Him and know His plan for me is bigger than anything I could ever imagine.
