Michael Alan Singer
Surrender
Life unfolds in its own rhythm, guided by a force far greater than what the mind can grasp. The path to peace lies not in controlling this force, but in surrendering to it — trusting that it knows exactly what it's doing.
When you let go of the constant need to shape life according to your desires, the struggle begins to fade. The energy within you naturally knows how to heal, guide, and carry you forward.
This surrender is not about helplessness — it's about balance. Like a sailor adjusting to the wind, you move from one balance point to the next, trusting that you are exactly where you need to be.
The Surrender Experiment
The core message of The Surrender Experiment is about letting go of personal resistance and trusting the natural flow of life.
- ✅ Surrender your need to control
- ✅ Trust that life knows what it's doing
- ✅ Offer your best without attachment
Living Untethered
In Living Untethered, Singer teaches that true love flows freely from within, meaningful relationships expect nothing in return, and inner peace comes through letting go.
- ✅ Release the need for control
- ✅ Embrace reality as it is
- ✅ Trust in life's unfolding
The Untethered Soul
The Untethered Soul explores how inner peace comes from mastering your mind, heart, and energy flow.
- Keep your heart open, regardless of circumstances
- Choose to relax through discomfort rather than resist it
- Practice unconditional openness to life
- Let go immediately when disturbances arise
Alan Watts
Core Teachings
Trust and Let Go
"You don't have to control every nerve cell — delegate the authority. As Lao Tzu said: 'The great Tao flows everywhere, both to the left and to the right. It loves and nourishes all things but does not lord it over them. When merits are accomplished, it lays no claim to them.'
Relinquishing control and trusting the process paradoxically makes you more powerful. Just as you trust your nervous system to wake you up, you can trust life to unfold beautifully. The key to unity with the universe is not control — it's trust.
Living in the Present
The real Self exists for no purpose; it simply is. It doesn't chase the future or cling to the past — it resides in the eternal now. The more you try to make this realization 'useful,' the more elusive it becomes.
True play is done for no reason — just for fun. Justifying play as 'exercise' or 'good for you' misses its essence. Let go and simply enjoy.
Living Authentically
If you believe earning money is the most important thing, you risk wasting your life doing what you dislike — just to keep doing things you dislike.
Human activity often tries to make fleeting joys permanent, yet life's beauty lies in its ever-changing nature. Seeking perfect security in a fluid universe is a contradiction.
On Joy and Peace
The secret to enjoying pleasure lies in embracing it without force or fear.
No amount of effort can turn turmoil into peace.
Essential Quotes
On Life and Existence
- "The secret of the mastery of life is to know when to stop."
- "You and I are all as much continuous with the physical universe as a wave is continuous with the ocean."
On Wisdom
- "A person may appear a fool and yet not be one. He may only be guarding his wisdom carefully."
- "You're under no obligation to be the same person you were 5 minutes ago."
On Living Purposefully
- "Paradoxical as it may seem, the purposeful life has no content, no point. It hurries on and on, and misses everything. Not hurrying, the purposeless life misses nothing, for it is only when there is no goal and no rush that the human senses are fully open to receive the world."
On Spirituality
- "Zen does not confuse spirituality with thinking about God while one is peeling potatoes. Zen spirituality is just to peel the potatoes."
- "If we cling to belief in God, we cannot likewise have faith, since faith is not clinging but letting go."
On Self and Society
- "What I am really saying is that you don't need to do anything because if you see yourself in the correct way, you are all as much an extraordinary phenomenon of nature as trees, clouds, the patterns in running water, the flickering of fire, the arrangement of the stars, and the form of a galaxy. You are all just like that, and there is nothing wrong with you at all."
Gary Weber
Core Teachings
On Decision Making
Gary believes decisions arise naturally from a higher power rather than individual will, cautioning against over-reliance on external guidance like the I Ching.
On Mind and Heart
He advocates for embracing the "intuitive mind" - a unified state beyond thinking that directly connects with reality. "Everything changes, becoming otherwise." - Suzuki Roshi
Daily Practices
Self-Inquiry Practice (35-50 minutes daily)
- Where am I?
- What is this?
- Who hears?
- When am I?
Other Practices
- Alternate Nostril Breathing for mental clarity
- Letting go techniques for detachment
- Food journaling for mindful eating
Spiritual Wisdom
On Surrender
He knows what is best and when and how to do it. Leave everything entirely to Him.
On Action (from Bhagavad Gita)
Treat alike pleasure and pain, gain and loss, victory and defeat. To action alone thou hast a right, never at all to its fruits.
Essential Truth
One does nothing, yet nothing is left undone.
Resources
For more insights, visit: happinessbeyondthought.blogspot.com
Jiddu Krishnamurthy
Core Teachings from Book of Life
On Time and Permanence
- Seeking permanence in relationships, love, or peace means pursuing something within time, which does not belong to the timeless.
- One who sees life totally is beyond time. Such perception is not bound by past conditioning or future anxieties.
