A Takeaway for 2020: Letting Go of the Results

My Dear Upbuild Community,

This has been a formative year for all of us occupying the planet together. The trials and tribulations have never been more formidable on a global scale. Suddenly, no one can escape completely. The global village has led to global catastrophe. It’s never been more obvious how much we need help to raise humanity above its present condition of misfortune. We face a health crisis, climate crisis, racial crisis, political crisis, socio-economic crisis, species extinction crisis, and crisis upon crisis, as serious as they get, ad infinitum. But all are inextricably connected by one thing — a consciousness of selfishness. That is all.

I wrote about the health crisis in The Spiritual Dilemma Within a Pandemic, Vipin wrote about the racial crisis in We Are Not Our Bodies, I wrote about the climate and species extinction crisis in The Consequence of Not Caring About Consequence, and I spoke to the political crisis in Our Nationwide Wake-up Call. There’s always much more to address, but for now, and as always, I’d like to focus on what’s behind it all, which is also our only way out — consciousness.

What consumes your consciousness? In our workshops, we emphasize it is the desire to control, and thus we call our default state — The Controlling Consciousness. Specifically we try to control others and our environments to get the validation our egos crave. We try to get the world to make us feel like we are a secure self. We ache to know we are who we think we should be. And we require others to tell us that we really are! But it doesn’t work, because we’re not who we think we should be. Nor do others exist to give us a sense of identity.

Control to get what we want is the consciousness that created all of our messes, macro and micro. When we stop caring about anything else, it leads to definite destruction. Control out of the desire to serve others with a sense of responsibility is necessary. Control for providing the most beneficial offerings to ourselves and others is exemplary. And self-control is critical. But consciousness defined by control and driven by our ego is the opposite.

To stop being controlled by the desire to control is not a small feat! The sacred text we’ve lived to study and teach for so many years — The Bhagavad-Gita — is entirely about this most foundational of all afflictions. The attachment to control runs ever so deep and it pervades everything we think and everything we do. It’s as subtle as can be, and it only lets us be when we are acutely aware of the tendency.

Yet, even with awareness, which is one of the most powerful forces in existence, and a linchpin of our work at Upbuild, still, the struggle does not abate. The degrees of selfishness and obstinacy of our desire to control will vary widely from person to person and moment to moment according to awareness. But the desire — to have things our way, arrive at the outcomes we want, have people see us as we expect — that is as formidable as the crises which result.

This year did not go my way. I started off with a personal retreat that was life-changing. It was the first time I ever did something like this by myself, for myself. I wrote about it in my Takeaway for 2019 and that writing helped me to follow through on it. I spent the first six weeks of the year (two weeks on retreat and four weeks thereafter) with better and more sacred habits than I had even in my five years as a monk!

I woke up consistently at 4 a.m. and did my morning meditation immediately, read sacred texts voraciously, exercised, and flowed with a sense of connection to my real self that was exhilarating amidst the calm. I’ve had greater excitement in my life. But I’ve never had greater calm. And that was more exciting!

I planned to have small retreats at regular intervals to keep this spirit going throughout the year and throughout my life! I calendared them and set the schedule with particular agendas for each, just as I did for the first. I conducted Upbuild workshops that would typically take everything out of me and disrupt my sacred habits for weeks at a stretch. This time there was no disruption. I was spiritually surcharged while working my hardest. It was surreal — a miracle I’d prayed for over the last 14 years.

Then I got sick for two weeks from not sleeping enough. That was not what I had in mind! Then I had to adjust my expectations — never what I have in mind. Then came a monumental pandemic that disrupted the world in an unprecedented manner. Disruption after disruption of every kind, and no ability to stay true to my greatest hopes. Perhaps even worse than this is the feeling of being fooled — I believed in my hopes. Not knowing what to trust and what’s possible or for how long is a heavy burden. Every time I’d toil like anything to get myself on track, I’d eventually be thwarted. That thwarting would last longer and feel more definitive than the progress made!

