All our lives are based on notions of perfection, struggles to reach these notions. Our lives are based on a fundamental sense of separation between others and ourselves, between ourselves and the rest of the world. While this is true in an everyday, physical sense, it is untrue as absolute fact; it is untrue as a reliable basis to understand ourselves and the world we live in. We are caught up in learnt notions and ideals; we are forever trying to reach a remote destination. Perfect happiness and contentment always appear to be in the future, in a distant place and a distant time. To realize our innate perfection, it is this maze of conditioning that we have to give up, completely and unconditionally. This giving up of learnt complexities is surrender.

The development of our lives, our interaction with others, is based on the dichotomy of thought. We divide the world into "we" and "they". We divide the world into "I" and "not I"; “mine” and “not mine”. Upon this dichotomy of thought, all our so-called progress is based. In the accumulation of magnificent knowledge based on thought, the first casualty is wisdom. In building our lives on the dichotomies of thought, we lose sight of the wisdom of unitive awareness. No matter how much stuff and knowledge we may accumulate, it is only our own unbounded, unitive awareness that can offer us the necessary insight to live wisely. It is only the unbounded, unitive awareness that is our natural state that can enable us to live with infinite joy, peace and contentment. It is only this that can enable us to embrace the whole of creation as one, to love another like we love ourselves. To express this splendour, which is our deepest self, we will have to peel the layers of conditioning within our minds; we will have to give up our mountain of misconceptions. To give up our masks and images, our learnt patterns of thought and action, is surrender

We see cause and effect as separate because they appear separately in space and time. In our perceptions based on thought, we are taken in by appearances. In perceptions based on likes and dislikes, on pleasure and pain, we believe what we would like to believe; we often see what we would like to see. To see things as they are, to see life as it is, to be in direct touch with life as it is, we must be free from the screen of conditioning, of likes and dislikes, of fears and hopes, of memory and imagination. To do so, calls for a return to unitive understanding, awareness free from thought. In this stillness and total attention, we see things as they are, free from learnt notions, from patterns of thought and conditioning. In this direct perception, this unbounded awareness, we are completely, unconditionally free. To give up the screen of conditioning is surrender.

Our awareness is fragmented – an ego, an intellect, a mind, a consciousness. Our egos run amuck, our intellects are clouded, our minds are disturbed and our consciousness is filled with pessimism and despair. To uplift our consciousness, to control our mind and guide our intellect, to subordinate our petty self-image, our ego, we need the wisdom of unbounded awareness. This all pervading awareness, this infinite intelligence and energy is what we already are, deep within ourselves, our very core of observation and understanding. To heal the fear and fragmentation within our own minds, to be free from the grip of mental dissipation, we must return to total awareness, beyond thought and feeling. To be free from the spirals and mindless repetition of thought and action, we must be completely attentive and aware. In this attention and awareness is an unconditional surrender of all that we know and believe.

Obviously then, to reach and abide in our deepest self which is unbounded, unitive awareness, to unleash that fountain of infinite love, peace, contentment and joy, what we have to do is not strive but surrender. To strive implies knowing and effort. To surrender implies a complete, unconditional dropping of all that we know. To be in a complete stillness, this very instant, calls for a total emptying of ourselves, an unconditional surrender of "I" and "mine”. In this emptiness, stillness and surrender, we are filled with a peace, contentment and joy beyond thought and time.