Surrender · “Let Go to Receive”
Clearing the Channel
To relax body and mind, release ambition, fear, and anger, and rest in trust so prayer can flow freely.
Clearing the Channel in 5 lines: Soften the body — “relax the wrists.” Set down ambition, fear, and anger; clear the channel for love to flow. Say it and mean it: “Let go, and know that God reigns and we are in His hands.” Rest a moment in that quiet, the eye single with love and joy. Then pray — and through the day, when you tense up, relax and let go again.
What it is
This is Glenn Clark’s preparatory move for prayer in The Soul’s Sincere Desire (1925), drawn from his famous golf-swing analogy: just as a good swing requires you to “relax the wrists,” good prayer requires you to relax and clear the channel first.
Clark taught that ambition, fear, and anger block prayer, and that the first work is to set them down and rest in trust. His watchword: “Let go, and know that God reigns and we are in His hands.” It is the surrender side of his teaching — not striving harder to make prayer “work,” but releasing the grip so love can flow through.
The Method
A faithful organization of Clark’s teaching into steps:
- Relax the body. Borrowing the golf-swing image, ease physical tension — “relax the wrists” — and let the shoulders, jaw, and hands soften. Strain blocks the stroke; strain blocks the prayer.
- Clear the channel. “The first step. is the clearing of the channel, making ready for the inflow of God’s love.” Consciously lay down ambition, fear, and anger — what Clark called “those twin offspring of the thought of self” (anger and worry) that “have blocked more prayers. than all the other vices put together.”
- Let go and trust. “Let go, and know that God reigns and we are in His hands.” Stop managing the outcome; rest the matter into trust.
- Rest in the present quiet. Stay a moment in the stillness this opens, “the eye single, filled with Love and Faith and Joy,” before moving into petition or thanksgiving.
- Carry the release forward. When tension returns through the day, repeat the small move — relax, clear, let go — rather than gripping again. (Sourcing note: quoted phrases are short excerpts from / faithful paraphrase of Clark’s text as reproduced in public-domain editions; the numbered shape organizes his teaching.)
Source & Lineage
Glenn Clark (1882–1956), professor, athletics coach, and founder of the Camps Farthest Out, characteristically used athletic imagery for the inner life. The “release the grip to receive” theme is one of New Thought’s deepest currents (Trine’s receptive silence, Behrend’s “impress then release,” Emmet Fox), and it converges with far older surrender teachings — Christian “Thy will be done,” Taoist wu wei, contemplative letting-go.
The Traditions' versions
Behrend — impress then release — having pictured the good, let it go to the deeper mind.
- Shinn — casting the burden — handing the weight over and resting.
- Peale — break the worry habit / prayerize — relaxing anxiety into trust.
- Letting go (Hawkins) — allowing a feeling to surface and release without resistance.
- Laozi — wu wei / non-forcing — acting without strain, the ancient root of “relax the wrists.”
Common refinements
Trying to relax. Effortful “relaxing” is a contradiction; let go rather than force calm.
- Using “let go” to avoid action. Release is for the grip of anxiety, not for responsibilities that need doing.
- Skipping straight to petition. Clark makes clearing the channel the first step, before asking.
- Suppressing rather than releasing anger. The aim is to set it down honestly, not to bottle it.
- Forcing it during acute distress. With trauma or panic, go gently and seek support; deep release can surface feeling.