If you haven’t already heard, I’m quite excited to have recently added Two New Offerings. First is the previously mentioned highly-desirable New 30-min Session. It’s perfect for the quick follow-up or single or short item that calls to be looked into. This is often a power-packed session and great for those who wish short and powerful insight, guidance, or spirit help and is receiving great feedback!
The second offering developed from the request of a beautiful soul that has been seeing me. The need for the session organically evolved and it was made clear to us that a Spiritual On-Site session was needed to help open her heart to the heart of her business/daily work. By this grace was the 1/2 day, 4-hour Heart-Opening Session born. It can be used to open one’s heart connection to one’s business or one’s connection to one’s self. This seminal Session was perhaps one of the most magical and exquisite experiences I’ve had helping individuals over the last twenty-one years and therefore felt so-called to add it to the roster (you’ll see it on the appointment page!).
Now onto some spiritual fun!
The story ...
I used to hear the word surrender and inwardly scoff. Sounds like an awesome thing to be able to do—surrender! Surrender to God they would tell me. Surrender to the light! Yeah right—WTF does that mean? How do you do that? And what the heck does that even look like? Just the uttering of the word ‘surrender’ reminded me of saints sitting in white robe praying in a large monastery room and the light of God somehow descending upon them. Great! Great for them, but that’s not me and that’s not my life. So what do I about that which only the holy and saintly have been ascribed to be able to do? It always seemed not only insane but impossible—at least in my understanding and experience.
Fast forward (or backward) to about ten years after I started practicing and about 11 years ago from this writing. A lovely Moroccan man (details changed to protect their identity of course) came to see me one day for a physical pain that had come on in the past few weeks. During the session, as he was describing it, he suddenly interjected and said, “Oh shoot, Arash, I forgot to tell you about something that happened to me. It has nothing to do with today but I thought you should know about it. About six months ago, I was driving on the freeway and fell asleep. Next thing I know, I had somehow plowed through some temporary highway dividers, suddenly woke, to see myself about to crash head-on into an oncoming car. I remember saying to myself, ‘Majid you’re going to die,’ and then I don’t remember anything after that. Next thing I know, I wake up in the ambulance and they told me I was unconscious for some time, that I was in a horrendous accident, and that they were taking me to the hospital. At the hospital, they did all the scans and everything, observed me for a day, and released me. The crazy thing was, I felt great, fine, perfect.”
“Wait a second,” I responded. “They found nothing on the scans?”
“No.”
“And you had no aches, bruises, concussion, nothing?”
“No. Nothing, I tell you. My car and the pickup truck were totaled. The other passenger was apparently injured pretty bad but recovering and I walk away with barely a seat belt scrape on my left collar. Nothing else, zero. No body aches, whiplash, nothing.”
My eyes squinted tight. “And when you saw you were going to hit the car head-on, anything else? Did you think or say anything else? Anything happen?”
“No, I just said to myself, ‘Majid you’re going to die,’ and I was one hundred percent sure it was going to happen. So I closed my eyes, and everything else is blank, until I woke up.”
‘Wow!’ I thought to myself.
Truth is, I thought about this story for weeks, intermittently for months, and think about it occasionally still. What is it like to surrender yourself so totally that such an impact force that would likely kill most, would move right through you with no resistance and no residue? What a beautiful state! I couldn’t get over it. What a magical state. I started in that moment to understand that true surrender cannot be done mentally or through will. It takes either an act of imminent death, apparently, or maybe some diving grace to penetrate one so totally that everything submits. I understood then, in my very core that surrender can never be an instruction or task to be carried out—that it had to occur, if at all, by a happening—an inner and total crystallization.
Interestingly enough, recently I came across some of Maharishi’s teachings. One part that struck me was when he talked about the two paths. One being the path of self-inquiry, and the other being of devotion/surrender. There’s that dang word again. Now I’ve always been the curious fellow, a heavy thinker, questioner, and investigator, especially of anything spirit. But as soon as I read his words, I knew which was me.
And just that knowing gives a whole new perspective on what’s what internally and what to focus on. What a great levity to know, a beauty, a light. And maybe just knowing: Path A or Path B?, opens surrender’s door.
