What is the deal with "letting go"?

Breaking down the art of letting go…and why it’s so misinterpreted

Throughout my healing process I came across a lot of words, quotes, coaches, spiritual teachers, etc, talk about the importance of "letting go", and if you don't, then you have "resistance" to it. Hell, I even started talking about letting go before I fully understood the concept.

Here's why the term “letting go” immediately triggers you and turns people off when used by others as spiritual bypassing or by those who do not know how to truly implement it.

Letting go is hard for anyone who has experienced trauma. Their whole life has been out of control, why would they let go again? When you tell a trauma survivor to let go, that is probably the worst thing you can do, as you're telling them to let go of everything they worked to get HOLD OF in their recovery. 

Letting go is hard if you've grown up with a strict religion and the idea of a scary god. Or if you've let go and put your trust in others before, such as those in power, and it backfired. For these and other reasons, using the term letting go is meaningless.

So what is letting go, really? There are many forms, but I am speaking of challenges in life, the spiritual practice of appropriate action, when you choose next steps for a specific situation. 

Letting go is trusting that you are supported by something greater than yourself. That you will find the courage to act at the right time, but not be attached to any outcome or demand a specific result. Letting go does not mean letting go of life, from now to infinity, floating around in time and space. No. It simply means you trust you are protected and guided, just enough to put one foot in front of the other. You do not need clarity on what to do, only that you will do whatever it takes to care for yourself first.

This is how we live in peace, in flow, and in harmony with ourselves and our intuition. But, how do we get there? How do you safely let go? What is the process? In my 39 years of life, I've never had someone explain it clearly until I came across Linda Howe, who provides such a simple method that I cannot believe no one has articulated this before. 

Linda explains that the safest way to practice the art of letting go is to put your trust in something dependable first. This could be anything from the cycles of the moon, the power that causes seeds to sprout, planets in orbit, the sun to rise, your vital organs working. This is something tangible, and something reliable. 

You do not have to put your trust in a higher power or The Divine, it has nothing to do with spirituality, it just has to be meaningful to you. Think about what that is. Waves crashing on a beach? Birds flying in the sky? Literally anything that is a constant in your life, and when you think about it, there are many. It's possible to let go into something you trust. 

When you find that constant, then begin to relax into the idea that there is a power for good at work in your life, and you can trust it without a second thought. Learn to trust what you can see, before trusting what you can't see. This is the safest way for your nervous system to begin to relax. Then, only then, can you start to let go. Eventually, you won’t have to keep letting go, because you’ll always be in flow, you won’t be swimming upstream, pushing through, and white knuckling it through life. You will just be.

Then, you can start all that other spiritual stuff. Try it, and see how it works for you.

A message to myself, passed to you.

These were words to myself for my own healing, which have since helped countless others in their healing journey. I share them with you now.

You're not broken, you’re blocked. Throughout your journey you’ve run into obstacle after obstacle blocking your path, until they prevented you from going further.

This may seem like the end of the road, but it’s not, you just haven’t seen all your options. That’s because obstacles are detours in the right direction. When a door closes, there is always a window. Doors lead to the ground. Windows lead to the sky, and the sky has endless possibilities.

Right now you’re looking around you, trying to see what other doors and passageways are open. But you’re not looking up, at the windows. That’s your way out.

You carry pain, which you’ve accepted as a part of life. But pain is not just a part of life, it’s LIVING. You have lived. You’ve known grace, sorrow, loss, love, joy, pain, and so much more. Pain is a blessing, because it means you're alive. If you don’t feel pain, you aren’t living. You aren’t alive.

But pain is exhausting when you can't let it go. You struggle to carry it, dragging it with you in life. What you don’t know is how to transmute that pain into power, purpose, & pleasure. When you do that, you’ll be unstoppable. You’ll feel alive for the very first time.

You may not feel alive now from the weight you carry, but you can let that go. I know because I did. I embraced the pain & allowed it to transform me. It made me stronger, more capable, kind, loving, and caring for myself & those along my path. But most of all, I learned to honor myself, first and foremost.

Perhaps our paths will cross one day, or perhaps you were meant to read this now to help you feel supported, strong, loved, & empowered. Perhaps you were meant to see what being alive, thriving, and healed really is. My scars are always there, but the wound has healed.

Healing allows you to evolve into the person you want to be, someone YOU will be proud of. When that happens you will know, because what’s inside will finally match what everyone already sees on the outside: a healed, whole, complete person. One who’s alive, joyful, peaceful, calm, and free. Free to be you, in any way you please. Free from the constrains of societal pressures and worries of other people’s opinions.

Free to harness the power to heal yourself.

Spiritual Identity Crisis...do I be who I am, or who I think people think I should be?

Throughout my journey in life I struggle with a huge identity crisis: being healed, a healer & leading a more spiritual life, all while staying true to myself and who I really am.

After life-changing experiences and healing moments, I thought I needed to appear different. More "healed", "spiritual", "wise", like I’ve got everything together & life is wonderful.

I tried to show how different I was and I'm never going back to my old ways. I projected a newly-constructed image of myself based on how I thought I should behave.

This resulted in a huge identity crisis. While trying to fit a mold of what others believed spirituality should be, I repressed my who I really am. I felt conflicted following the path of others, my true self screaming to be let out.

I knew I needed to make a change, step away from other's opinions & forge my own path. I needed to stop taking myself so seriously & acknowledge things in me that will never change.

