Surrendering to God  as a tool for Healing. Dr Suriyakhatun Osman copyright

Part 1

If there is anything that works against the vanity of the ego, it is love. The nature of
love is to surrender. The world of variety, which has divided life into limited parts,
naturally causes every lesser one to surrender to the greater. And, again, for every
greater one there is another still greater in relation to whom he is smaller, and for
every smaller one there is another still smaller, in relation to whom he is greater. And
as every soul is by its nature compelled to surrender to perfection in all its grades, the
only thing that matters is whether it be a willing surrender or an unwilling surrender.
The former comes by love, the latter is made through helplessness, which makes life
wretched. It moves the Sufi when he reads in the Qur’an that the perfect Being
asked the imperfect souls, the children of Adam, ‘Who is thy Lord?’ They, conscious
of their imperfections, said humbly, ‘Thou art our Lord.’ Surrender is a curse when,
with coldness and helplessness, one is forced to surrender. But the same becomes the
greatest joy when it is made with love and all willingness.

Hazrat Inayat Khan Vol 5 part 4

Dear friends, the topic I have chosen for this month's class is about surrendering our will to God's will. I have found that when I talk about surrender, there are many who feel uncomfortable with the notion of surrendering and equate it with giving up or with being lazy. There is a fine balance between lacking initiative and acting while surrendering and it is an art that we could well learn to help us heal ourselves and others!

I have often seen much misery caused by thinking that we are in charge and we need to do things,.I have seen people become wretched and fall ill because they feel that they have so much to do and could not cope. The situation is difficult they say, they are unfortunate they say, they have so much to do and ends cannot meet. There is a tool I use to try and help them with their sufferings and, it is a tool I myself use daily in the form of a prayer that becomes a continuous reminder to me who is really in charge.

Here is a case I had some months ago. A lady who did not earn a salary but did a lot of  volunteer work while at the same time taking care of her children and managing the home began to have a repeat of migraine headaches she had been having earlier but which had resolved.The feelings she expressed was her sense of responsibility over what she wanted to do, her fear of not doing enough and her fear of neglecting her household duties. She was quite familiar with the way I worked so sat with me while  I held her hands and guided her to look within herself. Let us pretend to be the patient for a moment and do this exercise with me, just like what I did with her.

First think of your own insurmountable problems, watch your body as it reacts to your thinking of your problems.
Next, hold out your hands and let me hold them. Now, together we will go into our heart space the way Himayat has taught us.
You focus first on the space of your physical heart, just above your left breast, start observing your breathing and as the breath moves in and out, imagine it gently caressing this spot and until the spot starts to expand and become warm..........
next focus on the spot exactly opposite to this in the right breast, focus on this spot and watch your breath caressing this spot .
Do this until you get a response here. The first center I mentioned is the latifah Qalb and the one opposite to it is the Latifah Haq, next focus on the center of the breast, the center of the sternum , the Latifah Sirriya. Focus on the spot and caress it gently with your breath. It may help to imagine the spot as a piece of wax that starts to melt with the warmth of your breath. The melting wax expands and warms the spot. Next you focus your breath towards your diaphragm or solar plexus, and this is the latifah nafs, By now you should be feeling your heart space. While you are doing this you may want to add this prayer that I teach my patients. It is a simple one and it is part of the prayer that is written in the Quran that Moses said it when he was to meet the Pharoah. It goes like this:' Lord, expand my breast !'(chapter 20  verse 25) Continue to watch your breath!
Now you continue with the Moses prayer, 'And ease my task for me' ( chapter 20 verse 26). And when you have said this once, you watch your breath and observe what happens to your heart space. Keep repeating  these two verses of the Moses prayer with pauses in between while you observe your own being and perhaps you can share with me what you experience while doing this exercise.

to part II