I see this as a metaphor for much of life. We desire, desire, desire. And when the results come, they lock us in the game to desire more… When they don’t come, we obsess over cracking the code and experience great frustration in so doing, until we have our moments of feeling on top again, which are, for even the best of us, just that — moments. Not even Tiger Woods or Michael Jordan could stay on top forever. Steve Jobs ultimately had to leave this world, as we all do. All results are temporary. All desire is perpetual.

What are we doing?! Are we not like the ant who labors to get the piece of food over the rock? Are we not Sisyphus pushing our boulder up the hill and then starting all over the next day? Is the pep talk about enjoying the journey to the top really going to make up for that? Is the self-help pump-up about how much we’re capable of doing and being going to solve the situation?

This year, I lost two of the people who meant most to me — one to Covid-19 and the other to cancer. Both are my spiritual heroes and nothing can ever make up for the loss. I’ve shed so many tears and I still feel bereft without them. One was a black, American lady, hailing from Cleveland, who some of you got to meet at our Remembering Who We Are — Krsnanandini Devi. The other was a Calcutta-born Indian man who I didn’t get to meet enough while he was here — Bhakti Charu Swami. Both were so different. One a mother of 10, the other a life-long monk. Both were self-realized souls — fully identified with the soul. They understood they are not their bodies, minds, or egos. They gave up their egos. Completely. I want the presence of these luminaries back with me and for all of you, but I’ve found that the best way to bring them back is to meditate on their instructions. I try to keep both Krsnanandini Devi and Bhakti Charu Swami safely tucked away in my heart and to meet them there. And I find somehow there they are.

It didn’t go my way that they left, but they were not without their parting gifts. They gave me an extraordinary window into the mission of the Gita through their lives. It all comes down to giving up the results of our activities for a higher purpose. They were not afraid to give up anything. Not even their lives. They both knew they would die, and they were totally free. Happy. Neither accomplished everything they dreamed of in service to humanity, but both succeeded wildly. Both were detached from anything beyond what was meant to be.

I had a conversation with Krsnanandini Devi some weeks before she departed and then later asked a question of her during a talk she gave nearly from her deathbed. In each interaction, I found she was urging me toward surrender. Let go and let God. Be free. What are you carrying all these weights for? I felt her imploring me.

In 2015, when I stayed with my guru, Sacinandana Swami, who also has spoken to the Upbuild community, I asked him if he had any personal instruction for me. It was a night or two before I would depart his hallowed home in Germany, and I was very nervous to ask this groundbreaking question I can’t remember ever asking him before or after. He looked at me with surprise, readiness, and a big smile.

“Your plan, not mine.”

That was all he said. I have a T-shirt, thanks to a dear friend and Gita student, which allows me to now wear this expression which I can never forget from that night in Germany.

We can continue to make all our plans. My retreats are still a life-giving staple and something I look forward to always. There are so many responsibilities and services for which I must plan and execute all the time. But unless I care more for a higher purpose than my own purpose, how can I say that my plans are satisfactory? And what is the ultimate test of purpose? When things don’t go my way. Can we still plan and see that there is something else being planned for me?

This is the difference between a life well-lived and a life crippled by anxiety. I know the latter very well. The former is all too elusive. But I am not giving up. And when I see the life well-lived directly before me, how can I deny its possibility? When Sacinandana Swami, Krsnanandini Devi, Bhakti Charu Swami, and so many great souls are modeling this, how can I pretend it’s not available? Not a necessity?

The other day, I had a striking conversation with my father-in-law while staying with my wife’s family in Toronto where I am currently writing to you from. Growing up in Lucknow, India, he saw his mother lose an immense amount of wealth going from riches to rags, lose her husband at a very young age, and have to raise a family of eight kids with no money, all on her own. It was an impossible situation. How did she manage? How did she get through it? Happily! Did she want any of this tragedy? Did she like the extreme difficulty and horrific uncertainty? Absolutely not. But she recognized it was not up to her. There was a superior plan. And if not superior in goodness, certainly superior in power. What would be the use in resisting it?

