Man : Depart (Letting Go)

LETTING GO

         Health and happiness is often not about of adding to or gaining something, but of removal or letting go. 

        We often encourage others to obtain more, to attain great heights, to grow and accumulate degrees, things, friends, children, money and this has its place.  However, the opposite – learning to let go of the past, of attitudes, emotions, things, friends and other “baggage” that are holding one back - is often a hidden key to happiness and healing.  The need to make room for more wonderful things to come and the process of letting go. 

A. LETTING GO INVOLVE

        i.      Leaving your comfort zone. 

     Learning to let go of old habits, ideas, people is a gigantous task.  It involves leaving one’s comfort zone or familiar situations, habits and thinking patterns.  It is an extremely stressful action and most will not do it.  Most of us are adapt in making excuses rather than plunge into change.  A stumbling block in letting go of anything in one’s life.

Letting go involves like a simple act as recycling or giving away old clothing to the radical of leaving a marriage or friendship and changing one’s entire lifestyle.  It is always going to be painful and involves the feeling of loss.

      ii.      Involves the unknown. 

      Letting go is also frightening for no one knows what the future holds.  The miserable past we have trod and know and can more easily navigate through it and knowing what to expect.  The future, however, is completely unknown and unnerving situation for most people. 

      The future is unpredictable.  No matter how well you plan ahead, the future is inherently difficult to prepare for. This stops some people from moving on because they don’t even know what they need to prepare for their futures.

      When moving on in life, you will lose some essential part of your identify, personality, friendships, family relations or other parts of yourself that you value.  You may seem to lose some, but if you do then anything you lose was not really you. 

 

B.SINCERITY FORGIVING

Sincerity in letting go is an important step in letting go.  Sincerity to forgives. However, it is possible to let go of something or someone without forgiving.  It is not possible to forgive sincerely without letting go.

             i.   LIVING HABITS

        Flawed living habits can offer temporary relief, but on the long run it will add stress and strain to your life. 
       a. Staying up later than 9 or 9:30 PM at night, 
       b. taking on too many obligations, 
       c. procrastinating instead of facing head-on challenges on work,  
       d. avoiding exercise.   
       e. Eating too much, 
       f. skipping meals, 
       g. drinking too much coffee or alcohol, smoking, 
      h. eating junk food or sugar, 
      i. getting upset over trifles or 
       j. taking stimulants or depressants instead of addressing deeper causes of unhappiness.

  a.    Requires a commitment to yourself. 

  A good solution is to substitute better habits from the old habits.   
For example, instead of staying up late, record the late television show, drink calming herb tea to help you slow down, decide you will not start projects after dinnertime, and start preparing for bed early.

   b.      Extra obligations. 

Set aside a time periods on your activity calendar each day - for meals, exercise, a long walk by yourself, a bath, perhaps, or another favorite recreation or activity.  Never give up these time slots for anyone or anything.  Feel selfish but it is all good training.

Set aside time for rest, to relax and to have peaceful, sit-down meals.  Eating habits is not something to squeeze in between appointments.  Avoid eating in your car, or while conducting business at an office.  Good habits foster other good habits, the rewards in your health will more than compensate for the time taken to focus on these simple good habits.

c.    Change in the spirit of celebration, not from need. 

Another trick for letting go of unwanted habits is to regularly treat yourself to healthful activities and therapies that balance and enhance your mind and body.  These can include energy work, foot reflexology treatments, chiropractic adjustments and perhaps a class of very gentle yoga, tai chi or another. 

To help you let go of the past, the need to seek balance and harmony in every aspect of your life.  Try continuously to separate the important from the unimportant, the essential from the non-essential. 

            ii.   Physical symptoms. 

   A physical symptom is the best telling tale the state of your body is having with you. Understanding the many symptoms, rather than thinking in terms of “diseases” that are out to get you.  What are your symptoms telling you?  Ask often and you will get answers, particularly if you leave yourself with quiet time to contemplate and meditate daily.  Taking a walk daily is a wonderful way to empty your mind, let go of the day’s cares and allow your future to come to you.

          III.   YOUR FUTURE , YOUR PAST

A great spiritual lesson is the deeply concerned with “finding themselves”.  This often means finding a career, a relationship, love, power, money or something like this.  The key is to make room for your future by letting go of your entire past.

Question everything and everyone in your life mentally and emotionally.  This does not mean divorcing or leave school, however.  It means to be free in your mind.  Then you will figure out in an objective way if the job, the school, the friends and so on are really for you.  But you must first let them all go emotionally in order to see where the future may lie.  That is the key. 

C.LETTING GO OF EMOTIONS AND BELIEFS

The beliefs that need to be let go include :
   a. fears, 
   b. all resentments, 
   c. guilt, 
  d. remorse, 
  e. excessive seriousness, and 
  f. judgments expressed as ‘shoulds’, ‘oughts’, ‘musts’ and ‘have tos’.

