Surrender in meditation, the planet Neptune

The word abandonment displeases many people on their spiritual path, in fact it frightens them, because it conveys a terrible feeling of loneliness.

It is the same when it comes to surrendering to a spiritual master, especially in our western countries!

What is this miracle of surrender to the master that many disciples tell us about?

There are certainly many? We will quote one in particular.

When we meet a master, the symbolism behind becoming a disciple represents an opportunity to disidentify ourselves from our representations and our ego by an inner gesture of surrender to preconceived ideas, to the image we reflect in our society, in our family. The prejudices we will have to face become an opportunity to individualize ourselves, to become what we have chosen to be! Surrendering oneself in all sincerity and in all consciousness is indeed an opportunity to let what is hidden behind the veil of our Persona show through.

A communion can be born between master and disciple that goes beyond the fact of adoration, the master is a bridge that allows us to pass from one shore to the other of our state of consciousness. This kind of experience is often frightening, having the master by our side represents a comforting basis to face the experiences that emerge from this dissolution, from a disidentification to our ego. Until the day we can extricate ourselves from this disciple/master bond and pursue our spiritual path alone.

Surrender to meditation

In a previous article, we proposed a method of meditation, here is a small excerpt (There is nothing to do, not even becoming the observer, the observer emerges naturally when the desire for control evaporates).

We are often told to observe our thoughts and emotions, to give them space, and that is fine. However, we would like to place ourselves in a position where we can actually observe without mental interference.

When we start to say that we need to observe our thoughts, the very fact that we have this intention causes interference with what we have learned from observation, a multitude of conditionings are imposed between the meditator and the observer and it is this spiral that we continue in our observation.

In fact, observation never stops, but saying that we must observe is a mental mechanism and it cannot be meditative. It's an encounter with nothingness, and out of this nothingness emerge thoughts, desires to... at some point in our meditation the observer is no longer the one observing, but detaches himself from the act of observation to become the witness of what emerges. 

Let's try to settle into the position of surrender proposed in our extract, there is nothing to do, not even becoming the observer...

To position ourselves in an abandonment to existence, to presence without looking for anything, without giving an opinion or an analysis of what appears or does not appear, just being there without more or less. It may take time but let us be guided by this state of surrender even if it requires courage and perseverance.

If there is a persistence to control, a tendency to interfere with comments or images or to want to accentuate a feeling, when this kind of resistance occurs, let us surrender to it. At some point, something new appears, a silence, a deep solitude...

At that moment, it is common to want to go back and look for familiar images because we are not used to this sensation of loneliness and we interpret it as a void, a nothingness or the unknown and this makes us terribly afraid, it is the fear of death!

This is where our heroic initiation begins. It is in this space that surrender takes on its full meaning and becomes the only possibility to take the step, to surrender to oneself. In this space of surrender, the ego softens and true observation comes naturally.

The planet Neptune

In this state of mind and as we know, Neptune bathes us in an uncertain sea and it would be wrong to think that Neptune means passivity and tranquility. It is enough to observe the seas and oceans from which it draws much of its symbolism to understand it. The oceans are truly changeable, going from peaceful tranquility to a surge of all kinds, from the beauty of their biotopes to the still unknown mystery of their depths. It is this mutability of behavior that makes the oceans and Neptune particularly attractive and frightening.

The most obvious one seems to me to come from the values that have lulled us from our childhood to adulthood, values that are far from the meaning of Neptune. Even if Saturn is not a planet of ease, it clearly represents a correspondence with the well-established structures of our societies and it is obvious that we have built ourselves rather on values of structuring, control, knowledge, etc., rather Saturnian lines of conduct.

And we have used the values of Saturn and Neptune as a bridge to lock up the spiritual values present in each of us, to make them into established dogmas in order to make humanity a slave to a particular type of functioning.

(This is obviously not to give Saturn the wrong role because it represents an extraordinary wealth of teaching, but rather to express the tendency that the human species has chosen to favor from the different influences of Saturn).

Neptune, being alien to self-interested calculations, will continue to be charged with its energy which, in this case, can only be confusion with searches for illusory substitutions until the day when the person understands the need to surrender to its dissolving energy. In reality, Neptune only dissolves what needs to be dissolved. What could Neptune do to a person who is accepting, resilient, welcoming the mysteries of the world and its manifestations? It would open the doors to their unconditional love and freedom to be in the unity of interdependence.

When in a chart we have a valued Neptune, a transit or a major progression that involves it, it is necessary to open to the spiritual world in a sense of letting go. Acceptance should not be approached as resignation, but as a welcoming, whether it be towards our emotions, our confusion and our sense of dissolution. And if the encounter with a spiritual master takes place in the space of the heart and manifests in us a call to the dimensions of meditation, let him or her gradually lead us to the acceptance of surrender to ourselves.

The definition of Neptune that comes closest to what we feel is that given by Stephen Arroyo in chapter 3 of his book; https://www.amazon.com/Astrology-Karma-Transformation-2nd-Ed/dp/0916360547

The only way to truly understand Neptune in its essence is to surrender to it, for it is by definition and function beyond boundaries. It is only by merging with it, by freeing ourselves from all boundaries, that we will come to know it.

And if we are not ready to abandon ourselves in meditation...

Let's learn to receive the emotions in each observation without expecting any result. And when thoughts turn into emotions creating anger or anxiety, feelings or fear etc., they will come to settle in the body in the form of knots, tensions, heat or cold, at that moment we release the mind from our attention and go to our body sensation with acceptance and welcome. Let's not try to make them disappear but rather watch them as when we watch a play, without judgment, analysis or control. Let life flow through us without interference, and what remains is a gentle observation.

Another way that we think is more effective:

Let's start by taking a breath in and a long exhale. Let's help ourselves for a moment by placing an imaginary blank page before our eyes. From this blank page, let us allow what comes to us to come with tranquility. 

We are often told that meditation is about living in the present moment and, when a thought or emotion arises, looking at it and gently coming back into the present moment. 

This has long been a confusion in my practice? The very fact of bringing our thoughts back into the present moment takes us away from the present moment, and it becomes a spiral that can last for many years without really living a meditative observation. 

Observation happens when we are in total acceptance of what comes on our blank page. A thought arrives and we look at it in total neutrality, an emotion comes to settle on the white sheet and well it comes and we contemplate it in the acceptance.

It is this letting go that we call abandonment. So we are in this welcome that is placed and moved and we let it happen without wanting to return to the present. Do not encourage anything to happen, do not expect or forbid our thoughts, emotions and feelings. 

SatyamAstro

Finally, we would like to quote Lao Zeu's phrase that represents well what we wish to share in this article, but targeting it to the meaning of meditation.

Let us live meditation as it is lived...