Non-striving

This week we focus on non-striving

For us list-creators, agenda-makers, and task-completers, this can be a tough one. We are busy “doing”. We’re getting things accomplished, making things happen, and moving our lives forward. Our productivity and accomplishments may be a significant identity defining feature for us. We often most value our capacity to keep everyone and everything in our lives organized and productive. Our energy is focused on accomplishment and our success and value becomes largely grounded in everything that gets done through our hard work.

We often get lost in doing, though. We forget that who we are is not what we do. Our spirit takes a back seat to the demands of the doing and we lose touch with the sweetness of our true self. Non-striving provides us an opportunity to remember who we really are and allows magic to shine into our world of doing.

Letting Go

Non-striving requires that we let go of our agendas and ideas of what has to happen. Non-striving does not make things happen. It does, however, let things happen. As we master non-striving, we stop applying force and effort. The focus of life can become about connecting with the source of our real being and identity. It allows our spirit to catch-up with our effort. Then we open to the unexpected and a richness that we don’t (and can’t) imagine.

Experience Being

The longer our to-do lists tend to be, the more difficult this practice will be. But keep your focus on who you are ‘being’ rather than who you are ‘doing’. Be brave enough to let go once, and let the practice of non-striving become familiar. Keep at it. Non-striving is the rich soil of an unplanned garden.

This shift away from identifying with what we do to how we are being, is the fertile garden for joy, fulfillment, and living richly. Be open to possibilities of what can present in life when we stop striving. You will find that wisdom, creativity, and delight will bloom.