Surrender: The Art of Living, Loving, and Dying Without Training Wheels

Now surrender is no longer like riding a regular bike. It is not as simple as “just pedal.” It is more like the bike keeps changing – someone keeps raising the bar and suddenly I am on skinny tires, and then on to a unicycle, and then on to a unicycle atop a high-wire, and then add some flaming knives to twirl around at the same time.

I remember well when I learned to ride my two-wheel bike without training wheels for the first time. It was in the long lane in front of our house that stretched down to where it ended at the foot of the Lantoga Farms dairy barn. I must have been about eight years old, and I had a red, two-wheel bike with white stripes that said “Flyer” on it. Up until that morning, my bike also had two little training wheels attached to the back wheel which prevented me from ever falling over.

The day came when someone had decided “it was time.” I remember my friend Glenn and his sister Ruthie on either side of me. They ran alongside my bike and then — my protests in vain — let go. I was both excited and terrified. My terror escalated along with the speed and they yelled “pedal Artie!” At first I could not get beyond my astonishment, and did nothing, and the “wobble-factor” began to set in and mount. Again, “Pedal!” they yelled, and finally I heard them and wildly started pedaling. It was amazing to discover the connection between the pedaling, the tires gripping the driveway, and my momentum forward. Oh my God – I was doing it!

What they say about learning to ride a bike is largely true: once you learn, it is something you never forget. If my body were able, I could climb on a bike, and within seconds I would be doing just fine. It is one of those abilities that more or less stays with you in your storehouse for your whole life.

But now the rubber truly has hit the road…

Not so with surrender. I feel as though I have been wrestling with learning to let go over and over again, all of my life. But now the rubber truly has hit the road…

I am now in Hospice care in my home. Hospice can mean different things, but generally, however you look at it, it signifies that you have entered the final phase of your life, during which you need another level of care; one that leads you in a kind and compassionate way toward the end-point of death.

So, now surrender is no longer like riding a regular bike. It is not as simple as “just pedal.” It is more like the bike keeps changing – someone keeps raising the bar and suddenly I am on skinny tires, and then on to a unicycle, and then on to a unicycle atop a high-wire, and then add some flaming knives to twirl around at the same time.

The release from the “wobbling” and whatever we are clinging to for safety – our training wheels – is more raw now, more fragile, and more tender at the same time.

My husband John and I have been finding that, unlike learning to ride a bike, it may be that with each progression of my “terminal” disease, a new kind of surrender is needed that calls forth something deeper from us; a deeper level of trust in some ineffable force that we don’t understand. The release from the “wobbling” and whatever we are clinging to for safety – our training wheels – is more raw now, more fragile, and more tender at the same time. Wobbling amidst all of the changes, I know that there must be a new way, and new lessons, for me to learn now, and so I ponder…

What is the attachment that I am letting go of?

I am fiercely independent. I am a sole survivor. I enjoy having the sense that I control the direction in which my life is heading or the life that I am proactively creating for myself. Put me into adverse circumstances and I will survive, without your help, thank you very much. For decades I have created an identity of being a man who is independent, self-sufficient, capable, able to take care of his own needs.

And so, I am letting go of the idea that I am separate from you, that my value or worth is wrapped up in how able I am to “do it on my own” – or ultimately in any of the ego, skills or abilities I thought were mine and that defined me – these, I am learning, are not the things that define who I am.

And in the letting go, what is it that I am accepting or embracing or allowing?

Art and John

Well, maybe I cannot stand up, but maybe we can stand me up. Maybe I cannot walk through the woods and breathe, but we can walk through the woods and you can carry my oxygen and I can breathe. Maybe I cannot get into and out of the car very well, but perhaps we can get me into and out of the car.

When I see you coming toward me, and I know that you are going to offer help, or do something for me, if I am attached and clinging, I brace myself and prepare to say “No, I can do this myself.” I hang on to my pride and I push you away. If I surrender, I look in your eyes and feel your kindness and I melt a bit and say to myself, “let yourself be loved.” I say to you, “thank you.” And once I get over any lingering shame, I feel grateful. The surrendering is hard, but I am discovering that vulnerability is like a muscle that can be strengthened with practice.

