Learning to let go
- Martyn Foster
- 1 hour ago
- 3 min read
The past, the present, what I can't control, and what I don't understand.
Something that is easy to say (or sing, even), yet difficult to do – let it go. We are designed to let things go; it’s part of the reason why our memory is not structured like a computer hard drive, but coded with emotions. Letting go acts as a counter to becoming bitter and resentful – which can creep up on us and sometimes we don’t even notice we’re acting this way.
When it comes to letting go, there is a difference between knowing you need to (and what the specifics are) and truly embodying it – because it really is an embodied experience. Your body feels it when you have truly let go and it may require a significant period of time to completely shed the emotional or spiritual weight of what you’re carrying.
So, what is it that I want to say with writing this article?
It probably comes as no surprise I do struggle with letting go, but I’ve improved immensely in this field over time. One of the things I’ve had to become aware of – I suppose I didn’t have to, but I imagine negative outcomes would arise – is that my level of intelligence enables me to logic and reason many arguments for and against – even wrong ones. For this reason alone, it can be very difficult for me to surrender a point when I can rationalise it and defeat the counter argument (or weaker opponent). One of my favourite articles I’ve ever wrote (and one of the most popular) is on “The Gift and Curse of Intelligence” in which I go into more detail about the experience. I highly recommend reading it.
What am I letting go of exactly? As I mentioned in the subtitle, I talk about the past, the present, what I can’t control and what I don’t understand. I go back and forth with what and how much I should let people know publicly about my private, inner workings. Any time one does this they open themselves up to attack and you don’t need to give people a second invitation nowadays – part of the reason why I wrote “Why you’ll always be wrong”. Always prepared for an attack is something I know I need to let go, but haven’t quite managed so. Stemming from my school days of childhood bullying, which I’ve written about previously, part of me is still waiting for people, even lifelong friends, to stab me in the back at some point. That trust factor is a doozy. That and being punished/antagonised for being a good person, that still irks me. People thinking I’m a bad person especially less moral people telling me I’m immoral, I need to let go of, highlighted by my article “Do you think I am a good person?”
I’ve always tried to act as a bridge between two sides, be it people or ideas, sadly you can get burned by both sides sometimes simultaneously. Ridding the world of bad ideas – an impossible task – but one this lofty idealist still tries to accomplish although on a lot smaller and localised scale. The last 10 years or so particularly has been dominated too much by politics and the culture wars – amplified by social media – a lot of which I don’t understand why it ever received so much prominence. People don’t listen to kind, calm, rational people like me – it’s not entertaining or emotionally inciting enough as we’ve collectively become conditioned for clickbait and hysteria. Thankfully we are seeing some progress in this regard, but I fear it’s still going to get worse before it gets better and I believe there is likely to be some irreversible effects society-wide, sadly.
I’m tired and I deserve peace. Letting go allows for peace.
Like how you can’t witness the beauty of a balloon drifting off into the ether without letting go, so it is with life. I cannot change the events of the past, but I can change my perspective on them and how I let them affect me. The present is the only place I have some semblance of agency and control to live my life. Make peace with what you cannot control. Learn to love the fact there is more you do not understand than what you do.
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"Ridding the world of bad ideas – an impossible task – but one this lofty idealist still tries to accomplish although on a lot smaller and localised scale." But as gets fleshed out repeatedly over the years ideas never die, bad or otherwise, the only countermeasure is better ideas. With everything going on in the world these days I think we have a moral obligation to put good ideas out there, regardless of how they're received, if at all.