Holding On

“If my hands are fully occupied in holding on to something, I can neither give nor receive.”
Dorothee Solle

What are you holding onto? Perhaps it is a cherished idea, your idea about something you feel very strongly about. Perhaps it is a cherished hope or even expectation of what the future should be like.

Perhaps it is a cherished possession, that reminds you of someone you used to know, or even of wonderful days gone by. We are all holding onto everything we can find that gives us a sense of who we are. Our ego demands all these things because they give it life.

But if we are fully occupied with these things, we can’t give. We can’t give another person those cherished possessions no matter how much he needs them. We can’t give another person reassurance that his belief about the world or the future is valid even though it disagrees with ours. To give those things away is to give away a part of us. And that our ego would never allow. To our ego, there is never enough validation of who we are, and any loss of that is a disaster.

If we are fully occupied with these things, we can’t receive either. If our attention is fully on what we already beleive about the future or the world around us, we can’t learn anything new. If our attention is fully occupied with having those cherished possessions of ours, there is no room to discover new desires and even better possessions. If we are fully occupied with who we beleive we are, then we prevent ourselves from learning new and exciting possibilities about who we really are.

Always keep your hands unoccupied as much as possible so that you can give and receive; so that you can really grow and really make the world a better place.