So, what is the surrendering to? It is to us; to knowing that we are not separate – that I am you and you are me. It is surrendering to the ever-present force of love and grace that surrounds us all the time like the currents of a river to which we spend most of our time blind and oblivious. We are surrounded by love and kindness and by the Great Spirit, always – this I am discovering. All that is required is to open and say Yes.

And when I have lost my way, how to find my way back?

I am discovering three ways to find my way back to the path, all of which depend on the surrender part having already happened. From that state of raw receptivity and awareness:

Find a direct source of love and access it

Search and find even a glimpse of your real self

Let yourself be transcended and awestruck by miracles.

I have discovered that I am at my most vulnerable at night after making it into bed. I’m not sure why this is the toughest moment of the day, but getting ready for and then settling into bed is like climbing Mt. Everest for me. When I am finally settled, I reach for John’s hand; I find it and I clasp it so that we are palm-to-palm, so I can feel his skin against mine, and I let myself go. I often cry, but after a time, when I can really feel the palm of John’s hand, I sense it as a direct intra-venous feed of love. With every labored breath I soak it in and imagine love filling me to my fingers and toes. Then, my breath slows, and I remember who we are and how much we love each other. I feel home.

At some point, I can suddenly see a glimmer of light in some corner and I move toward it. I discover something that is NOT suffering, but is another part of me. I breathe into it and shine my light there.

Other times I find myself alone and lost, and caught by suffering: physical pain, emotional despair, or mental anguish. When I have enough awareness to notice this state, my big question is: If I am not just this physical, emotional, or mental stuff, then who am I? What is the part of me that is NOT that? The part that knows joy and transcendence, that knows love? Where is that part?

I close my eyes, and enter what seems like a very dark basement with only a flashlight and I begin to search around. Mostly, I encounter the elements of my suffering; my physical discomfort, emotional pain, and my mental maze. So, I keep searching. At some point, I can suddenly see a glimmer of light in some corner and I move toward it. I discover something that is NOT suffering, but is another part of me. I breathe into it and shine my light there. I try to open the crack more. As I do, I find that the light gets brighter and the space gets larger, and if I persist it becomes bright enough to remind me that I am also Spirit and Life and Light. I let that awareness grow until it seems to have the upper hand. The suffering is still present, but no longer “has me.” Instead I am guided by a more essential love-based me that also brings along some suffering – a very different proposition.

Finally, I notice more and more that we are, right now, living in paradise. I have always been searching for it in some way, and now I discover that it has been right in front of me all this time. Everywhere I look; every tree, every cloud, every human face, every dog, most cats , every body of water, every reflection of light, each sway in the breeze of a limb or frond these days seems to me to be a miracle. If we open our eyes and senses and witness the world around us it is easy to know that we are a part of an awe-inspiring miracle – no matter how long we have to live.

And so, I look up to the sky and it makes me realize how magnificent is the human spirit. I wobble and let my own spirit soar with gladness anyway, like I felt on my bike without the training wheels. The paradise that we seek is all around us all of the time…we have somehow just forgotten. And so my practice is to assume that what I have written here is true, and to let my soul be moved by the miracles of life around me, and inside me, every day.  When I do this, I often weep and always want to. I let the awe remind me that I, too, have an essential nature that is a miracle and divine, and that I am a unified and inseparable part of all the glory.

And so, my friend, are you…

Art Shirk lives in Malden and Rockport MA with his husband John and best friend Mario the Labradoodle. Currently his favorite activities are walking (slowly) in the woods and playing frisbee with Mario. Art is easing into retirement from his work developing effective leaders and conscious human beings throughout the United States, Europe, and Colombia, South America. In 2014, Art was diagnosed with Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF), a progressive and terminal lung disease. While navigating the hard parts of IPF, Art and John have been engaged and focused on the many questions about living and loving fully that the harsh reality of the disease sparks.

We invite you to share a story about yourself or another person, reflecting on the question: “How has gratefulness shifted a moment, an experience, or a lifetime?”