Letting Go. Sucks.
Generally speaking, I learn pretty quickly…however, there are some life lessons that really have to knock me over the head several times before I, begrudgingly, grasp them. Though, once the beatings have subsided, I do try my damnedest to remember them and live my life with them in mind.
The fact that I cannot control other people - especially their emotions and/or the morphing of their feelings towards me or our friendship - has been a hard, and sad, lesson that I think, finally in my 30s, I have begun to understand and accept. It has been this knowledge of my own lack of control that has allowed me to give up this absurd feeling of responsibility for the actions of others around me. In this acceptance I have also been able to release myself from the knee jerk reaction to judge others for decisions they make.
This doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt when I become attached emotionally to friends that drift into my life…only to drift out without my blessing. It’s hurts and feels terrible to have a relationship change that I am very attached and happy with…I feel like the little kid stomping her feet, red faced and yelling “No! You can’t leave…I want you HERE!”
But. In the end, no matter how much I agonize over the decisions that others have made…I have no control over them. No matter how much I judge, no matter how much I cry or beg or plead…I cannot change the emotions or decisions that they have made.
The only thing I CAN do is to accept what has been decided, make my own honest feelings be known and live in the knowledge that time eventually will heal my hurt. New friends will drift in to my life - or I into theirs and life goes on. There is a freedom I feel in letting go of a situation, or friend, when I finally have accepted that I have done all I can do in the face of a decision or a change in feeling that I had no control over.
I have also learned that this acceptance also requires me to give up any judgments I might make, any feelings of contempt I might have, any form of grudge I might hold - because, in the end…it doesn’t matter. It won’t change anything, and, if fact, the only person it ends up hurting is me.
