What is letting go? Letting go is severing the attachments that people, places or things have on you. Essentially, it is taking that major step to move forward without looking back. It is something extremely difficult for most to do, particularly if they were victimized by their past and especially if it has had a traumatic effect on the events, or choices, they have made in their life. When you have experienced this, it is like you almost have your past on repeat, living the pain or angst over and over again.

I get it, I too have lived through this. But I am here to tell you that it is so worth getting to the other side of hurt where there is happiness and LIFE. While many of us, me included, needed the help of a therapist to get through it, there are things you can do to get the process started because holding on to pain is not healthy and can hold you back from having the life you desire and deserve.

Making a decision to let go and move through the trauma doesn’t negate it or discount its effect on your life but what it does do is help you break free from your trauma. To get started, here are are some things to consider:

• Allow yourself to feel all the feels: honor your feelings by acknowledging them by speaking to someone, crying when you need to and journaling.
• Accept that you cannot change the past: stop letting the past control you or your mind even your actions, you cannot control it but what happened happened now move forward because that IS within your control.
• Forgive others and yourself: this doesn’t change the events of the past but it helps you heal and move on, it doesn’t mean you will let them back in your life but it does mean what happened doesn’t control you anymore.
• Practice meditation exercises: this helps you be more mindful and peaceful, even breathing exercises letting negativity out and positive emotions in helps a lot.
• Make time for joyful things: filling your life with what and who makes you happy will help you lose yourself in positive experiences and not focus on the past.
• Find your tribe: your tribe is your key support system that you know you can count on; this can be in person or even online.
• Create positive affirmations: reciting these every day, several times a day helps you rewire your thinking to get to a better place (examples could be “I let go”, “I have everything I need”, “I am not burdened by my past”, “My past does not define me”, etc)
• Be compassionate with yourself: we tend to blame ourselves or be hard on ourselves, but it’s important to practice self-love, self-acceptance and know your worth as you are.
• Create distance from the cause of your pain: it’s hard to let go when someone or something is in your face all the time, creating distance helps you disconnect the tether holding you together
• Seek professional help: we often need to have a safe space to heal and therapy provides that in a non-judgmental non-biased way.

No one is worth your peace of mind. No one is worth your misery. No one deserves to take up free space in your mind. Take back control and power over your life by deciding to let go and taking the actions necessary to do it.

TRY THIS: Acknowledge what it is that is holding you back from moving forward and write down a plan of action of how you will work to let it go.

POST IT NOTE: My past does not define me

Click for for recorded segment exclusively on BlastTheRadio.com: LET GO [10:32 mins]

READERS: What are your thoughts on this? Please share in the comments!

One.Step.At.A.Time.

Suzie