Letting Go and Letting God

I used to think surrender was defeat.

That letting go meant giving up. That trusting God meant becoming passive, resigned, obedient, small. I thought control was strength, and faith was for people who had no better options.

Then I burned out.

Spiritually. Emotionally. Physically.

My plans unraveled. My beliefs cracked open.

And in the rubble, I heard the softest invitation: let go.

Not as punishment. As mercy.

Zen says clinging is suffering.

Christianity says God’s strength is made perfect in weakness.

Both point toward the same truth: you’re not in charge.

And thank God for that.

Because the longer I tried to white-knuckle my way through life, grasping, fixing, managing, the more I missed the grace that was already here. The love that didn’t need my performance. The peace that came not from control, but from release.

Christian Zen taught me this:

Letting go isn’t failure.

It’s faith.

It’s the moment you stop trying to carry the whole universe on your back and realize it was never your job. It’s the breath you take when you stop pretending to be the one holding everything together. It’s the shift from ego to presence, from fear to flow.

In Zen, we call it non-attachment.

In Christianity, we call it surrender.

In both, we learn to open our hands and trust that what matters doesn’t need to be gripped.

So what does this look like in practice?

It looks like sitting down and not trying to fix yourself.

It looks like praying without a script.

It looks like breathing through discomfort instead of numbing it.

It looks like saying, “Thy will be done,” and meaning it, even when you don’t know what that means.

Letting go doesn’t mean you stop caring.

It means you stop straining.

You stop resisting the moment. You stop arguing with reality. You stop pretending to be the author of a story that was never yours to write alone.

And in that space?

God enters.

Not as a rescuer. As a presence.

Still. Deep. Near.

So let go.

Let God.

Let breath replace worry.

Let presence replace performance.

Let yourself fall into the grace that’s been holding you all along.