Give Your Love A Way
Why less is sometimes more
Problem solving is a skill, non-action seems nonsense. And yet, we can get lost in trying to solve problems by scrambling about. For some things cannot be addressed by going at them directly, they need a different path – one that requires some sort of acceptance, stepping back, letting it be and letting go. Then something might open which is beyond our control and sometimes beyond our imagination.
This is by no means a passive, fatalistic way of being in the world. Just the opposite, it is a way in which I flow with the energies and dynamics of life in a creative way. Such a way might look very different from how I am used to go about things, and that exactly might be what turns it into an exhilarating adventure. All I need to do is get out of my way
Chapters:
- 00:00:00 Intro
- 00:00:26 Immer Wasser – Solo
- 00:02:53 Was Yin und Yang übers Leben lehrt
- 00:14:07 Immer Wasser (Remix)
- 00:16:58 Outro
Transcript
Give your love a way
The solution
is not
finding a solution
The solution
is
stop finding a solution
The answer
to undoing
all the doing
is not undoing
all the doing
The answer
to undoing
all the doing
is to stop
doing
Focus
by not focussing
and become
aware
Power
is in the now
Wanting to determine
the future
is manifesting fear
Manifesting the future
is creating
Be in the now
Everything is now
Everything can become
Focus
by not focussing
and create
Create
by not wanting
Give your love away
Give your love a way
Create
©️ Laughing Brook/Peter Müller 2025
Where the Gold is
There’s this story I once heard. No idea whether it is a true story or made up, but it certainly is a good one. It goes like this.
There was a gold mine where the owners took great care that none of the workers would secretly pinch gold. So when everybody was leaving the grounds of the mine at the end of their shift they had to pass through a gate where guards meticulously controlled the workers to make sure they wouldn’t take out any gold. They had to empty their bags and pockets and were thoroughly searched.
One days a man comes to the gate with wheel barrel full of dirt. The guards could smell that something was very fishy here and began a search through the dirt in order to find any gold hidden in there. Yet, there was nothing. Finally, they let the man pass. But they knew something was wrong about this.
A couple of days later at the end of the shift he showed up again with a wheel barrel full of dirt. Once again all their lights turned to red and they began searching the guy and his seemingly harmless content. They even took off the handles and looked inside the poles, but could not find any gold in there. Still they knew something was very wrong here.
This went on for some weeks, and no matter how hard and thorough they searched, they could not find out how he was smuggling. Until one evening when they finally figured out how he got them fooled all this time. What do you think was his secret? How did he manage to pull their noses? They finally realized that he was stealing – well, wheel barrels.
I love this story for it illustrates so charmingly how we may stare in the completely wrong direction when we try to solve an issue. This certainly applies to the way we have set up the world around us. For the most part we are convinced that if only we work hard enough, if we achieve and overcome, fight and struggle, we will eventually pass all the alleys of misery and arrive in paradise. And of course there is something to it, for effort does lead to results.
But just like with search for gold we go astray when we think only in those terms and believe that this the way to find the answers. For somehow life always seems to get us yet once again just when we believed we finally had achieved and found rest. The perfect vacation and then you get into is this argument with your partner. You’ve got that promotion and then the company struggles. You finally retired and then there is this diagnosis your doctor speaks to you about.
Climbing the ladder higher and higher doesn’t seem to go anywhere. Not until I realize that the ladder is a hamster wheel and the answer isn’t faster and stronger, but stopping and – now, letting go of this idea that I need to go, to climb up to a certain place in order to be well and happy. It’s about dropping this idea of ”if only such and such would be like this or that“.
Of course it’s easy for me to put it like this here in this podcast, and it is quite another thing to live it in real life, for when we do live through it, we live through all the emotions that go along with it.
This different way of being in life has been described in many ways, like letting go, following your heart, wu wei in the Tao Te Ching, doing by not doing, living in the now. Or to put it differently – it appears to be a universal thing that is part of our shared human experience.
A new perspective is only possible when I step back from my apparently so well established way of going about life. This means uncertainty and potentially failure. Yet it also means new experiences and perspectives and is a way to lead me to a wider version of me, of life. It means to leave old certainties behind. But then again, how would I be able to fly if I was staying on the ground?
Outro:
We’re at the end of this episode. As you probably noticed, some of the recording was a bit bumpy. I’m currently on Dartmoor in England, holding a vision quest, and Dartmoor is a place that is always windy. But I wanted to keep things fresh, and so here we go, in imperfection.
I nevertheless hope you’ve enjoyed this one and tip my hat to say thanks for joining the ride. As always a reminder that I’d be happy to read any comments you would like to make, and I’m grateful for a rating on the platform you are listening to this, as well as if you recommend this podcast to a friend or two. For more info about me and things beyond this podcast, please check out laughingbrook.net.
My name is Laughing Brook, I am a poet, dancer, mystic, nature coach and man whisperer. Thank you for listening, and – keep on flowing, bumping and jumping with the stream of life.
