Note- I use the word God throughout this article, but it can be replaced with the Universe, Source, Higher or Intrinsic Power of your choice.

 

I admit it. I am a complete control freak. Just look at my daughter, you will frequently see it reflected in her obsessive ways, and my Dad, oh my! We just have this innate inability to trust and let go. The thing is, I completely resonate and understand the sometimes abstract and feminine quality of allowing and, it just completely goes against my inherent nature.  I always laugh when people call me laid back, or comment that I have an endearing quality of just ‘going with the flow’. I have to work so damn hard internally to do that. Right now, I need to work harder. 

 

Currently my 3 year old daughter will only swing herself on the swing, and ride the see-saw at the playground alone. Always awkward when someone with a lone child walks up and excitedly tells said child there is someone to ride the see-saw with, then once they climb on my daughter immediately climbs off and walks away. She is not anti-social, she is actually quite confident and extroverted, but we are not to try and change her solo- ride it my way- ways. These are some examples that have reflected to me my own need to be in control and lack of trust for my environment and others, and God even, if I am honest. All of this is so contradictory to who I am within. It is a constant battle of soul and over mind. Or my sunny carefree sun sign of Sagittarius, over my perfectionist, analytical moon sign of Virgo. (Apparently this makes me balanced – or neurotic!).

 

When I had struggles getting, and staying pregnant I knew it was a lack in my ability to receive. To just allow. These are feminine qualities, why was it so difficult for me to be in them, I am a woman after all. Because I grew up in a world that revered the masculine. And like all of my friends I learnt to strive for everything. To use my internal power. To control my circumstances. What I didn’t realise was the art of allowing- using my feminine nature, was actually a superpower. One that it took me so long to tap into and one that I still need to actively engage now.

 

For me being in the flow of life, means being in alignment. The only way I can do this is by moving from my head into my heart. By moving away from my over-active mind and into my soul. I have practised the law of attraction actively for fifteen years. This was a total shift for me into allowance. That doesn’t mean we just take what life gives us, but clearly define what we want, and trust that we will receive it. I got very good at doing this, aside from a few fundamental misinterpretations of Gods will and healing my own wounds! Despite this, and even because of this, I deeply understand when I am enforcing my will and controlling everything around me, and when I am expressing my desires and trusting fully that they will come to fruition. 

 

The big divide for me really happened when my daughter became a toddler. Or maybe it snuck up a little earlier when she first became ill at around ten months, and I realised, I could lose her. I mean she had a vomiting bug for less than a day, I was not going to lose her that day. But I could, one day. It was my birthday, and it wasn’t a big thing. Except to me, I guess it was. I trusted so beautifully in my pregnancy, my birth, my health, my ability to take care of a newborn, that before I knew it I had a toddler. By then I was a mother with no time or energy to consider whether I trusted anything or anyone anymore. Children are so unpredictable, and it made the world to me, suddenly so. So I did what anyone would do, I tried to control it.

 

That breezy mothering I adopted in babyhood, became a nervous, slightly over-bearing, but hopefully not frantic, mothering style. As my daughter explored the world more and more, I kept telling her it was safe and that she could trust everything, and I was showing her it was not safe, and to control everything.

 

The art of allowing is not just something we need to master as mothers, it is something that we all need to master; it is just harder as a mother. (So much harder!). I used a lot of various techniques to be present enough to let go and receive over the years, meditation is by far the best. But having practised it for many years consistently I can align myself into the energy of my soul, or flow when I check in without needing to be sitting on a mat allowing Gods will, Source light or Love to come. If we are in the present moment, we are not worrying about the past or obsessing over the future, which better put us in a state of allowing. It also gifts us the presence to check in to what we are aligning with. Maybe you don’t resonate with being in your heart space in order to open up to receive. Maybe you feel it somewhere else in your body? The mind is a built-in protective device so as long as it is given the reigns it will take them- and protect, by means of control, at all costs.

 

Controlling comes from fear, receiving comes from openness, openness is trust. Sink into it, within your physical body. It has no secrets. Uproot any resistance or fear and transmute it to faith. Not always easy. But always necessary. If we hold on too tight we strangle the Love and joy out of every experience. I feel this far too often. I know a lot of us do. Although I love to use mantras, I prefer to feel it in my body first, then mantra it out if called for.

 

When I don’t have a project, a burning idea, desire or dream to project (yes project and project are the same spelling!) onto the world, I am in a state of receiving. Allowing, inviting, listening, trusting.  Breathing, being, dancing, flowing. Going where I am called, listening to my unbound heart, which has many small desires and wishes rather than just one big overwhelming goal.

 

When I let go. When I receive. Intuitively I know God does it better. Every. Single. Time. Without fail. I just have to allow, and let something larger than me take the reigns.