Surrender · “Let Go to Receive”
Self-Identity Through Ho'oponopono (SITH)
Take full responsibility for what appears in one’s experience and, addressing the ‘Divine Creator’, recite a structured cleansing prayer asking forgiveness and the transmutation/release of negative memories — restoring inner balance (pono) and connection to the Divinity.
SITH cleansing prayer in brief: Bring the issue to mind and own your inner state (100% responsibility, no blame). Address the Divine Creator and pray, in substance: “If I, my family and ancestors have offended you and yours in thought, word, deed and action from the beginning to now — we ask forgiveness. Let this cleanse, release, cut and transmute all negative memories and energies into pure Light. And it is done.” Repeat (traditionally ×4), then release the outcome and return to peace.
What it is
This is Morrnah Simeona’s fuller, longer cleansing-prayer process — distinct from the four-phrase “cleaning” mantra popularised later by Zero Limits (see that entry).
Where the four phrases are a short distillation, SITH as Simeona taught it centres on a formal recited prayer addressed to the “Divine Creator,” asking forgiveness for offences “in thoughts, words, deeds and actions from the beginning of our creation to the present,” and asking that negative memories, blocks, and energies be cleansed, released, cut, and transmuted into pure light.
It is a devotional surrender-and-release practice built on the premise of 100% responsibility: everything appearing in your life arises from your own memories/programs, so cleaning your inner state is the lever.
The Method
Based on Simeona’s published cleansing prayers (the “Divine Creator” prayer and the “I Am the I” prayer) and SITH process notes. Short phrases below are paraphrased; the prayer’s recurring structure is hers.
- Bring the problem to mind. Identify the person, situation, feeling, or symptom you want to clean. In your own words, name “the issue” clearly to yourself.
- Take 100% responsibility — without blame. Hold the SITH premise: this appears in your experience and arises from memories/programs running in you. This is ownership of your inner state, not guilt for causing others’ suffering.
- Recite the cleansing prayer to the Divine Creator. Address the “Divine Creator, Father, Mother, Child as one…” and pray, in substance: - Acknowledge & ask forgiveness — “If I, my family, relatives and ancestors have offended you, your family, relatives and ancestors, in thoughts, words, deeds and actions, from the beginning of our creation to the present — we ask your forgiveness.” - Ask for cleansing & transmutation — “Let this cleanse, purify, release, cut all the negative memories, blocks, energies and vibrations, and transmute these unwanted energies into pure Light.” - Seal it — “…And it is done.”
- Repeat the prayer (traditionally four times) for the thing being released, slowly and sincerely, aloud or inwardly.
- Release the outcome. As with all SITH cleaning, you do not demand a specific external result; you clean, return to pono (balance/peace), and trust the Divinity to do the work.
- (Within the wider SITH course) Simeona’s full Self-Identity work also includes shorter cleaning tools, breath (“HA”) and visualisation elements, and teaching on harmonising the three parts of the self (often rendered Unihipili, Uhane, Aumakua) — taught through her organisation rather than from a single book. (Sourcing note: SITH was taught primarily through Simeona’s classes and her Foundation rather than one canonical trade book; the prayers above are the widely circulated forms of her texts, paraphrased.)
Source & Lineage
Traditional Hawaiian ho’oponopono is a communal/family conflict-resolution practice — “to make right” (pono) — led by an elder, involving confession, discussion, forgiveness, and release. Morrnah Nalamaku Simeona (1913–1992), a kahuna lā’au lapa’au (healer) named a Living Treasure of Hawaii (1983), adapted it in the late 1970s–80s into an individual self-healing practice she called Self-Identity Through Ho’oponopono (SITH), founded on total personal responsibility, and taught it internationally (including at the UN and WHO gatherings) through her foundation.
Her student Dr. Ihaleakala Hew Len later carried the work forward, and the much shorter four-phrase “cleaning” (“I’m sorry / Please forgive me / Thank you / I love you”) was popularised through Joe Vitale & Hew Len’s Zero Limits (2007).
This entry documents Simeona’s own longer cleansing-prayer process; the four phrases are the separate, distilled hooponopono cleaning node. → suggested author node. A note on the evidence: SITH is a modern individual adaptation, not the ancient communal rite, and it carries New Thought / “Huna”-adjacent framing.
Some Hawaiian practitioners object to commercialised forms. Present it with that context and cultural respect.
Common refinements
Turning responsibility into self-blame. “Total responsibility” means ownership of your inner state, not that you caused others’ pain or your own trauma. Held wrongly it is harmful.
- Demanding a specific outcome. Clean and release; using the prayer to force a result contradicts its surrender core.
- Reciting mechanically. Sincere feeling (genuine repentance, gratitude, love) matters more than counted repetitions.
- Conflating it with the four phrases. This is Simeona’s longer prayer process; the four-phrase mantra is the separate popularised distillation.
- Treating it as the ancient rite. It is a modern individual adaptation — say so honestly.