Surrender · “Let Go to Receive”
The Law of Non-Resistance
Stop fighting obstacles, people, and conditions. Like a stream working around a boulder, keep attention on the goal, bless and ‘agree with’ the opposition rather than resisting it, and let the friction dissolve — conserving energy and removing the enmity from your own consciousness.
Law of Non-Resistance in brief: Be the stream, not the dam. When you hit an obstacle or opponent, don’t brace to fight — keep your eye on the goal, make the obstacle small, and flow around it. Work for what you want, never against what you don’t. Bless the obstacle, agree with the adversary, stop arguing — release the enmity in yourself first. Replace hardness with one real act of warmth. Be meek to the Law, never a doormat to people.
What it is
Holliwell’s Law of Non-Resistance (epigraph: “Resist not evil,” Matt. 5:39) teaches that resistance creates friction, and friction is what wears people out and keeps obstacles in place. His governing image is a mountain stream: it does not stop at a boulder or fallen tree “and wait for its force to build up so that it can push the opposition from its path.” Instead it “quietly works its way around the interference and hurries on,” intent on reaching the ocean.
Likewise, the practitioner keeps attention on the goal, not the obstacle, and stops fighting — because “if we go through life fighting, opposing, resisting, arguing, we are bound to meet with many obstacles.” The deepest move is mental: to bless the obstacle and “agree with thy adversary,” which “removes the opposition and enmity that once seemed there” — first in your own consciousness, so you stop attracting the same conflict.
The Method
Faithfully drawn from Holliwell’s “Law of Non-Resistance” chapter:
- Catch yourself bracing to fight. Notice the reflex Holliwell names: when meeting opposition we “steel our energies, collect our wits, and use whatever means we have to outwit and break down the opposition.” Recognize that this resistance is itself the problem — it “causes friction. irritation and inflammation.”
- Work for what you want, never against what you don’t. His instruction to a struggling student: “Cease working over limitation and work only for prosperity.” “The Law does not require us to work over or against the things we do NOT want.” Stop giving “time, thought and energy to that which is opposed to what we want.”
- Keep your eye on the goal, make the obstacle small. Like the stream intent on the ocean, “strive to make little of the obstacle and keep your minds on the objective.” You may have to “wind around and around,” but each turn takes you nearer the goal.
- Flow around it — bless it, don’t battle it. “The wise ones will not fight the obstacles, but bless them and go on.” Treat each worry, fear, complaint, argument, and angry thought as “so many boulders” you cast into your own stream; remove them by blessing them and being willing to understand them. Mark the obstacle “no longer a stumbling block, but a stepping stone.”
- “Agree with thy adversary.” In conflict with a person, stop arguing. Holliwell: “nothing worthwhile and lasting is ever gained by argument. To agree with your worthy opponent leaves him defenseless.” Extend goodwill instead: “bless them that curse you. do good to them that hate you.” The point is that this “removal must first be in the person’s consciousness” — once enmity leaves you, you stop attracting it.
- Replace hardness with a concrete kindness. His central example: the harsh rooming-house keeper was told to “go back and use the Law of NON-resistance.” She simply greeted her quarrelsome tenants with a smile and spoke kindly to the one behind on rent. The hardness in her melted, the household changed, and the conflicts dissolved. The practice cashes out as a small, real act of non-resistant warmth.
- Be ‘meek’ to the Law, not weak to people. Holliwell is explicit that this is not doormat behaviour: “To be meek does not mean to be an easy mark nor to be a door mat.” Meekness is “the strength by which you win an argument by refusing to argue” — strong and spirited, but not quarrelsome. You may “speak out fearlessly and positively”; you simply don’t set up friction. (Sourcing note: faithful paraphrase with short identifying phrases quoted; no extended passages reproduced.)
Source & Lineage
Dr. Raymond Holliwell (1900–1986), New Thought / Divine Science; Working with the Law (1964). The chapter leans on Jesus’ Sermon-on-the-Mount sayings (“resist not evil,” “agree with thine adversary,” “blessed are the meek,” “love your enemies”).
The non-resistance teaching is a New Thought staple — most famously Florence Scovel Shinn, The Game of Life (the “law of non-resistance”), and Emmet Fox on the Sermon on the Mount — and resonates with the Taoist wu wei (effortless action / the softness of water overcoming the hard).
Later promoted within the Bob Proctor study-course tradition.
The Traditions' versions
Wu wei / water teaching (Taoism) — the soft yielding that wears away rock; Holliwell’s stream is the same image.
- Non-resistance (Florence Scovel Shinn) — the direct New Thought predecessor.
- Acceptance / “drop the rope” (ACT) — the evidence-based version: ceasing the struggle against what is.
- De-escalation & “don’t argue” (negotiation, conflict resolution) — “agree with thy adversary” as a practical tactic.
- Turning the other cheek / loving the enemy (Christian ethics) — the scriptural root.
Common refinements
Mistaking it for passivity or doormat-ism. Holliwell’s own warning: meekness is strength, not weakness; keep your boundaries and your voice. Non-resistance is about not creating friction, not about surrendering your rights.
- Working against the unwanted. “Working over limitation” is the classic error — energy spent fighting lack is resistance. Pour it into what you want instead.
- Fixating on the obstacle. Like the stream that never stops at the boulder, keep attention on the goal; the obstacle shrinks when it’s not the focus.
- Winning the argument, losing the relationship. “Agree with thy adversary” — refuse the argument; you don’t have to make them wrong.
- Faking warmth. The rooming-house smile worked because it became sincere (“she saw good in them”). Aim for a genuine shift, not performed niceness.