The wise and wonderful have been counseling us for years on the relief and freedom involved in letting go, on releasing people and circumstances to fly from us so that they---and we---can be free to pursue our own ends. Of course this all makes good sense and extolls the wisdom of rational thinking. The trouble is that letting go does not only involve the use of reason but also the powerful clutch of emotion involved in hanging on. So we not only are looking at a rational choice about releasing a situation but also the smarts to know when to do so.
Reason vs. emotion...
The awareness of when gets all mixed up in the function of reason versus emotion. When should we persist longer in the possibility of seeing things through, when just a little more patience might uncover some resolution? On the other hand, when do we get stuck in endless teasing, thwarting, texting, tweeting, cajoling, persuading with rounds and rounds of push back and resistances? When do we have so much feeling involved around a person or situation that there is simply no place for reason to surface?
Inhibition of flow...
Good questions…and part of the endless challenges that growing up every day of our lives presents. One of the problems that not knowing when to let go illustrates is the inhibition of flow, of healthy movement. Stuckness long held eventually leads to stagnation and the small deaths that come from it. Lack of movement leads to lack of health at every level. If we want to be really whole, effective beings, we will all need to recognize when we have worked long enough with something that is not resolving and when it is time to just let go and let new paths open before us.
Necessary?
Necessary? Yes. Easy to do? Maybe not.
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