THE ART OF LETTING GO...
The concept of letting go may seem easy at first, yet it is probably one of the most challenging lessons in a person's life. There are three categories of letting go: 1) physical, 2) psychological, and 3) spiritual. Even though these categories are interrelated, to simplify the process we will relate to them as separate.
We have all learned the difficulty of letting go of some material possession. We had to let go of a house we really liked, clothes we just couldn't fit in anymore, a favorite object. When we ended a relationship, we had to let go of the physical touch we were used to. Big or small, letting go was not easy. At times, it left us feeling empty, lonely, and sad. Yet, we have also let go of unwanted pounds and let go of clutter, and we felt lifted by the experience. When we get close to the time our child joins us in our home, we experience the nesting instinct that instinctively makes us go around and rearrange our living quarters, letting go of the way things were around the house. We are making room for our bundle of joy to join us and have her rightful place next to us.Throughout this book we have worked extensively at psychologically letting go of people, places, and things that no longer serve us. The process, although a bit painful, has also turned out to be refreshing and renewing. Logically, we understood the need we have to let go of anger, fear, rancor, and resentment, and we have learned the tools to check ourselves in our daily lives for evidence of those feelings resurfacing, so that we may understand them and bring love and compassion to them in order to exorcize them. When we allow ourselves to let go of our need to be perfect and we allow others the same privilege, we set ourselves up for success.
Letting go at the physical and psychological levels has given us freedom. After all, when we hold tightly to something, it becomes that which runs our lives more than the other way around. I often heard successful people tell me that if we go to a job interview not "needing" the job, we are more likely to get it. Needing the job, money, object, or person enslaves us to the erroneous concept that we cannot live without it. On the other hand, when we enter any situation not needing it, we enter as a free individuals whose emotional state cannot be altered by that which is outside of them. Dr. Beckweth once said, "When you wake up in the morning, be a thermostat not a thermometer." What he meant was that a thermometer changes its state according to the outside influences, and a thermostat changes the environment that surrounds it by raising or lowering the temperature according to its programming.
As a thermostat we decide what the circumstances will makes us feel instead of becoming a victim of them.Which brings us to letting go spiritually. If the thermostat has been programmed only by us, it will have within it our human characteristics and personality. After all this work, we might certainly be better than we were, but by all means we still have a long way to go. So why not let the Mastermind of the Divine do the programming. This in essence is what the dictum Let go and let God really means.
Excerpt from Chapter 10 (Painless Childbirth:An Empowering Journey Through Pregnancy and Birth - by Giuditta Tornetta)