On Fear and Death
The fear of death arises as long as there is an observer, an experiencer, or a thinker. When there is no division between the observer and the observed, fear dissolves.
On Suffering and Liberation
- Misery can be cut immediately, like a surgeon removing an illness. The mind's tendency to delay or analyze suffering only prolongs it.
- Sorrow ends within sorrow itself—escaping sorrow only prolongs it. Full attention and direct awareness dissolve sorrow instantly, without conflict.
Understanding Occupation and Education
Understanding Self and Work
Without understanding ourselves, mere occupation leads to frustration and escapism. True relationships require freedom from compulsion and authority.
The Role of Education
Parents and teachers, fearing disruption to security, guide youth toward safe paths through jobs, marriage, and dogma. They pass on their own limitations through imposed traditions and beliefs.
Learning and Success
Many stop learning after formal education, while others become knowledge-dependent. The pursuit of knowledge for success breeds competition and struggle.
Key Insights
True Attention
Pure attention has no motive or object - it simply is. In this state of complete attention, reality reveals itself naturally.
Freedom and Understanding
- True happiness comes only with complete freedom
- A mind under pressure becomes distorted and cannot function naturally
- Self-knowledge is essential for wisdom and learning
The Art of Living
- What's truly meaningful cannot be sought - it must happen naturally
- Trying to control or escape from loneliness only creates fear
- True surrender cannot be deliberate or demanded
Resources
David Dawkins
Core Principles
- Self-Perception: "The world can only see us as we see ourselves"
- Service: Work driven by care creates greater impact than work driven by fear
- Inner Peace: Finding true inner peace makes one immune to external manipulation
Understanding Emotions
Freud highlighted that repression causes neurosis, but expression alone isn't the cure. Instead, negative emotions should be neutralized and channeled into love, work, and creativity. Simply dumping negativity onto others harms relationships, forcing them to suppress or react, while taking responsibility and processing emotions leads to healthier interactions.
People often avoid inner struggles through distractions, which can turn into addictions. However, letting go of emotions—without resisting, venting, or judging—leads to immediate physiological and emotional benefits, improving health, perception, and overall well-being.
Emotions emit energy, shaping our relationships and environment. By surrendering resistance, emotions naturally dissolve, leaving behind peace and clarity.
Wisdom on Relationships
- "Hate is not conquered by hate. Hate is conquered by love. This is an eternal law."
- Insecurity leads to possessiveness and attachment in relationships
- Our thoughts about others are often mirrored in their thoughts about us
The Path to Freedom
- Surrender: Allow feelings to exist without trying to change them
- Timing: Let things unfold naturally instead of forcing immediate results
- Motivation: Act from love and joy rather than competition, like the runner who runs for the love of running
Key Quotes
"Letting go involves being aware of a feeling, letting it come up, staying with it, and letting it run its course without wanting to make it different or do anything about it."
"Because emotions emit a vibrational energy field, they affect and determine the people who are in our lives. 'Love promotes love,' so that the person who has let go of inner negativity is surrounded by loving thoughts, loving events, loving people, and loving pets."
"Just being ordinary is an expression of Divinity; the truth of one's real Self can be discovered in the pathway of everyday life. To live with care and kindness is all that is necessary."
Core Teachings
- Let go of trying to change and control others.
- Each moment is created by divine intelligence.
- To be free of inner conflict and expectations is to give others the greatest freedom.
- Willingness to heal is essential.
Resources
Articles and Blog
Video Content
Additional Material
Robert Adams
Core Teachings
- Silence is the ultimate reality. It is not the absence of sound but the absence of mental noise. In true silence, all questions dissolve.
- You are already free. The idea that you need to attain something is an illusion. The truth is that you are what you seek.
- Reality is beyond concepts. No philosophy, teaching, or belief system can capture the absolute truth—it can only be experienced.
- Nothing ever happened. The world, your struggles, your story—these are all projections of the mind. Beyond them, you are untouched.
- Let go of personal identity. The ego is a collection of thoughts and memories. It has no real existence, only the power you give it.
- No need to change the world. The world exists in your perception. As your perception changes, so does the world.
- The mind will never find peace. It is in its nature to create problems. True peace is in the recognition of what is beyond the mind.
- Stop seeking. The very act of seeking reinforces the illusion that you are separate from truth. Be still, and it reveals itself.
Ramana Maharshi
On Food and Mind
Eat without thinking of the ego. Then what you eat becomes Bhagavan's prasad.
Mental Control
Just as an elephant's trunk becomes steady when holding an iron chain, the restless mind becomes steady when focused on meditation or invocation.
The mind is like a wandering cow - it takes time and practice to train it to stay in one place. But once it discovers inner happiness, it will not wander outward.
The Nature of Self
You need not eliminate the wrong "I." Simply find its origin and abide there.
States of Consciousness
Deep sleep (sushupti) is always present. The difference between an enlightened being (Jnani) and others is their awareness of this state. While both experience ego, the Jnani remains aware of its source.
