When the Angel Gabriel visited Mary, she was initially
both afraid and confused.
The message the angel conveyed to her was so enormous
that she was overwhelmed,
and also the seemingly impossible realization of the message
of her giving birth to a baby,
as there was not even a man in her life,
made it initially difficult to understand.
But then she said YES: "Let it be done to me according to the will of God."
Letting God operate in us depends on our availability.
We are two sides of the same coin.
God lives in us, but only in the measure that we accord to Him.
The more we truly surrender ourselves to Him, the more He is able to live through us.
The barriers to this are our own will and our own way of doing things, our efforts.
"To let God" implies letting go of ourselves,
OUR BODIES, with all it's desires
(God Himself looks after our true needs),
OUR MINDS ( with all it's conditioning),
OUR WAY OF DOING THINGS,
OUR FEELINGS, REACTIONS, OPINIONS, PERCEPTIONS,
INTERPRETATIONS, CULTURE etc
and
OUR WILLPOWER.
It is about
A WHOLE NEW LIFE , BEING BORN AGAIN.
To do things differently from the way we have always done them,
to change our way of thinking, of acting, carrying out tasks, from
the most simple to the big undertakings,
takes most of all, awareness.
In many situations we actually actively sabotage God from letting His
perfect solution taking place in our life, by our own efforts, that gets in
the way.
We didn't have the wisdom to LET GOD, we blocked Him in those
moments when we needed him most, by our own actions and interventions.
Often that is simply because we don't trust Him.
Also we are taught to not take revenge when somebody hurts us, we are
told to show love to everybody ( and not just those that we like),
we are told to NOT WORRY about material things and about food for
our bodies.
We are always reminded to not worry about money, and
to not live in a way that we always put money first.
If we do, it creates a blockade, we cannot grow in His life.
We ought to not think too far ahead, not to have any specific required
conditions for "happiness" in this life, in order to chase after them,
("I will be happy when I have that job, that man/woman/child/children/house/car)
so we can believe that we can then be "fulfilled".
We must let go of the past,
and instead live fully with God in the NOW.
Because only God can fulfill us, we cannot do it ourselves.
One of the biggest stumbling blocks is PRIDE.
But true humility does not mean that one submit oneself to other people's
power, nor does it mean a devaluation of oneself. That is false humility.
On the contrary, true humility means that you have discovered who you
are in your deepest nature,
and the reality of this knowledge is so immense, that gentleness and
personal humility is a natural consequence of it, it is a state of being.
Our Lady, The Mother of God, is our perfect example, our perfect model.