The truth about me is that I’m goofy, really spacy, I don't have it all together, I'm a bit clumsy & make poor decisions when rushed. I love to have fun, go out and dance in clubs. I'm wild & do things for shock value to rattle people's cages. Many times I’m a walking contradiction.

I thought being spiritual meant I couldn’t drink, go out, or do what I used to do in the past for fun. I thought I needed to meditate every day, follow a strict diet and face every event as something I had resistance towards that I needed to surrender. While yes, some of these things are good, there is a balance. Not everything you dislike means you have resistance & must surrender. Not everything must have a profound meaning that I have to ponder for hours or I’ll never learn the lesson. Life does not need to be so serious.

This journey has taught me about balance of being who I really am, not just portraying some image on social media. It's about joy and fun, being able to laugh at absurdities and finding pleasure in life.

The times I get the most comments about being at peace and happy in my life is never when trying, but just being myself.

When you're happy, successful, and at peace, you don't need to show or tell anyone, people know. The same for healing. People see the change in you. They see you’re different. They may not like it, but it’s there. It may bother them at first, they may tell you that you’re not spiritual, they may tell you they’re disappointed or disillusioned in you, but these people are put on your path to mirror to you what your greatest insecurities are.

Healing for me is personal, it’s private, but it’s also a never ending shift. It’s the ability for me to say and be who I want, to not sit back and take criticism, and to share my story with others because that’s how we all heal, by learning from everyone else. When you're healed, you’re not healed alone.

Reflecting on my transformation over the past year

The past year and a half has been the most transformative of my life. I’ve stopped lying about my past & not only come to accept it, but learned to turn that pain into power, changing the question of “what happened to me?” Into, “What can I do with what happened to me?”

I’m now I’m able to help others heal and move forward from trauma and experiences that have held them back their entire life. I’m in a place of peace and happiness in my life, taking no shit from others and living exactly how I please.

Of course, this road hasn’t been without challenges. I’ve been viciously attacked, both by strangers & people close to me.

Here’s some things I’ve been called in the past year:

Narcissist
Liar
Pedophile sympathizer
Dangerous
Mentally ill
Needs electro therapy
Trying to get attention
Pathetic
Dumb/stupid
Brainwashed
Should be in jail
.... to name a few

I won’t lie and say these things haven’t hurt me. It’s awful to be targeted by strangers, & worse by people I know. But the good thing about healing is learning to accept not only all possible realities of yourself, but using it to your advantage. That's what shadow work is.

Shadow work involves going into the deepest, darkest places of yourself, and not just looking into it, but sitting with it, getting real comfortable with the uncomfort, until it just becomes a part of you.

These days if I’m bothered when people call me things, I know that on some level I must think it’s true. When you go into your shadow, accepting ALL possible realities of yourself, NOTHING anyone says about youwill bother you, because you know it’s not true, and you’ve already accepted that part of yourself anyway.

No one can touch you when you're in touch with your shadow side. Attacks are water off a duck’s back, & teflon to criticism. My new comfort zone is being uncomfortable. If I’m not there, I’m not growing. I’m going to push the envelope, cause a ruckus & evolve . That’s where I need to be and where I’ll stay

As Carl Jung said, “One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but making the darkness conscious.”

#shadowwork #acceptallpossiblerealities #theuncomfortablezone #livingwithpurpose #comeatmebro 😊

When do you feel most free and like yourself?

When I was in New Mexico away from people, cities, politics, and distractions, it allowed me to figure out who I was, when I most felt like myself, what made me come alive and most importantly, when I felt most connected to my higher self.

There are always areas in our lives where we shine, when we feel most connected and most like ourselves. For me, that's being out in nature without anyone else around. The feeling of total freedom, being connected to mother earth, completely unafraid of anything, is the most profound feeling ever. I thought I was alive before, but I didn't really know what that meant until got rid of all the things I thought I needed to feel that way.

We're all different, and we connect to our deepest self and our hearts in all kinds of ways. I'm curious to hear from all of you: what makes you feel most alive? When do you feel most connected to your highest self? When do you feel most inspired and what contributes to that inspiration? Let me know in the comments below!

The only person you can save is yourself

The only person you can heal is yourself. The only thoughts and judgment you can change are your own. The story we tell is the only nightmare we believe. We can heal from anything because our present pain is self inflicted from past pain, attached to beliefs and stories we created around the experience.

Does heading mean you never suffer again? No. As trauma survivors you're allowed to be angry and to forgive. You're allowed to be healed but still get triggered. You're allowed to move on but acknowledge the deep pain that was inflicted on you. You're allowed to go through all those things and still be healed.

Healing is about acknowledging all these things, experiencing the deep pain come up again and again, yet having the tools you need acknowledge the experience and how many times you've relived it. Then forgive yourself for the pain you've endured all this time. This allows you to move past it and come to an understanding with yourself and your life.

If you're waiting for the perfect apology from someone who's wronged you you'll be waiting a long time. The best thing you can do is learn to provide the apology and love to yourself that you never received. But this means acknowledging some hard truths about yourself and your beliefs around the situation that maybe you haven't faced before. The result is peace, letting go of self hatred, letting in self respect, boundaries, and dropping that weight you've been carrying around for years that was never yours to carry in the first place.

You can do it! And if you need any extra support, email me at hello@serenakelley.com. I'm here for you.