A wise man once said "participate in everything with detached involvement."
Deepak Chopra is more than just a wise man. He is a force whose books have taken over my bedside table, my nonsensical scribblings on each page a purposeful distraction so that passerbyers believe I not only understand his work, but that I am also learning from it. He is a force whose name I haven't been able to escape for the past few years. When friends and therapists (yes, there are multiple - "takes a village"), realize my intense levels of generalized anxiety, they insist that I drink less wine and read more Chopra. And he is a force who has finally pushed me over the edge with one of his famous Seven Spiritual Laws of Success. I just cannot seem to wrap my head around the Law of Detachment, which quite poignantly, being a bit of a control freak, is also the one that I need to grasp the most.
Chopra's Law of Detachment states that "in order to acquire anything in the physical universe, you have to relinquish your attachment to it. You shouldn't give up the intention to create your desire. You give up your attachment to the result." This immediately sounded easy. Just don't do anything, and get everything? That dream job I always wanted, the perfect husband, the 6-pack abs, the pet cat that wasn't moody, a bagel with no carbs. All I had to do is just sit and wait until until all I had ever wanted just hit me in the head?
While I understand most of his other six Spiritual Laws, this one just seemed to go against everything I was ever taught in school and at home. How many times did we hear when we were kids, "you can do and be anything as long as you work hard at it and NEVER give up." We are taught to want more, dream bigger and to be VERY attached to the outcome.
Socially, we are conditioned to emotionally respond to outcomes. We are afraid of failure, of not doing something of importance or relevance. We are afraid of success, working our tails off to achieve something that might not wind up being our long-term passion. We pay both outcomes equal attention creating a volatile internal war where detachment isn't even an option. How could it be when that was never encouraged, never even considered as an alternative. No one ever said, "Hey Lauren, follow your dreams! Get detached!"
In a frustrated attempt to feel closer to the author-mentor who continues to challenge my familiar and comfortable cynicism, I recently imagined Deepak sitting behind a large mahogany desk. His black framed glasses framing an all-knowing calm demeanor, while he pens another profound teaching that I can trip all over and bitch about on my blog. I imagined him writing with clear intention and meaning, and then pausing to look up at me, slightly smiling at my simple interpretations and elementary confusion of his profound enlightenment. And just like that, it became clear.
My unknowing, this befuddlement that I have been fumbling about in, is living the Law of Detachment perfectly. Finding peace with being exactly where you are, no matter where that is, is being detached. Not having all of the answers, not picking winning or losing as being better or worse, just being is being detached.
You can still love and inspire, hope and have real aspirations. You just don't have to fight to a finish line to define whether those feelings were worth it or of value. Success according to this law is being part of the indefinite ride, and valuing every sentiment without the pressure of an outcome. Deepak wasn't all-knowing sitting at his desk, pen in hand. He was simply at peace with just being.
A wise man once said "uncertainty is my path to freedom." And with that, and a glass of Sauvignon Blanc, I will continue my scribblings in his books, admire his bold efforts to change the world with words and positive affirmations, and participate with purpose in my journey to not find the answers, but to simply evolve.
