Letting Go

To have an immediate experience of letting go you can always stand up and stretch as much as you can and then relax. You’ve done that thousands of times in your life, and it almost always provides an instant burst of good feeling, clarity, and energy. The following two exercises are expansions of the same idea. One of them emphasizes letting go physically, the other, mentally.

Physically. Sit in a chair with your hands on your legs. Tense your legs and keep them tense as you successively and steadily tense your pelvis, rib cage, shoulder, neck, and jaw. Hold all of that tense for a moment. Now relax. You have just let go. How did it feel? Observe.

Mentally. Imagine that something you mentally carry around with you - a strong opinion, belief, or thought that blocks your way - is actually represented by something you are wearing. It can be a shoe, watch, ring, bracelet, scarf or tie. Strongly imagine that this blocking mental set exists totally in the article you are wearing. Then: take it off!

How does it feel to let go in this way?

But when it’s happening to us, it’s hard to get that distance. We’re so caught up in the situation that we can’t think straight. Our emotions run wild and get the best of us. Attention narrows, we ruminate on the negative, and can’t seem to break free.

The fourth step in the process is to let go of our unnecessary options and move on, embracing our choice fully so that we can get the most from it.

Do yourself the favor of getting lots of options, then culling the list down to a short and manageable size (five max); then make the best choice that you can, given the time and resources available to you, get on with it, and build your way forward. Note that if you’re doing this with prototype iteration, you don’t have too much at stake, and you will be able to adjust as you go, before you really reach a significant investment. And once you make a choice—then embrace your choice and go with it. When the questions that lead to agonizing creep into your head, evict the thoughts, and direct your energy into living well the decisions you’ve made. Pay attention and learn as you go, of course, but don’t get caught with your eyes fixated on the rearview mirror of decision regret.

This letting-go step relies primarily on personal discipline. Keep your reframed understanding of decision making handy, and be sure to win the internal argument with yourself when you’re tempted to rehash and ruminate. Put in place the support you need to stick with it—find a life design collaborator or team to help remind you why you made the choice or choices you did; make a journal entry about your decision, and reread it when you get confused. Find what works to enable yourself to enjoy your choices fully.

Life is always at risk of slipping by unnoticed. If the days and months and years feel as if they are moving too quickly, focused attention might be one remedy. Giving something your undivided attention is a way of bringing it to life and assuring that you don’t float through time on automatic pilot. Noticing someone is a way of respecting them, paying tribute to the person they are in that exact moment. And noticing yourself, checking in about how you move through the world, about where you are now and where you would like to be, can help you identify which people and pursuits most need your attention. Attention is your most precious asset, and deciding how to invest it is one of the most important decisions you can make. The good news is you can make that decision now, in this moment, and in each moment of your life.