Imagine you are 6 years old and you found a shit hot gadget with all the bells and whistles and you decide you would really like to have that. You found it in the toy shop and were so excited to see it sitting there that you grabbed at it and begged your Mum to get it for you now please. “We’ll have to tell Santa about this one” she says, ushering you to put it back on the shelf. There’s no way in hell she’s getting it for you right now and you know it. Back on the shelf it goes. Now there are 2 types of kids. The ones who put it back on the shelf, knowing it will come, and happily leave the shop. They get on with their life as normal, giving no further thought to it other than the occasional flutter of excitement that Christmas is on it’s way. The gadget is on it’s way. Then there’s the other kind of kid. They throw a tantrum at the putting back on the shelf. They keep grabbing it back down, their mother forced to physically pry it from their fingers while apologising to the shop owner. They leave the shop being carried out surfboard style under their Mothers arm, all the while kicking and flailing. They escape her grip for a brief moment, and run back to the window. With their nose smooshed against the glass, they pine for that toy they want and demand they get it right this second. They go on and on and on about it. The  months pass by and everytime they pass the shop, they press their face to the glass again. When they see a commercial on TV for the toy they run to their mother begging her to please just give it to her now, they promise they’ll be good! Both kids know Santa will deliver the goods – this or something better. Same toy. Same timeline. My latest bag to unpack – and this bitch was the heaviest yet. Because I am the second kid.

There is a fine line between having passions and interests, and being flat out hooked on something. Between having lofty ideas and goals, and just having to have somewhere to focus your attention. And while I have the former, the latter is also me – it always has been. I have always “needed” to have my attention fixated on something (and behind every perceived need is – you guessed it… a fear). While the past 6 months has seen me let go of alot of beliefs and fears, and subsequently changed my perceptions and behaviours – this one was still sitting there. And it is a root cause to my suffering. In fact I believe it is the root cause of all the other layers I have peeled away. I have always needed to have the next monkey bar in my hand before I would let go of the last. I have always craved and sought a sense of control. Having a mental hold of something gave me that sense of control – despite it being illusory. While I have had this awareness for some time now, I didn’t realise just how much this was affecting in my life. How it has been blocking me from truly living in the now, from appreciating every single day that I get to walk around in this human body. And from receiving the things that my heart truly desires. I recently commented to someone how “I used to be that person” that controlled. Nope. Still am.

I grew up in a house with a really volatile person. One minute everything was rosey, the next I was being screamed at, smacked and told what a worthless little bitch I was. The way I was treated depended on who was there to witness it. I never knew what the next day was going to bring. Fuck, I never knew what the next hour would bring. I remember walking to the bus stop one morning – I would’ve been maybe 8 or 9 years old, and commenting that I must’ve been really good that morning because I hadn’t been smacked yet. This isn’t a woe is me story. This is the explanation for how I came to be always searching for something to hold onto. Somewhere to focus all of my attention. Learning how these fears came to be helps me to give them compassion, and remove them as blocks in my life. So because the world around me was so uncertain as a child, I learnt that the control that came with clinging to something gave me a sense of safety. While I never actually had control of anything, just the feeling of holding on gave me the illusion  that I did. I sought things to focus my attention on fully, because it gave me a distraction from sitting with the pain that came with the environment I was in. The holding on and perceived control was my only safety blanket in the ups and downs and round and rounds in my little world.

That childhood environment was also one where self diagnosis of medical conditions was the norm. Even the cat was diagnosed with some sort of adrenal burnout and “appropriately” medicated. So I learnt by what I witnessed, that there must always be something wrong in terms of health. That ultimately, this abundant health I seek is not available to me. My eldest son had alot of health issues when he was younger, and he continued to be a sickly kid in that he was always picking up bugs and colds etc. He started school last year and in the first 12 weeks of school, was off 6 times with various illnesses. Each time was roughly a week absent, and included 2 hospital trips for steroids and oxygen as he couldn’t breathe properly. My focus his whole life has been on his health (except we saw real practitioners and got real blood tests and diagnosis). I had “control” over that while I had my attention on it. I felt safe keeping a watchful eye on it. I only feed my kids wholefoods, they don’t eat sugar, dairy or gluten eat and as organic as possible. So when I separated from their father earlier in the year, I knew I had no control over what happened at his house in terms of diets, bedtimes, routines etc. I had  no choice – I had to just let it go. For some reason, this letting go spread to letting go of all of the anxieties I held around my boys health.  I just accepted whatever will be will be, while continuing to do exactly what I’ve always done. And you know what has happened? In the same period of time as his first year at school he has had 1 cold. Just 1 cold and 2 days off school because of it (the second day wasn’t really even necessary). The moment I stopped focusing my attention on his health, and trying to make health happen, it just did.  The moment I let go, I allowed the flow of good health. This is one of many areas of my life where I have witnessed the miracle that follows the letting go.

Even with this knowledge, I have still had hold of the abundant health and big (romantic) love areas of my life where I have wants left to be fulfilled. I have held onto them tight because i really really really want them. I have picked apart, analysed and over analysed, and dissected the components to within an inch of their lives. I have gripped hard to the idea of both. Everything else I have wanted has flowed easily to me so far, so why the hell not these? I knew the answer to that – I was just seeing if you did. As with the kids health – it’s the holding on that is blocking them both. Why is it so damn hard for me to just let go? Tonight the light bulb came (thank fuuuuuck).  In the clinging onto things, and the illusory sense of control I “gain” from doing that, I actually fear the letting go. I fear that if I don’t hold on tight to the thing or person or situation, I will never get it. That if I don’t keep it alive by thinking about it every second of every day, it will be gone forever. But is that even true? Do I even have any control over the situation? Is obsessing over all the things that could be causing my health issues going to somehow make them dissipate? If I just let the health issue go, ride the wave, will I never be healthy again? Of course not. I felt like I’d been slapped upside the head tonight when I realised – whether I choose to hold on or to let go won’t make a speck of difference to the outcome. What will be will be. But that’s what fear does. It looks for the need, and the safety and distorts our perception as to the best course of action to take. Those things will never yield us the results that we desire. Fear really is a cockblock to the things we desire. It makes us say and do some stupid ass shit.

It’s now Christmas day, and you are that 6 year old again. You awake and rush to the tree to find all of the awesome presents that Santa has left for you. You rummage around through the sack, searching for something that feels just like that gadget you saw in the shop all those months earlier. Bingo!!! Found it. You pictured this exact moment- how it would feel, how it would sound, hell, how it would smell! Oh happy days! You take it out of the box and play with it all damn day, so grateful that he bought it for you. And that he remembered after all of those months! For the first kid, that time flew by. While for the second kid, the wait was long and tortuous. And through all of the tantrums and the hanging on and clinging, they  exhausted themselves – both physically and emotionally. Again, same toy, same timeline. Both knew Santa would bring it. The difference in their experiences? The first kid let it go. The second held onto it for dear life.

I have been holding onto this abundant health and big (romantic) love so tight. I have had my face pressed against that window so hard I have been fogging up the glass. It has been a (self imposed) torture. With the releasing of more fears, and the awareness of my perceptions and subsequent behaviours, I am now able to make new choices. Tonight I choose to put the toys back on the shelf, and calmly leave the shop, trusting that those things will find me when I am living my live from love. Intuition and inspired ideas just come to you when you allow the flow. Things just happen when you live from love. Because love is the flow.  Love – a feeling state where miracles happen.

xx