Mary’s Minute
“All the
art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.” Havelock Ellis
“Abundance is a process of letting go; that
which is empty can receive.”
~ Bryant McGill
The phrase and concept of “letting go,”
has been recently popularized by the song from Disney’s Frozen. We use the term
loosely sometimes with friends, and other times struggle to deal with letting
go with pain or anger. Letting go can
mean a lot of different things. It can
mean forgiving ourselves, forgiving others, moving forward with new ideas, or
letting go of something painful. I was
intrigued by the notion in the Ellis quote – the balance between letting go and
holding on. The greatest example in my
life that I recall of that concept is in how I dealt with losing my dad. I remember how I cried every day, and
although I wanted to be able to function, I also didn’t want to let go too much
that I would forget. Holding on can mean
keeping beautiful memories close to our hearts and learning from our
experiences, but the delicate balance falls in not letting the past paralyze
us.
Although we always need to learn from our
past, there are certain feelings that we must release in order to live healthy,
happy lives. Holding on to bitterness,
only hurts us. That is where the McGill
quote is helpful. We know that hatred
hurts the hater, not the hated. When we
harbor bad feelings for ourselves or others, or we hold on to old ideas, we
fill space that can be filled with happiness and new beginnings.
Yes, we need to hold on to memories and
learn from our mistakes, but we also must learn to, in the words of Elsa, “Let
it go!”
Have a great week!
Mary
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