To Hang On? Or To Let Go? — How Can We Know?
Even though we face this predicament on a daily basis on mundane decisions, it is those tumultuous times when we are confronted with truly life-altering choices of hanging on or letting go that are agonizing and anxiety inducing.
The saying goes “A bird in hand is better than a dozen in the bush”, but if the bird we are holding has gotten sick and will infect us if we hold it, then we are better off with no bird at all as unfamiliar and scary as that may seem.
Consider this:
The mind can only see what it is losing, but it has no way to see what it is gaining.
This means that we must transcend the mind in order to gain any vision of the good that is hiding behind that seeming loss.
I think it’s fairly common knowledge that monkeys are often caught by putting peanuts inside a hollow coconut or something small enough to trap their hands once they make a fist. The monkey can insert the hand, but once it grabs the peanuts and makes a fist, it cannot slide it out; and the sad part is that, as smart as they can be, they don’t think that, if they let go of their small loot of peanuts they will be free, and oftentimes this costs them their life.
Surely we can learn a valuable lesson from that.
Life is full of invitations, opportunities and imperatives for deciding.
What are we equipped with, as human beings, to aid us in making these decisions in a way that our future self will thank us?
Our feelings
And when was the last time that you listened to your feelings?
Why do we hang on so tightly to things or situations when in our heart of hearts we know that we should let them go?
We are scared.
Why do we let go of opportunities when we know in our heart of hearts that we should grab hold of them?
We are scared.
The answer lies in each of us, and more often than not, we just don’t know what is going on, and that of course, is scary, but we can’t wait to have a forward 20–20 vision, that doesn’t exist.
We simply have to exercise our faith. And then add to it some more; become very bold with your faith.
There is also the fact that a part of us desperately resists change; if it were up to our ego, nothing would ever change. Ego never wants to know the truth because the truth always informs us of a reality that threatens the ego.
If we are not careful, we will live (waste) our lives as protectors of ego and tailor our lives so that nothing changes. It is a losing battle. — “Desist therefore” maybe would Shakespeare say.
Let go.
A life of resisting change is a life of suffering because the imperative of change is in the air everyday we wake up, every hour we live.
We erroneously label — letting go of something obsolete, as a LOSS!!
obsolete relationships,
obsolete ideas,
obsolete stories,
That is not a loss… it is a gain, even though it feels like a horrible vacuum at first. In reality you are gaining fresh, clean and open real estate where you can build something wonderfully useful. Just by letting go.
But sit still for a while with that vacuum. Don’t rush onto anything without care; “guard your heart above all else”, said Solomon in Proverbs 4:23, “for all life stems from it”.
The truth is scary. But only at first, when we are in fight mode with it. Surrender: you aren’t going to win that one.
We can be in truth-fight mode for a very, very, long time; it is up to us. In fact, our culture is imbedded with the compulsion to fight and complain about the truth.
Nothing scares us more than the truth. And nothing can liberate us more than the truth once we have accepted it; but until we do, it terrifies us.
How I wish to always accept and love the truth in my life! How much more free I would be! How much more energy would I have to spend on things that propel my life forward, make me useful and give me joy?
In this “new” life that I am still barely learning to live, learning to let go has been one of my biggest allies. I also have learned to hang on stubbornly to dreams and a certain vision of my life, regardless of the fact that it is not linear thinking. These two in combination, (letting go of some things and hanging on to others), like a locomotive, can propel our lives in a direction we will be glad with.
When hard truths have shown up in our lives they have demanded more strength, grace, faith and patience than we had; and we felt that we blew it, but that is only human. It is, after all, through the exercise of facing hard truths bravely and resolutely that we gain substance in our lives and spirit.
Here’s a checklist to help you decide whether to hold on or let go to situations
- Do they foster your (spiritual or otherwise) development?
- Do you foster theirs? (These 2 questions usually will have the same answer)
- Do they inspire you?
- Do they challenge and encourage you to grow?
- Do you feel alive with them or in that situation?
- Do they make you live in fear?
- Do you feel expansive or shrunk with them, or in that situation?
- Do they receive your love and service or does it bounce back to you unused?
We never can see the full picture, all may see is the next step. Faith is essential, and prudence.
(Don’t even try to see the whole picture; you never will succeed, and it will drive you crazy.)
Some times all we can do it to hang on, and we hope that any hard condition is transitory. As we put our hearts into what we do, conditions will improve, and we won’t feel like we are hanging on by a thread for very long.
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Copyrighted 2017 — Viviana Rose
