Surrender

Do Not Submit

Photo by Jackson Simmer on Unsplash

Most world religions promote the idea of surrender in some way. In the religious context this is often depicted as: Giving up a struggle to submit to a higher authority. This means giving up putting yourself as the center of your universe and putting God, the community, or others at the center of your existence.

I grew up Catholic so I’m familiar with how surrender is sold. Looking back, there isn’t much difference between what I was told as a child and how some cults are structured. If there is a person or organization to whom you are told to surrender (cult leader or the Catholic church), then yeah, you aren’t surrendering, you are submitting. You can surrender to something much more powerful than yourself that you control (a God, mother nature, etc.). You don’t surrender to a peer or manmade organization - that is submission.

I thought it might be instructive to look at how the world’s major religions see the act of surrender. Between them; Catholicism, Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism are practiced by about 6 billion people on Earth. That means about ¾ of the planet should be somewhat familiar with the concept of surrender. Of course other religions deal with surrender in similar ways, but I thought I’d start with the big four.

Surrender in Catholicism

Surrender in Catholicism means trusting in God’s plan for your life. This is not about submission, but in finding peace in God’s guidance.

Surrender in Islam

Surrender in Islam, also referred to as Tawakkul, involves placing trust in Allah and relying on him in all aspects of life. This concept emphasizes the peace and fulfillment that comes from recognizing that Allah is the ultimate authority and his plan is always for the best, even if we may not understand him. As a Catholic this sounds familiar. It sounds like “God works in mysterious ways,” is part and parcel of all religions when the people say “I don’t get it.”

Surrender in Hinduism

In Hinduism, surrender (prapatti or sharanagati) is a spiritual practice that involves relinquishing the ego and aligning oneself with the divine will, leading to liberation and inner peace. This includes acknowledging one’s limitations and letting go of personal desires and outcomes in order to trust in the cosmic order and divine plan.

Surrender in Buddhism

In Buddhism, surrender is about accepting the present moment and letting go of the need to control, leading to freedom and inner peace. Surrender is about acceptance and trust in the natural flow of life. It involves recognizing that many aspects of existence are beyond our control and that clinging to desires or outcomes can lead to suffering.

These all sound similar. I’m no theologian, but I’m confident that my brief research into world religions showed that the concept of surrender is a universal one. But the idea of surrendering to something bigger than ourselves isn’t only a religious one. We are all encouraged to surrender to our current economic system.

Surrender in Capitalism

Surrender in Capitalism sounds a lot like what you have seen above. Trust in the power of the power bigger than yourself - in this case, the market. Give up the idea of control and trust that the market can guide our economy and society to beneficial outcomes if we just accept its omnipotence and omniscience.

The only problem is that Capitalism skipped the God loves you part and just focuses on the message of “this is inevitable” there is nothing you can do. I don’t know about you, but that sounds like submission to me.

Surrender / Submission. What’s the difference?

Surrender is your own choice.

Submission is giving up, yielding your power to another.

Some people might think there isn’t much difference there, but to me it’s a big one, and I think knowing that difference holds the key for us as a society going forward.

Choosing to surrender can save us. Submitting got us here.

Surrender

In the religious context if you are indeed surrendering to God’s authority and not some religious organization, I get it. That’s part of what appealed to me as a child. I’m not really religious anymore, so I am not surrendering to God’s will anymore, but if someone truly is, and not simply submitting to some religious organization, I admire that. Surrendering to something bigger than yourself is a state of being I think we have largely forgotten is an option, if we have not forgotten how to do it all together.

Admitting that we live in a world with physical limits to our economy and our lives is surrender - the good kind. Refusing to do so and saying that we will not submit to nature is just humanity being a spoiled child.

Submission

We are encouraged to submit to an economic system and way of living that is destroying us.

Surrender is giving up the fight against something that you can’t fight, that you shouldn’t fight. You surrender to mother nature.

Submission is giving up the fight when you can win it because the fight would be hard.

You submit to men.

Know when to surrender.

What would surrendering to mother nature look like? Here are a few examples:

In the 1940s, Costa Rica was a tropical paradise, as at the time about 75 percent of the country was considered rainforest. But by 1987, Costa Rica had lost half of its forest cover, which led to a system in which the government paid local communities to protect the forest through its Payments for Environmental Services Program (PES). This allowed Costa Rica to become the first tropical country to reverse deforestation.

The PES plan is mainly funded by a tax on fossil fuels and has paid out approximately $500 million to landowners and farmers since implementation. The program is estimated to have saved about 1 million hectares of forest. Costa Rica has benefited from this program as eco-tourism has grown a great deal in the country, with tourism making up more than 10 percent of GDP in 2019 before Covid-19 hit.

A recent study conducted by German and Ecuadorian scientists found that species have returned to regrown rainforests in Ecuador’s Chocó forest. Acoustic monitoring and AI were used to track the return of biodiversity to the forest. The study helps show that reforestation and rewilding can be powerful tools in helping to restore biodiversity and repair environmental damage.

Such rewilding doesn’t have to come from a tropical rainforest. If you are looking for a more mundane example, take an old golf course in Akron, Ohio that was rewilded and is now the home to 500 different native plants. The spot helps clean the city’s air and waterways and has become a meeting spot for the people of the city.

Huge mangrove forests used to dominate the coastlines of the world. Where it is possible, we should let them come back.

Almost 90 percent of deforestation worldwide is caused by agricultural expansion. Livestock grazing is responsible for 50 percent or more in North, Central, and South America.

A 2021 report from the United Nations estimates that rewilding 350 million hectares of degraded terrestrial and aquatic habitats could remove 26 gigatons of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. This potential GHG reduction number is slightly less than the carbon dioxide emitted per year on Earth. That seems like it would be worth a strategic surrender of this land.

The kind of rewilding that will make a difference, that pays for ecosystem services in Costa Rica, that brings back a rainforest in Ecuador, that gets us back to the happy side of our planetary boundaries - those are all examples of surrender. Letting Mother Nature win over human expansion and convenience is a step we need to take. Check out resources like the Global Rewilding Alliance, to get started. Or just jump in and start rewilding and asking our leaders to do more.

We shouldn’t submit to our leaders.

We should ask them to surrender.