     All these beliefs are deceptive and hanging and blocking to enhance forward.

Too often we shun those who speak the truth and received an embrace those who we think like us. Feel bold to listen from honest comment and blocking all forms of deceptive manners, beliefs and irrational thinking.

Be truly honest to friends and even strangers can be extremely helpful, at times.  Be bold enough to  listen to those who dare  to speak up to you, saying things that may not feel good to you or to them, but which sometimes need to be said.  Too often, we shun those who speak the truth to us and only embrace those who think just like us. 

i.      Asserting the past. 

A few carefully chosen and simple affirmations may be helpful to  remove deeply held resentments and negative attitudes.  Such affirmations are not intended to be used for brainwashing.  The purpose of such an affirmation is not to change anything, but just to bring up all thoughts that are unlike the affirmation.

For example, the affirmation, "I choose fearlessness" will accelerate or bring up all thoughts of fear within you if you say it often.  Try it for a week or two and you will see this if you do it faithfully and with conviction.

Old belief patterns will often continue to live in our life. Just denying them usually won't make them go away.  Instead, letting go means to take notice of them, but don't allow them to make a home in your mind.  Notice them, bless them and see them as a relic of a dead past.  Turn them over to a higher power.  Take a walk, take a nap or otherwise shift your focus and let them go.  You do have a choice which emotions and thoughts you will entertain in your mind.  It takes a lot of practice, but the old thoughts will begin to lose their hold on you.

ii.     Negative thoughts.

  Try always to entertain positive thoughts, such as that only love is real and I am the form of expression of love in this world: a living human love form.  It may seem first as outrageous.  With practice, it may become comfortable and will eventually work wonder why you believed otherwise for so many years.

If friends or family constantly remind you of the old fears and angers, it is fine to tell them thanks, but you are not interested in it any more. Figuring out that anger and fear heal nothing, and only hurt the one who harbors them.  Letting go of judging about others, as it may help to realize that we don't often see the big picture, and we don't really know what is best for others.

iii.   Doubt the negatives

  If you cannot embrace a positive thought to replace a negative thought of emotion, at least doubt the negative.  This is a helpful technique that helped to turn around a lot of negative thinking and feeling.  When thinking negatively, doubt yourself purposely.  “Perhaps I’m wrong about that”.  Intentionally confusing the negative part of yourself. 

iv.    Stay in the present time.  

   As you explore letting go, it helps to remember that "I am in the right place at the right time".  This statement can help counteract one way that your mind keeps you in old beliefs and attitudes.  It does this by reminding you of something in your past that is familiar and reinforces your old beliefs and thoughts.  Realize that your past was perfect, but it is time to move on, let it go completely so that your future can come to you.

v.      Do not compare yourself with others. 

    Comparing always leads to unhappiness.  There will always be someone more beautiful, smarter, more successful, and happier.  Later, as you embrace your future completely, you will realize that comparing yourself with others, for the most part, is a futile effort.  You and your life are different from that of others.  If you are a carbon copy of your neighbors, you are not living your own life, but simply “keeping up with Jones family”, to use a common phrase.

Instead, try setting a new example to be the one who inspires others. 
  i.  Help up as you wish others to be.  
 ii.  Be a friend, rather than look for a friend.   
iii.  Be a good partner, business person, and student. 
    It is a lot more fun and productive than comparing yourself or trying to make everyone and everything else conform to your desires.

Letting go also applies to fear-based and ego-based voices that often whisper in our ears, and serve only to confuse and hold us back. Identifying these false voices and learning to ignore them gets easier with practice.

Letting go may involve questioning every belief system you have ever been taught. 

vi.    Do not rebel for rebellion’s sake. 

  Rebelling is not at all the same as letting go of the past.  Rebellion is a very popular sport today that often wastes years of people’s lives. They think they are running toward their future, but are really just running away from their past.   

Letting go does not just propel you in any other direction.  

 It is just a total and repeated emptying of the mind and 

the emotions so that something else can come in and show you your way.

If you find yourself rebelling, slow down and just allow yourself to question and allow the answers to be revealed.

vii.  Ask and you shall receive. 

Many people want to let go, but they do not ask frequently enough.  Keep that in mind.  For example, many pray for friends, success, money, or health.  They should be praying to let go of the past, which is often the reason for their illness and seeming failures.

D. LETTING GO OF EXCUSES

i.     Excuses disempowered you. 

  Excuses imply that you were a victim of circumstances and therefore you are powerless and not responsible for your actions.  They may make you seem more innocent, but really they just disempowered you.  It paralyses you to make decision and used many form of blaming to hide your powerless to make actions and decisions.

Rid yourself of this attitude and habits and it inhibates your true self and life. Feel yourself free from excuses and held it in your hand, as a free bird fly. Never find excuses but find ways.

ii.   Responsibility for your life. 

