Sound of Surrender!
The Lord has been speaking to a lot of us about childbirth this year.
There have been words, specifically, about the transition period in labor. I have heard this from several places, including in my own spirit. This is the phase in labor where the baby is making its way down the birth canal. The contractions are the strongest, hardest, and longest of any other time in labor. It is at this point that the pain is the most intense and the pressure builds up the most.
Obviously, it is the phase right before the actually pushing/delivery.
Well, this weekend, there was yet another reference to it... but this was not in a message or even a word. It was a sound that the Lord brought forth during a worship time at the conference.
I was at home watching the conference via live web stream, and I was "praying with my body" which is something that the Lord has been teaching me to do recently.
Part of the time I was "moving," the Lord led me to get on my back in the labor position and massage my belly. It was also during this time that the ladies at the conference started making an "odd" sound. Like a "huh huh huh huuuuh huuuuuuuh" sound. I didn't think the two went together, and I didn't really even understand what the sound was.
But the next morning, the worship leader got up and explained. She said that the night before, after the service, a midwife came up to her and told her that the sound was a sound of surrender that women make during labor.
I still didn't completely understand what that meant, so I google'd it. And here is what I found at http://www.socalbirth.org/shelly/whynat.htm
"Labor is challenging, a powerful process marking the miracle of bringing forth a new life and a new being onto this planet. It is a rite of passage, a psycho spiritual training ground for both mother and child. The laboring woman must put aside her own comfort and learn to surrender to a process so intense that it threatens to consume her. She must have the willingness and openness to dive deep within herself and find the stamina to endure, to focus, and to trust. She may have to stretch beyond her own perceived limitations in order to experience this act of creation in the now.
"How many mothers' eyes have filled with tears as they asked "When will it be over?" only to be told to "take each contraction as it comes, be with it, and let it go, for as long as it takes." As she copes with the successive waves of contraction she develops patience and persistence. She forms a bond with this child she is birthing that is all the deeper because it has been forged with hard work and sweat and tears. It may be the most difficult work she has ever done. It is a labor of love and the most precious gift she can give to herself and her baby.
"At some point during labor, many women may come face to face with some form of fear: fear of pain, fear of the inability to cope, and at a deeper level, fear of death. It may be that some part of her ego must "die" in order to get out of her own way and surrender control to the instinctual part of her being that knows how to give birth.
When a woman is able to release into her own intuitive consciousness, she gives birth to the spirit of the "Divine Mother" within, opening herself up to experience birth at a profound spiritual level.
"Gerald Jampolsky wrote in his book Love is Letting Go of Fear that there are only two emotions, love and fear.
'Fear always distorts our perception and confuses us as to what is going on. Love is the total absence of fear. Love asks no questions. Its natural state is one of expansion and extension, not comparison and measurement. Love, then, is really everything that is of value, and fear can offer us nothing because it is nothing. As we let go of fear...we start to see beyond our old reality as defined by the physical senses, and we enter a state of clarity in which we discover that inner peace and Love are in fact all that are real.'
"Through the process of letting go of fear, a birthing mother may begin to experience a personal transformation which will prepare her to be a more loving mother, a mother who loves unconditionally."
Isn't that AWESOME?! I especially love the first paragraph, where it says, "The laboring woman must put aside her own comfort and learn to surrender to a process so intense that it threatens to consume her. She must have the willingness and openness to dive deep within herself and find the stamina to endure, to focus, and to trust. She may have to stretch beyond her own perceived limitations in order to experience this act of creation in the now."
*wooooot* Over these past few months, I feel like I have hit so many points where I cried out "I can't do this! I'm not able!" Only to find that God gives me the grace to "find the stamina to endure, to focus and to trust.... to stretch beyond my own perceived limitations..." Isn't that awesome?!?
AND... fear makes it much worse. But if we can let go of the fear and totally trust, then it becomes a LABOR OF LOVE!
And as soon as I read that, I remembered the first prophecy I ever received in which Ms.S said, "'The labor of love is MY labor of love,' says the Lord."
That phrase didn't make any sense to me at the time, and I feel like I don't totally grasp it now. But the Lord is showing me. Little by little, as I learn to let go of my own inhibitions and fears and "surrender to the process... [taking]each contraction as it comes, [being] with it, and [letting] it go, for as long as it takes."
Which also reminds me of something else they talked about this weekend. Part of maturing in Christ in how we make it through trials and difficulties. In the beginning, as a new Christian, we take trials personally. We say, "God!! Help meeeee! This is too hard!!! Don't You LOVE me anymore?! Why am I so depressed/frustrated/dry/etc.?!?" But as we mature, we begin to shift from a self-centered reaction to a God-centered focus. Then we begin to ask, "What are you teaching me through this? What is your message to me and to the church through this? How can I bless you in this situation?"
Now, obviously, I have not reached that mature place. But I feel like that is part of what happened on Friday night. It was an act of surrendering to the process, of saying "However long it takes, whatever you do, I surrender to love."
Hehe! Good stuff!
Okay... I'm gonna go get back to work now. It's so difficult to focus!!!!