The Missing Step

Rumi once wrote: “Life is a balance of holding on and letting go”, but I feel there is a step missing.

When something brings unbalance into your life, it isn’t always easy to “let it go”. As you bring the anxiety up to a friend or a family member, chances are that they will tell you to “let it go”, but how do you let go of something that is irritating you like a tag on the back of your shirt, scratching into your very being?!

The hardship could be anything from: a job loss, to an unkind word someone said to you, to a loss of a significant relationship or friendship, or to a (fill in the blank).

When your body experiences pain, you notice it and it becomes a sore spot. Every day experiences may ignite said sore spots, like getting up from your chair, sneezing or coughing, bending over to pick something up, getting in and out of your vehicle or simply going for a walk.

You can take measures to hide the sore spot, like taking pain medication, but is it really going to release the problem from your body? Probably not. Medications only mask the pain, they are a bandaid treatment to whatever is initially causing you the discomfort.

Pain is an indication that something is wrong within your body. It is the last step your body sends you, to get your attention. If the other ailments didn’t get your attention, the pain certainly will.

Like an iceberg, pain is the 10% portion that is above the water that you feel, but 90% of the iceberg is below the water and is not visible to you. It is the problem that caused the pain, in the first place.

Whether the disruption is within your body, like pain, or within our lives, like the loss of a job, the loss of a significant other, the loss of a profound friendship, etc, the results are the same, we experience pain and it becomes a sore spot.

Let’s say, for example, that you lost a really good friend, with whom you had a strong connection to. They didn’t pass away, they just left your life with no reasons as to why. You send texts and emails that go unanswered and you sit there wondering what the heck is going on. It is said that people come into our lives for a reason, a season or a lifetime, but usually when a friendship/relationship ends, you know why it ended. Maybe you weren’t compatible, maybe there were too many issues, maybe you grew apart, but you always receive closure as to why it ended. 

You express your confusion to a few friends, and they really tell you to “let it go”, but how do you do that?!

The person/situation is in your thoughts all of the time. They are with you upon waking up, as you drive to work, as you drive home. They are in your thoughts as you make dinner, as you shop for groceries, or take your vehicle to get an oil change. 

When you’re awake, that’s one thing, but then they follow you into your dreams. The only time they may not be in your thoughts is when you're at work, focusing on your tasks at hand. When you're talking to your boss, you call him by the wrong name, by the name of the person who has abruptly left your life,..yet you don’t know why and the other person, literally isn’t talking to you to tell you why…

Simply put..they are haunting you.

Like the iceberg, the 10% of the hurt that you feel is visible, but the remaining 90% is hidden, beneath the depths and layers that aren’t seen.

So how do we get rid of this sore spot without taking medication or without “letting it go”.

I feel that the missing step in Rumi’s formulation is that you have to make peace with whatever is ailing you, from a spiritual standpoint, before you can “let it go”.

When you dive deep into the pain and sift through it, only then will you be able to let “it” go.

In the example of the loss of a lovely friend, releasing the need for closure from the other person is a good start.

Why does this person need to give you closure? Why can’t you give yourself closure? Why does it matter why the friendship ended? Why do you need to know what went wrong? Why does it matter?

Holding on to the chains of pain is going to keep you tethered to the hurt and it will always haunt you. Start by healing the “whys”.

I love the analogy of the bird: If you’re holding onto a bird and telling it to fly, it won’t. No matter how much you yell at the bird to fly, it simply won’t.

Once you become consciously aware that you are the responsible party for the bird not flying, you release your grasp, open your hands, allow the bird to stretch its wings, in order to fly away ... .and eventually it does.

Holding onto pain and hurt, from any situation is the same thing. You have to become consciously aware that you are preventing yourself from opening your wings and flying away from it.

Instead of bringing more pain and hurt to your situation, what if you began remembering the good times you had with this person/situation, the great conversations, the laughter, the silliness, the deep conversations?

What if you remember how much they made you smile? Or how much they brought light to your life, when all you could see was darkness? What if you became grateful for this person coming into your life…even if it was for a short amount of time?

What if you send this person/situation unconditional love? By sending someone unconditional love, you send yourself unconditional love in the process. The more love you send, the more love you receive.

What if you sent this person/situation forgiveness; real, raw forgiveness? By sending them forgiveness, you receive forgiveness and wash the pain and hurt away. Is it better not to forgive, which will dissolve the bind that holds you together, creating more karma for future lifetimes, or this one…God forbid. 

I know some people say that it’s hard to forgive, but is it really?  Doesn’t your soul (and theirs) deserve peace? Then there are those who say that they will “forgive, but never forget” but once you forgive, you do forget, because it doesn’t matter anymore. You’ve forgiven the person, the situation and released yourself from the glue that held you to the thing that bound you in the first place.

What if you send this person/situation blessings or good wishes? What if you send them healing energy full of rose quartz or diamond energy? What if you send them so much love and kindness, you feel as though your heart will explode?

As you focus on the good things about this person/situation that left your life, peace naturally showers down upon you and eventually you’ll find yourself smiling because the pain is literally washed away…

We never know what people are going through and although friendships and relationships will end or situations will arise that will cause us pain and discomfort, it is always better to dive deep into the pain to make peace with it, in order for us to let it go.

What if instead of running away from pain or from things that hurt us, we run into it, to heal and make peace with it?

Only then, can you let it go.

My collaboration with Rumi would then read:

“Life is a balance of holding on, making peace and letting go.”