Letting Go
Posted Feb. 20, 2009
Last week, I was musing over my life and all the shifting circumstances that seem to be happening lately -- from the individual to the global level. And I realized that all my inner pain or angst at any given time was a direct result of my trying to “hold on” to something.

Then I realized how far reaching that realization was: it affected my pain regarding giving up habits, thought patterns, old relationships that I didn’t want to let die – even old investments that I didn’t “flow with the times” on, and so, in trying to hold onto them, I experienced pain.

You even see it in the body: you try to let go of your old ways, but you don’t -- and then you experience pain in your physical self as a result. Emotions translate to sickness. Inflexibility in your whole life is mirrored in your body.

I realize now more than ever, the wisdom of “letting go of the past.” Holding onto people and things with an open hand seems to be the wisest of ways. For example, holding onto resentment robs us of the peace we could experience in our lives on an everyday basis.

Have you ever noticed the words “forgive” and “forget”? It seems to me our language is trying to tell us something. “For Give” and “For Get.” I try to visualize it as if I have two large clay jars full of gold coins. One jar is for “giving” out of. The other for getting, or receiving into. So as I give my “gold coins” out (my pardon), I get/receive the compensation of peace. My goal is to keep my forgiveness jar empty so I can keep my forgetting jar full. “For it is in giving that we receive” are the words from the famous Prayer of St. Francis.

In addition, another word for “get” is not only “receive” but also “accept.” One “accepts” something given to them. I know it’s a stretch of the whole concept, but acceptance is the pathway to the forgetting part of forgiveness. The offense won’t be banished from the memory, but the acceptance of it “as it is” will enable the forgiver to truly move on and let go of the past.

– Carine L. Horner, CCWFN, Soul Food Nutrition