It is a valuable and popular concept.  Taking responsibility means empowering yourself.  It implies that if things are not right, you have the power to change them, whereas if you make excuses, the implication is you are a victim and not as able to change your life.  Life's are our playground, not our master. 

Taking full responsibility for everything in your life, even the negatives, such as alcoholic parents, mean partners, troublesome children, horrible diseases or other seeming misfortunes.  Taking full responsibility may seem daunting, but it is really not so at all.  It is a new way to live that prepares you for a wonderful and fulfilling future full of joy and love.   

E.THINKING

 Your present situation is the result of your past thoughts, attitudes and actions to a greater extent than you might imagine. 

Really practicing and living the letting go philosophy each day will cause amazing life changes - sometimes very quickly.  All kinds of problems can improve, and life becomes much simpler and happier. Old thoughts and attitudes created the problems in the first place.  This is a most important principle. 

Change your thoughts, habits and attitudes and over time your entire life will change.  The amazing changes that occur can be hard to believe.

F.  ACCEPTING AND ALLOWING

i.         Accepting your life.

This is the hardest thing in the world to do.  Striving, straining and effort have been our hallmark to success get even to the extent simply allowing and accepting seems difficult.

Allowing and accepting are really part of letting go.   

Holding on to the past is like living on autopilot, 

accepting the belief that they are in control and 

“creating their future”.   

We are simply living out their older beliefs and ideas in new forms.

Once you have set your intention to let go of your entire past, the next logical and related step is to relax and really allow and accept the new beliefs and principles into your life. This will happen automatically as you make room for them and search honestly.   

G.PEACE

It is to consciously choose to be at peace within.  It means a deliberate choice to be at peace all the time, not just when things are going well and life is fun.  It means choosing for peace even if it hurts – and it will hurt at times.

Giving up the sweet feeling of revenge against friends and others who appear to slight you or harm you.  Warring walking away from a situation in which you could choose to fight back.   It is not about gritting your teeth and walking away, or putting on a happy smile while you fume underneath.  It means observing your feelings, expressing them when appropriate, and then letting them go.

Learning how to communicate effectively and acting boldly, at times, but not from anger. 

Nor does it mean to be a pacifist.  Sometimes an action of another demands a forceful response.  It means to be at peace inside yourself even if you are in a fight. 

This kind of peace within or lack thereof, always affects those around you.  When you choose peace within, others will analyse and see.  This is a wonderful gift to your children and others around you.  However, if you continue to be caught up in outer events and tied to your past traumas, anger and resentments, you will keep those around you somewhat caught up as well.  Keep this in mind, as it is a key to family peace and relationship success.  Be the model, in other words, rather than waiting for others to let go of their past and treat you as you wish to be treated.

H. FRIENDS AND RELATIONSHIPS

i.       Relationships

An inevitable occurrence in life and not to be feared.  Women, have trouble in this area.  As you change, you need to see around you differently. Satisfied with what is seen, but others will not.  A lot of courage is required in willingness to let go of the past.

    a. Divorce should always be weighed carefully.  
    b. Leaving friends or family can be an easy way out and substituting old, deep patterns of  thought and behavior that lead to discord and disharmony.  While many friendships are not the best, our instant ego-gratification, throw-away culture is certainly not the answer, either.

ii.      Toxicity

When “friends”, family members or partners dishonor you by dishonoring their contracts and agreements with you, be prepared to take vigorous action.  Otherwise you dishonor yourself.

Some people absolutely refuse to take responsibility for themselves and insist that others take responsibility for their happiness.  Absolutely committed to unhappiness or anger.  At these times, the most loving action during these hardy times is to be sane, but realizing that physical separation is sometimes needed to honour the insane.

     Sometime realizing that your focus or level of living is different from theirs.  It is not a judgment, just an observation.  Staying with them may mean you must stay at or near their level, which can cause depression and illness in a sensitive person.  With great compassion, you may realize you cannot maintain your integrity and keep living as another would wish, although it may seem perfectly fine to outsiders.  Each situation is different.  As with any important decision, ask for guidance and you will receive it.

    One key is to recall that letting go of the past emotionally and mentally, not physically letting go.  It is about stopping your emotional judgment in other people and things so as can see clearly the overall picture.  Then the right course of action will often become apparent without hurting your emotional overtones.

Letting go of unwanted things, habits, attitudes beliefs and even people is an ongoing process for anyone who wishes to unfold spiritually.  

Allowing and accepting more of who you really are requires reflection, always involves some pain and suffering, and requires loads of compassion for oneself and everyone around you.   

As much as possible, relax, enjoy it and celebrate the process as often as you can.  Know that letting go, as children are so good at, it the key to your growth and development throughout your life.

By Lawrence Wilson, MD

© July 2012, The Center For Development