September 29, 2024 by Amy
The Art of Letting Go
My deep contemplation of letting go began in earnest in late 2019 when I signed up for an online decluttering class and, over the course of the next year, excavated my home to dismiss a bunch of crap that was simply weighing us down. Releasing physical objects is perhaps the easiest kind of letting go.
The truest, deepest letting go began a little over a decade ago, when my mother was diagnosed with Posterior Cortical Atrophy, and we watched her disappear right in front of us. I had to let go of everything I knew about her, and I had to let go of the dream that we would someday reconcile and build the kind of relationship I craved. Seven years ago, I had to let go of her physical presence. Then, at our father’s request, my sister and I went through her things and let go of many of her possessions.
Shortly after that, in close succession, I had to let go of my two cats of over 20 years and Tom Petty. 2017 was not a banner year. Late the next year, I let go of my Gran.
Two and a half years ago I let go of one of my beloved fathers, the pain of which I feel daily. And then my sister and I had to let go of all of his belongings, which was excruciating physically and emotionally. I have written volumes about that, none of which is public (yet). I have to let go of some personal, deep feelings first, before I feel comfortable sharing that particular story. (I’m working on it.)
I have let go of jobs that stopped serving me creatively, that challenged my ideas of ethics and integrity, that demanded I commute to another city simply because my new, old-school boss didn’t believe in remote work. I let go of a job that no longer brought me joy and instead brought me only harassment, mental health issues, insecurity, and anxiety. I let go of another job that I loved simply because the promise of an even better role awaited and my future was murky with the combining of two enormous corporate entities. I’ll be forever grateful for the friends I kept from those last two jobs; those relationships were what made the letting go hard.
Speaking of friends, I let go of some who became, unexpectedly, not the sort of people I want to associate with. Friends whose interests, priorities, and even values eventually branched away from my own. I have let go of friends whose negativity simply became too much for me to bear on a regular basis. I once let go of a book club that had become less about the books and more about griping about situations that were resolvable, yet the biggest complainers did nothing to resolve them. I have nothing against those friends…it’s just hard to participate in the conversation when you can no longer relate to their daily lived experiences. (We had taken action, so I no longer had anything to gripe about.) Plus, I really wanted to talk about books.
I have let go of food that my body can no longer tolerate. This includes beer (sigh) and most sugar (seriously, body?). I didn’t like giving up either, but both are definitely worth forgoing since neither is worth the intestinal agony they inflict. I let go of the idea that this body of mine will never, ever look like I wish it to. I’ve come to terms with that by instead developing an appreciation for what it can do instead of how it appears.
Just recently, I had to let go of my child.
Life, it seems, is a series of goodbyes. Some are easy, some difficult. But all are unavoidable and most are necessary. Thinking about things this way actually makes decisions and daily life easier. Stay with me here. If you never actually own anything, if you think about everything you “possess” as merely on loan from the universe for an undetermined amount of time, it’s easy to stay focused on what’s actually important. It’s much harder to get caught up in the minor annoyances and inconveniences of life when absolutely nothing is permanent.
We had beloved guests with us for the Fourth of July. Lots of coffee brewed in the morning as we sat around the kitchen and great room, catching up and making plans for the day. It was wonderful and I was incredibly happy to be surrounded by so much love. At one point, a cousin held up the Starbucks mug she had carefully selected off our shelf and said, “I didn’t take the NASA mug because I figured it was special, so I grabbed this one instead!” She was worried about accidentally breaking something precious to us. I grinned and said, “Enjoy the Starbucks mug. It’s a limited edition from the first Starbucks in Seattle.” She looked terrified. I laughed and went on, “Every mug up there is special. Each one has a memory or meaning attached to it. No matter what you choose, it’s gonna be a ‘good’ one. I did that on purpose when I decluttered; I got rid of the stuff that’s meaningless because life is rich when you use your favorite things every day. But guess what? If you break it, it’s fine. It’s a mug. You’re a person. I care about you way more than I care about a mug.” She smiled, and I’m hopeful that I convinced her.
I believe it’s possible to hold both truths at the same time. You can have beloved possessions that evoke memories, and you can let them go when necessary because you’re not owned by your stuff. The memories remain even when the physical things are gone. So why not get rid of all the stuff? Well, you still need a mug to drink your coffee in the morning. Why wouldn’t you make it a good one?
This is a fine line I’m scratching out here, and I’m not entirely sure I’m doing it well. I try to surround myself with people and things I love; but I’m not so attached to them that I can’t enjoy their daily use and release them when necessary. It’s a balancing act, for sure, and it’s a mindset I’ve had to grow into over several years. This is the first time I’m actually fleshing out my thoughts around it. Joan Didion said, “I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means,” and girlfriend was not lying.
It is freeing to live like this, to be able to appreciate and enjoy nice things but not care so much about them that their condition (or even their existence) compromises my happiness. To live in the moment with friends and family, focusing on them and not the stuff that surrounds us. It’s a fine line, but it is worth not just tiptoeing up to it but dancing right on it. As I sank through the deep, dark waters of grief when I lost people I loved, I clung to those memories and gratitude, for they are worthy life boats. In the meantime, I use the good mug, and when the dishwasher inevitably chips it or I drop it on the counter, I fling an expletive into the universe, sing Que Sera, Sera, and move on to the next good mug without a second thought. Because they’re all good mugs.
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