Letting Go of Letting Go

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We’ve gone deep lately, and in that depth we’ve examined and started to dissemble the entire framework of our lives.

This is daunting, and if you’ve found yourself floating in a void feeling lost and lonely then you are in the wrong place. We have to be careful of the void. We have to be careful because letting go has the potential to become something we hold on to. It has the potential to be as counterproductive as everything we’ve worked to understand and let go.

So let’s take a step back and look at letting go itself.

When we indulge our expectations our tendency is to possess, control, gather and own. Whether it be physical stuff, psychological baggage, or mind blowing ideas, we try to hold on and make them our own.

Even the idea of letting go.

So we need to step back from letting go to avoid building a construct that has the potential to trap us. A construct is only as good as our ability to move outside of it and see our relationship with it, and this includes the construct of letting go.

A construct is helpful in the beginning when we are learning how to let go. It provides a framework we can work in, a space that allows us to get comfortable with an idea before we fully embrace and accept the idea. But at some point we have to be able to step out of the construct and be free of it.

This means that we also have to let go of letting go.

If letting go becomes a dogma that we blindly follow we are again possessing, controlling, and owning. If we let go of too much, we end up in the void I mentioned earlier.

Alone.

Rather than let go, and rather than hold on, we should exist with.

Existing with is the essence of the moment, and existing in the moment is the other theme woven throughout our examination. This existing is both accepting and letting go of everything in the moment.

Let me share an example with you. I had to deal with a rude and belligerent customer at work last week. I was trying to help him, but he was not interested in my help. Instead of letting go and letting me help him, he just yelled and refused to listen, becoming angrier and angrier the entire time.

He was captive to his emotions. He was holding on to that anger and he was owned by it.

I was also angry. Being treated that way, being blasted with such negative energy pissed me off. My adrenaline was pumping, my heart was racing.

I was angry and I accepted that anger, I did not hold it, but I existed with it. I acknowledged the anger.

In that anger I wanted to say to him, “Sir, if you would just shut the fuck up and listen to me I could help you.”

I didn’t. I took pause.

I did not own the anger and it did not own me. Instead we existed together, and that mutual existence allowed me to handle the situation. It allowed me to take mindful action and deal with him calmly and respectfully.

After he left, the anger left me. Because I did not hold it, it did not hold me, I did not have to let it go. It was simply gone. I won’t lie and say I was whistling dixie the rest of the day, but I was not angry and this allowed me to let the film of his negative energy slide off of me and melt away.

It could have been a fight with that anger. This is where the trap of letting go can spring if we let it. In trying to understand and let go of our emotions we can fall prey to the idea that we should not feel anger, that it is bad to feel this kind of emotion, or any situational emotion. This couldn’t be farther from the truth.

Not only should you feel those emotions, you should accept and exist with them as I existed with my anger. In fact, the anger was key to handling of the situation I was in.

The man I dealt with was a force in his own right. He is used to controlling situations through blunt force, yelling and refusing to acknowledge anything until he gets what he wants. It would be very easy for a person to wilt under the force of this man’s energy.

My anger was part of what allowed me to stand in that moment and deal with this gale force in a calm and mindful way. Awareness was the other key. Awareness in the moment allows us to experience the connection that helps define the self, and in that moment I was able to understand my relationship to this man and how it was defined.

To me he was a person that needed help. He had a desire, something he wanted and it was my job as an employee of the establishment to try and provide that to him.

To him I was the focus of his frustration. I was the target upon which he could unleash himself. He had defined me not as a human, or even as a person that could help him; I was less than that. To him I was a vessel to pour rage into.

As soon as I realized this I was able to reframe myself. I received his rage, and it became my anger. I willingly became the vessel and in that moment I was less of a vessel and more of a conduit. I was the connection, the portal inside that is the self.

By accepting the anger I was able to change it. Had I fought with it and tried to push it away, I would have created a struggle within. This struggle would have amplified his rage and fed it back to him, creating a negative feedback loop that would have continued to grow between us.

In accepting his rage, it became my anger; an anger that I did not hold, and did not push away. An anger that I modified into a calm energy. With that energy, I damped the feedback loop and diminished his rage. I did not eliminate it, he was holding far too much rage to do that, but I visibly damped it.

This is why letting go of letting go is so important.

This is not the same as letting go of hope and fear. Letting go of our emotions is understanding that we do not hold them to us, instead setting them free to be what they are.

Letting go of letting go is understanding that we need to accept those emotions and not push them from us. It is a balance that must be achieved in order to truly experience life in the moment.

Letting go of letting go is stepping out of the construct and fully into the world.

Our emotions, our wants, desires, hopes and dreams, are part of the human condition. Our existence allows us the opportunity to experience and feel these emotions.

And remember, without hope we have no fear, without rage there is no joy.

We need to experience these things.

We need to experience the feeling that runs through us when the sun is shines as it rains.

The thrill that jolts through you at your lover’s touch.

The exuberance that has you grinning through the entire day.

This is life, in the moment. In every moment.

Even in the moment I accepted his rage, I felt joy, I felt them together in that moment, flowing through me, electric. I felt alive, I felt the aliveness that comes from understanding and awareness of the universe of possibility that this moment holds.

That understanding and awareness is what allowed me to step out of the construct of letting go.

It is what allowed me to be the vessel for his anger.

It is what allows me to share this experience with you.

to feel love for my wife.

to feel awe at the river that rages at flood stage.

to feel love for you.

The energy that we give and receive, the vibrations that we emit, are part of the connection between us. In accepting his energy I was able to change it, and in changing his energy I was able to change the world.

I had an impact in the world.

Do you see the magnitude of that? Do you see how amazing this is?

These words I write have power, they touch from a distance. They spring from the desire to share with you and I accept that desire and exist with it in a way that brings me joy. These words are vibrations of my energy and intent communicated across the wormhole of the internet to the world.

Sound is also touch, at a distance. The sound waves of my voice touch you when they reverberate against your ear drum.

This touch is the energy of our existence. It is the vibration created as our bodies move through space. It is the vibrations of our feet impacting the earth, it is our thoughts and hearts touching the world.

And it is the emotions we emit to the world.

We are energy given consciousness.

Our ability to impact the world comes from recognizing the connection to the portal within. By recognizing our connection and understanding that we move through this existence not to own or be owned, not to hold or let go, we unleash this potential within us.

You have this potential, all you have to do is use it. Step out of the construct, let go of letting go and be in this moment with me. It is in this moment that you will find it.

It all comes down to this, to awareness and existence within the single piece of space and time that we have. Right. Now.

Accept the energy and emotion of my words, exist with it, do not hold it. Step outside of the construct and into the world and see how you can accept and change my energy. Make it yours and share it via the tweet and like buttons below.

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