Angrily Stomping in Rainbow Socks: The Juiciness of Letting Go

My feet were stomping angrily up the hill towards the picnic pavilion. My rainbow socks trembled with the strength of their landing on the ground.

I looked up and saw the stuffed animals, all in the wrong places!  Again! I could not believe it. My mind seethed. And the spiraling thoughts started: We've talked about this so many times. How could he forget? If he puts them there then… There I was walking towards a picnic pavilion for a child's birthday party with steam coming out of my ears. 

Though I had started this path,—of living beyond our limited conditioning in favor of a joyful and free existence—I was just beginning to experience the ability to access its wisdom and make changes in my own life.

Jeff, my lovely business partner and then boyfriend, had hung up stuffed animals to decorate the pavilion, but they were all in the wrong places. I knew exactly where I was going as I continued stomping…

to pick a fight, to place blame— and ultimately to prove that there was a right place for the stuffed animals and that I knew where it was!!  

I was exactly where I needed to be. 

I had enough awareness of the reactive thoughts and feelings passing through my experience to see that something was going on, and that tiny little space—between the thoughts and emotions—the ones watching them  gave me a choice.  

This is the first step in being able to make a shift: having awareness of thoughts and feelings rather than just being identified with them! This– that little space– is called conscious awareness! And it is the essential missing ingredient that we need in order to “let go.” 

Click here to download and save this reminder

As I walked, a flash of perspective came as a moment of stepping outside of the situation far enough to start to laugh!  

“Oh my goodness,” I exclaimed out loud, still giggling. 

I understood at that moment that I had a choice. I didn’t have to choose a fight. I didn’t have to believe the thoughts that were causing my own suffering.

I suddenly, realized what it means to let go. I let go of the thoughts and beliefs that were causing me suffering:

Those suffering thoughts: There is a right place to put these animals, and it's a personal insult that they are not in the right place. They're in the wrong place. 

The fact that the circumstances of my story involves rainbow socks, birthday cake, and stuffies makes this all a little more palatable, one might think, but it was serious business to me.  

The same as an argument about where your spouse left the Tupperware or the tea, or when your colleague didn't remember to reply all, or include the attachment, or when your child didn't remember to finish cleaning up the kitchen, though they promised to. Or when your mother-in-law talked too much at dinner, or when your father drank too much alcohol and started slurring…we have so many preferences that we are attached to!!  

So consider your own attachments as you listen to the end of my story.

There's me, much younger and very attached to my beliefs, ideas, and opinions. 

And then suddenly, I get it in a flash of insight, like a breath of fresh mountain air.

I can choose not to believe this story. I can choose to let it go.  

I can stop being attached to it. That’s the juiciness of letting go. We let go of our own gripping—It's not about things outside of us, though those are lovely teachers, it's about choices inside.

The opportunity for letting go of suffering is inside of us all the time, when we have awareness, in fact if I stop attaching to the thought.. it doesn't even exist.

I don’t even have to accept the opposite of this thought—the stuffed animals are in the right place, I merely need to begin with and let it go. From here, all possibilities open. 

That day, I continued smiling and laughing, and finished my walk up the hill, and looked up at the exact same scene that moments ago was causing great disturbance.

I was filled with love and gratitude. I felt it for myself, for Jeff, and for the entire mountain landscape. I felt free, open and at ease. This is the power of letting go.

Attachment is what blocks our access to love and joy. The love and joy that we are.

As we continue into the holiday season, a time often filled with family, many preferences–our own and others'–about what “should” or “should not” be, I invite you to explore what you have attached to and what may need the attention of letting go

BLOG: 4 PRATICES FOR A JOYFUL & PRATICAL .HOLIDAY SEASON

And for those of you who've been on the path for a little longer, I invite you to explore circumventing the need to let go in the first place by living so presently attachment does not arise. And then if those attachments come, let them go as soon as you know they are there.

This whole life journey is about letting go. 

Letting go of resistance. Letting go of blockages. Letting go of our bodies, homes, loved ones. And for now as we live our, as Mary Oliver called it “one wild and precious life,” letting go of the attachments that keep us from living in freedom.

Thanks so much for reading and exploring this journey together.

Share your successes and challenges with me via email or text. I love to hear from you. If you have requests for writings, lessons, updates, or stories from me, I'll be sending to more in the coming months and I'm all ears.

If you would like to join a supportive and lovely group of people exploring these practices in their lives. Come and check out my meditation group. We have some space available. It meets every other Thursday evening. 

With love and great respect on our journey Inwards and Homewards,

Paige