Work and Action
The feeling "I work" is what binds you. Ask "Who works?" The work will continue naturally. Make no effort to work or to avoid work - both create bondage.
Pain and Perception
If you remain free from pain, there will be no pain anywhere. Both world and pain are within you. Look within to find freedom from pain.
Meditation and Practice
Your very nature is meditation. You become conscious of this later, but your nature remains unchanged.
Final Teaching
Let what comes come, let what goes go, why worry? Like an actor in a drama, play your part free from love or hatred.
References
Taoism
Introduction to Taoism
The Lesson of the Hand Pump
Between the days of lowering a bucket into a well and the modern electric water pump, there was the hand pump. The hand pump was usually made from cast iron, and you had to pump a handle up and down to get water out of the well.
The problem with the hand pump was that it had to be primed to make it work. Priming involved pouring a little water on the pump to create a seal. Once it was sealed, it was easy to pump up much more water. If you didn't have water in your priming bucket, you had to borrow some from a neighbor.
It took water to get water. A simple lesson.
Taoism functions the same way.
You have to prime the pump. You need some spiritual wisdom to get you going.
Qi Gong and Practice
Qi Gong Seekhna He!
Managing Life with Taoist Principles
Core Principles
- Managing Resources
- Managing Relationships
- Self-Development
- Self-Maintenance
A Taoist lifestyle includes:
- A large surplus of qi
- Activities like sleep to reduce energy costs and restore energy
- Consuming high-energy foods
- A routine with exercise
- Physical care that circulates qi
- Insulation from outside stressors
For thousands of years, Taoists have designed tools to restore your body, mind, and qi. That's why practices like kung fu, qi gong, and various health practices exist — to undo the reckless expenditure of energy during youth.
Living in the Present
In our modern world, we often believe there's always another door. Social mind builds around this thought.
However, Taoism teaches that the only thing we can truly do is walk through the present door with confidence, knowing the next door will appear as we move forward.
Many wait for a "big door" that guarantees instant happiness — but this is rare. The real journey lies in passing through one door at a time.
Taoism doesn't simply confirm your prejudices; instead, it demands you build a direct link with the Tao itself and learn from it.
Key Concepts and Resources
- Karma: What is Karma?
- Wu Wei (Not-Doing): Steps to Practice Wu Wei
- Social Mind & Ego: Understanding Social Mind
- Taoist Love: Taoist Love is Practical
- Restoring Energy Wasted in Youth: Qi Gong & Replenishing Energy
- Spiritual Enlightenment through the Body: The Body Achieves Spiritual Enlightenment
- Path to Happiness in Taoism: 4 Taoist Doorways to Happiness
- Free Will in Taoism: Free Will - The Cornerstone of Taoism
- A Great Pigeon Story: Nature's Lesson from a Pigeon
Understanding Taoism and Sexuality
- Sex & Qi Depletion: Taoism emphasizes how sexual energy can deplete qi, clarifying misconceptions.
- Taoist View on Sexuality: Understanding Taoism's Position on Sexuality
- The 4 Ascendants - A Complete Path: The Four Ascendants
Tao Te Ching Wisdom
On Water's Power
"There is nothing in the world more soft and weak than water, and yet for attacking things that are firm and strong there is nothing that can take precedence of it;—for there is nothing (so effectual) for which it can be changed."
On Serving the World
"Who can take his own superabundance and therewith serve all under heaven? Only he who is in possession of the Tao!"
On Strength and Weakness
"Man at his birth is supple and weak; at his death, firm and strong. (So it is with) all things. Trees and plants, in their early growth, are soft and brittle; at their death, dry and withered."
On the Way of Heaven
"It is the way of Heaven not to strive, and yet it skilfully overcomes; not to speak, and yet it is skilful in obtaining a reply; does not call, and yet men come to it of themselves. Its demonstrations are quiet, and yet its plans are skilful and effective. The meshes of the net of Heaven are large; far apart, but letting nothing escape."
On Finishing What You Start
"(But) people in their conduct of affairs are constantly ruining them when they are on the eve of success. If they were careful at the end, as (they should be) at the beginning, they would not so ruin them."
On Preparation and Order
"Action should be taken before a thing has made its appearance; order should be secured before disorder has begun."
On Great Accomplishments
"All difficult things in the world are sure to arise from a previous state in which they were easy, and all great things from one in which they were small. Therefore the sage, while he never does what is great, is able on that account to accomplish the greatest things."
On Choosing What Matters
"Or fame or life,
Which do you hold more dear?
Or life or wealth,
To which would you adhere?
Keep life and lose those other things."
On Softness and Strength
"The softest thing in the world dashes against and overcomes the hardest; that which has no (substantial) existence enters where there is no crevice. I know hereby what advantage belongs to doing nothing (with a purpose)."
On True Mastery
"(Those who) possessed in the highest degree those attributes did nothing (with a purpose), and had no need to do anything. (Those who) possessed them in a lower degree were (always) doing, and had need to be so doing."