How to Develop the Letting Go Mindset
By: Darshak Rana
Tags: Mental Illness, Personal Development, Mental Health, Self Improvement, Letting Go

How to Develop the Letting Go Mindset

Photo by Fernando Brasil on Unsplash

Letting go is a free feeling where we create a space in our hearts and fill it with light and love. It’s a feeling of liberation.

But we don’t find it easy to let go of the hurt so quickly. It feels like emotional quicksand. The harder we try, the more we fail.

So, why it’s so difficult to let go of things?

It is not because of our inability to let go but lack of correct understanding and deep-ingrained wrong belief systems.

Whenever we are hurt or pained, it creates a deep groove in our minds. The hurt and pain remind us of the time and energy invested in the relationships or endeavors. This irreparable loss of time and energy also prevents us from reciprocating further in life.

Letting go means to replace the old stuff with the new, not just letting go of the old. The space inside our minds can’t remain empty. We need to fill that void either through spiritual knowledge, understanding, positive self-love thoughts, or adopt some mindful practices.

However, most of the time, we fail to get a complimentary replacement; thus, we hold onto the pain and suffering as armor to protect our mental stability. Through this negative shield, we resist positive changes.

“Some of us think holding on makes us strong, but sometimes it is letting go.” — Herman Hesse

Moreover, we have adopted a belief system from either movies or social media, or our friends that holding onto the pain makes us strong. Besides, we have forgotten to consider the consequences of holding pain.

But have you ever felt that holding pain empowers you?

Have you felt that holding grudges or devising revenge plans gives peace?

I guess the obvious answer is NO. The inner conscience bites, sooner or later.

“The truth is unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless you realize that the situation is over, you cannot move forward.” — Steve Maraboli

Because we have entered into a negative comfort zone by holding onto the pain, we do not want to leave it. Besides, the fear of getting worse pain causes us to hold onto that problem more tightly. e.g., People don’t easily and quickly invest in relationships after a broken marriage or a breakup because of the fear of trusting. As a result, they hold on to the past hurt forever, which doesn't allow them to love and trust others.

We keep on churning the hurt and pain in our minds and believe that we are drawing strength from it. But we are depleting ourselves internally. And this negative thinking gives birth to rude behavior, negative talking, mood polarities, mental stress, anxiety, panic attacks, etc.

A research study at the American Psychological Association suggests that letting go (detaching from hurtful feelings and emotions) improves mental health.

But there are times when we often find it extremely difficult to let go. These situations are mostly in the form of:

Any situation that we are unable to accept the way it is. Persons who have hurt, betrayed, cheated, or harmed us in any way we think were wrong. Memories or events where we got involved with anyone (our dear ones mostly) who got harmed. (Cases of War survivors, road accidents, etc.) Loss of a loved one or a material thing. Past bitter memory or a bad experience. (Failures, Injuries, etc.)

There can be plenty of them, but most of them fall under this umbrella.

Besides, it is not the above factors that pull us down from letting go, but the thought patterns associated with it causes more trouble.

I’ll try to explain it with my personal story.

My Story

I (seven years old) and my cousin (twelve years old) were playing in a park. He asked me to sit on the merry go round. I don’t know if he empowered and educated me with safety instructions for sitting on the merry-go-round, but then the main thing happened. He used his full power to rotate it.

Within a blink of my eye, I launched like a rocket and fell afar, breaking my left leg. Due to tender age and growing bones, doctors could have healed my leg, but they suggested otherwise.

I incurred a permanent loss in my patella that doctors couldn’t fix. Because of this childhood injury, I still suffer from chronic pains due to which I can’t run for long distances or jump like an athlete.

I could not walk until I was eight. I lost one year of my childhood, and I kept blaming my cousin for that until the age of twenty-four. I held onto that mental pain, which didn’t allow me to reciprocate further in my life.

This negativity wasn’t letting me trust him, love him, or even talk to him. Though he even suggested I do the same to him, I couldn’t— the significant conscience issues.

Living with that agony was making my life from bad to worse. Physical pain was transforming more into a mental one. One day, I decided not to live that way because every time I saw him or heard his name, the whole incident played in my mind again and again.

I wanted to release him and myself from this twisted knot. I thought, “though he had apologized a zillion times to me, why am I not able to forgive him.”

After years of self-help and studying spiritual knowledge from the Brahmakumaris (The World Spiritual University), I realized that my thinking about him was not letting me forgive him. I also learned some techniques to recognize the cause of not letting go and ways to overcome them. (I am going to talk about it elaborately in the ensuing paragraphs)

I realized that these following thoughts pained me more than my physical discomfort:

“He is my cousin and isn't supposed to hurt me. He did it on purpose. He wanted me to suffer. He did not love me because I was the center of attraction in our home. (I was the youngest, and we lived in a joint family.), etc.”

Ignorantly, I held onto this negativity within me that forced an offensive behavior externally. But by following some practical exercises, I was able to transform my negativity into positivity and embrace my relationship with my cousin. However, it took me sixteen years to figure out the cause of pain, replace my inner void with love, and let go of the past.

But, I am sharing my lifetime research and experience that could help you let go of your past grievances quicker than I. Though it might be challenging to implement instantly, a real heart and regular practice will fetch the desired mental peace results within a short time.