I’ve always felt weird about the phrase “May my will be thy will” or even the concept of surrender. I don’t like to think I’m just giving everything up to an unknown entity and just flopping over like a dead fish, ready to accept whatever chaos might come my way because, hey, it’s the Divine Will of the universe for this to happen to me, right? No, thank you. It actually reminds me of Stockholm Syndrome a little, like I’m just happy to be a prisoner at the mercy of whatever my jailors decide to do with me. To me this phrase has an undertone of submission and I really don’t like it.
I do, however, love the idea of personal alignment, accountability, and conscious action. I think this little phrase encapsulates what I’m going for: When I align with my self, I align with the will of the divine universe.
That phrase came into my head when I was meditating today, and I liked it for a few reasons.
Perhaps you think this sounds just like “May my will be thy will” but I think there’s a subtle but critical difference. In the first phrase it feels like I’m just happily submitting to whatever the universe decides to throw at me. This other phrase though, feels like there’s a lovely balance and harmony with nature occurring. When I align with my self, when I come into my own alignment, I naturally and effortlessly align with the will of the divine universe. I like this notion that all I need to do is stay in my own lane and focus on maintaining my own alignment, and when I do that I’m also aligned with everything else, the grander universe. I visualize this almost like I’m a segment in a long line, and when I orient myself to be upright (or in alignment) I also naturally align with the rest of the line (the universe/natural order).
I also like the specificity of the second phrase, “…I align with the will of the divine universe.” I’m talking about the divine universe specifically, not just a vague entity, because who the fook is “thy” anyway? I know it’s God but I like to be specific about who I’m talking to or about, because if some rando in the sky hears me say that and decides to take over, I don’t want that. Is that a little paranoid, yes. Does it make me feel like I’m not just throwing my fate away to some dude in the sky without a name, also yes.
Another reason I like this phrase is that it dissolves the separation between me and the universe. The first phrase has a distinct separation between “my and thy” or “me and you.” When saying that phrase, we’re presumably talking to God, but it’s also clearly relating to me and God as separate. My will and God’s will are two different things, and I’m praying that my rinky dink human will can match God’s will, which is inherently better than my own. This seems a little sad and a little stockholm-y to me.
I’m not saying that my human will is better than God’s will. But I do like to think that the intentions of my soul are intrinsically resonant with the intentions (or will) of the divine universe. My human self has some wild ideas for sure, and I a lot of them are not exactly ideal or healthy or holy. But my soul knows what’s up, and so does the divine universe. My soul’s will and the universe’s will already match. They’ve always matched. The will of my soul and the will of the universe are already the same, because my soul and the universe are the same. Why would they have ever been different? And why do I need to pray for them to be the same?
I’d love to define some of the terms in the sentence too. This is what I mean by the various subjects in that phrase:
- “I” in that sentence refers to my human self, my mind and my desires.
- “my self” in that sentence is my soul, the will of my soul, or my soul’s intentions (the reason I came into existence in the first place).
- “the will of the divine universe” is the will of the divine universe, the natural rhythms of the universe and of life, or the will of god, and/or the grander plan that the universe has in store for us.
So with those definitions in mind, what I’m actually thinking when I say the phrase, “When I align with my self, I align with the will of the divine universe” is this:
When my human self, my mind, aligns with the intentions and deep knowing of my soul, I naturally align, or come into harmony, with the grander design of the universe.
I know these two phrases are essentially saying the same thing. The first phrase is more concise, and assumes we all know what we’re talking about. May my will be thy will, whoever wrote that probably was thinking the same thing I just explained. They likely meant, may my human mind align to the intentions of my soul which is the same as the will of God. But what can I say, I like mine better.
You can reconfigure this sentence to make it resonate more with your language and understanding too! All you need to do is define those three subjects however you wish to, and then substitute them into the sentence like I did above. (Look at that, we’re using algebra.)
Since I mentioned algebra, why don’t we just be super extra and think of this like math.
If the first phrase was an equation it would be: x = z.
If the second phrase was an equation it would be: x = y = z.
The people who made the first phrase knew that y and z were already equivalent, (the soul’s intentions and god’s intentions are the same) so they just say: let our human will (x) be the same as god’s will (z).
The second phrase just shows their work (like a good little student) and defines the variables, so people who aren’t good at algebra (me) can understand wtf is happening. when my human will (x) aligns with my soul’s intentions (y), I naturally align with the universe’s will (z).
Thanks for attending today’s Akashic Algebra class, there will not be a quiz, but make sure you do the homework (your daily practice!).