It turns out, she was a very self-realized soul on the spiritual path. She trusted in everything that came to be, no matter how dark and unending. My father-in-law carried these impressions deeply. They shaped him. When he had a severe heart attack, the hospital staff expressed their disbelief at his completely calm, jovial spirit. Years later, when he had chest pain that felt like another heart attack, he called 911 and the medic who rushed onto the scene expressed the same utter disbelief. This has happened to my guru regularly as he’s been on the brink of death so many times.

Dad Singh, as I call him, told me of times when he was on top working at GE, as if he could do no wrong and praised famously. He also told me of times when he could do no right at GE, accused wrongly and constantly. In either case, he showed up the same way — ready for whatever is meant to be, even if he didn’t like it.

When I was in Croatia celebrating my guru’s birthday in 2014, he took me to a concert where he sang kirtan — musical meditation — for a packed house at a prestigious yoga studio. There were hundreds of people all cheering for him with great jubilation. He looked at me shyly and held my hand as we walked to his position on the stage. Then he spoke: “…Save me!” “Whether they’re all cheering for me or whether they’re all booing at me, it is always the same. …Save me! …Save me!”

In 12-step programs, the aforementioned phrase “let go and let God” is frequently used. Give yourself over to a higher power. This is the fundamental platform from which the journey to recovery begins. There’s been outstanding efficacy to this methodology as documented by numerous studies and countless anecdotes. I’m very close to former addicts who have been sober decade after decade and swear by this principle. Could there not then be something here for us who have the addiction to control?

Gabor Mate in his Ted Talk, The Power of Addiction and The Addiction of Power, which we screen and discuss at Upbuild events, makes the case that the “us and them” mentality we take toward addicts is entirely false. We think they are other. But we are all addicts, trying to fill the vacuum in our hearts. It’s perhaps the best Ted Talk I’ve ever heard, spoken from deep realization and about something so crucial. To treat our own addiction, we, too, need a methodology, and I find the starting point to be universally applicable — Let go and let God.

After speaking to Dad Singh and reflecting more on my life, especially in the light of my guru, Krsnanandini Devi, and Bhakti Charu Swami’s teachings, it became abundantly clear to me that I need to change something. I’ve been striving to make headway for so many years, but something needs to give way for me to finally progress on this front.

I saw myself through the eyes of those more experienced on the path than me. I saw my own striving to serve every living being as purely as I know how, dedicating each moment of my day, day after day, as a sacred offering. I saw I was doing my best. I am doing my best. I am limited. I am weak. I still have so much ego left in me. I am not great. But I am trying with all my heart. And with all the obstacles, all the constraints, pressures, failures, and frustrations, I am giving all that I can at my present level. I cannot expect more. It will not help to expect more. It also will not help to compromise my vision or lessen the striving toward higher levels. But I want to be happy with all that I’m giving and all that I’m receiving. I’m tired of being a more spiritually-inclined Sisyphus!

I’ve gotten a good practice-run for the last several days living with less entitlement, trying to better accept what comes, good, bad, and ugly. I’m in suspense because this consciousness is not mine to possess. I can’t completely control the mentality of giving up control! But I can see a shift that my wife declared as night and day. I have experienced a freedom that I haven’t known previously. And it comes from striving to do everything in my power to serve while recognizing nothing will ever fully go my way, even with the best intentions. Let go and let God is the only path to emancipation from being controlled by the desire to control. I am now making a conscious decision when I feel the incessant pain of attachment for results to say: “Your plan, not mine.”

I used to wear that shirt and fear what would happen when I did. There seemed to be more upsets each time I wore it! But now I don’t want to fear. I didn’t want to fear then either, I just wasn’t willing to see that there is another plan in operation, which I’m but a tiny part of, whether I like it or not. I have my role to play, but the plan is not mine to sway.

If we want to break free of the macro and micro-crises, it all comes down to consciousness. We all long to be untouched by this tumultuous world. We all long to be steady during every storm. We all long to be who we truly are, unshakably. Emerging from the wilderness of 2020 into an unknown future, why don’t we give our hearts to this cause and help everyone to be free?