“Just let it go.” I’ve heard this phrase many times and have often said it to myself. It sounds like something I should do, but I’ve often wondered, “How do I actually let something go when I feel so attached to it?”
For me, not letting go is like being in quicksand. I’m held hostage by my negative thoughts, and nothing I do, think, or say can get me out of the loop. The harder I try, the more I’m sucked in. Everything around me disappears while I’m immersed in the quicksand.
On the contrary, when I’ve been able to let something go, it is a relief. The clouds part and the bright sun comes through. A sense of calm washes over me, a trickle at first and then an extended lightness. The resulting clarity is hard to put in words, but I feel it all over. My thinking and feelings shift. It can be like an “Ah-ha” or a “Now I see.” There’s a settled sense of knowingness and peace. My body calms.
Your turn: Take a few moments and jot down a troubling thought, situation, or feeling you’d like to let go of.
Ultimately, each of us has to find our own way to let go of the unhelpful thought spirals, consuming mind loops, and unhelpful reactions and behaviors that don’t serve us well. At times, we let go only when we’re at our wits’ end and no longer have the emotional energy to invest in the situation. Other times, we let go when we genuinely want to feel better and are willing to do the emotional work to heal/resolve the situation. I have found the following strategies, individually or in combination with each other, to be helpful in letting go:
- Recognize you’re attached to the thought/situation/feeling. You’re stuck. You can feel the angst in your body, and the more you ruminate or fight it, the more distraught you are. Sometimes, when I catch myself spiraling on a thought, I say to myself, “Wow! I can see I’m really invested in this situation.” By stepping back and acknowledging the grip the thought has on me, I am able to: 1. recognize the emotional energy the thought is consuming and 2. observe how it might negatively be impacting my overall life.
- Focus on your body. Investment and attachment to consuming thoughts/feelings naturally cause our bodies to tense up. Take 5-10 seconds to focus on deep breathing and release any muscle tenseness. Drop your shoulders, and sink into your body.
- Recognize the fear. Most problems are caused by fear. It may be fear of change, the unknown, a loss, or something else entirely. Fear intensifies itself in our minds, rarely leading us out of our stuck-ness. I often say to myself, “This fear is amplifying and exaggerating the situation,” and that helps me turn away from the fear.
- Create a Control Chart. Often our fear comes from an inability to exert control. Sometimes by identifying what is within my power to change, what is outside of my influence, and what I wish the outcome to be, helps me regain some agency over the situation. I frequently gain perspective and realize what I am holding onto is beyond my control, so I gain nothing by worrying about a situation that may not even come to pass.
| What I can control | What I can’t control | What I wish to control |
Jot down what you DON’T have control of. Are you trying to control, plan, implement something over which you have no control? If so, that’s exhausting and rarely works. Letting go is a common-sense option when you have no control.
Jot down what you DO have control of. Are you depending on outside people or circumstances to make you feel better on the inside? We are responsible for our expectations, hopes, and peace of mind. If we are depending on others or other situations to make us feel better, we may never find peace. It may be surprising that we do have control of letting go. We don’t think we do but we do. Letting go is a decision we make when we’re ready to make it.
- Examine what it’s costing you to not let go. Holding onto my interpretation, my justification, or my expectations makes me miserable. Ask yourself, “Is it worth it to hang onto this?” We can literally make ourselves sick, mentally and physically, by holding on when letting go allows us the freedom to move on.
- See the big picture. Michael Singer, in his book Living Untethered, reminds us that we are sitting on a tiny planet spinning through vast outer space. We are a speck of dirt in the cosmos. How does my immediate personal drama compare to those of others in my community, our country, our planet, the Universe? A broader perspective can help us let go of the little things or see which things have greater significance.
- Consider what you really, really want. This step is helpful if you’re not being completely honest with yourself; is what you should do overriding what you honestly want for yourself? Another way to do this is to ask yourself, “What do I yearn for?” Often when I yearn for peace over being right, I can let go.
- Use a visualization. When my son was about ten years old, he witnessed a car hitting a pedestrian. He replayed the image over and over in his mind, especially at night before going to sleep. Together we used a visualization where he put the experience in a hot air balloon and let the balloon drift away. At times, I mentally put my sticky thought in a bucket, place the bucket on a table, and walk away. What mental picture symbolizes letting go for you? It can be helpful to use that visualization when you’re feeling velcroed to a negative thought/scenario..
- Enter the “I don’t know space.” Our intellect has tremendous energy to search for reasons, solutions, and scenarios when the reality is we simply may never know. When I’m exhausted with a thought, I go to my “I don’t know space.” It’s where I truly just don’t know what to say or do next. There is stillness in this space. It’s surprising how often when I’m in this “not knowing space,” a creative insight or helpful thought arises.
- Ask yourself if you are invested in not letting go. When I was going through my divorce, I found that I was exhausted from the months and years of conflict. But when I considered letting the conflict go, I had thoughts such as:
- Am I giving up or giving in?
- If I let go of the conflict what’s next?
- Does it mean I don’t care?
- Does letting go eliminate any chance of reconciliation or healing?
Sometimes we stay attached to the pain, the fear, or the grief because letting go seems too scary or uncertain. Letting go doesn’t mean that you didn’t love the person or job, or that you’ve failed; it just means it is changing where you are putting your emotional investments.
- If you can’t let it go, let it be for a while. Sometimes I can’t seem to let go so I just let it be as it is. In my mind, I set the thought/situation/feeling in the middle of a room and I walk around it. I just let it be what it is for a while. I don’t resist it; I just be with it. This is an intermediary step that helps me let it go eventually.
Your turn: Take a few moments and revisit the troubling thought/ situation/feeling you noted above. Allow yourself to imagine who you would be if you let go. Feel into this thought. Feel the results of letting go.
There is power in letting go. It’s almost magical. I’m not sure I intellectually understand the power in letting go. Perhaps it creates space for us to creatively respond to what is happening. Perhaps it helps us see that our perception was not 100% correct. Perhaps it gives us a break, points us in a new direction, or allows us to trust in that which is bigger than us. And perhaps, when we let go, we create space for something better.
