Letting go?

What does is mean to let go? Thoughts or emotions of the situation or both? I don't understand how to let go of the thoughts their always in my mind I remember the event..If you always remember can you ever let go?

Life is full of situations, good and bad. If there is deep meaning to what has happened, it is easy (I would say even natural) to fixate on it. But you have to find a way to make peace with what happened. Not only will you grow through that process, you will feel at ease again.

Well, something really embarassing happened to me in elementary school and I thought I was going to live with that embarassment for the rest of my life. Well, of course the memory is still there, but later on I just learned to accept it and be okay with it. It's not really about letting go, it's more like settling down with it. Same with grief and whatever. Enough time and effort makes you see anything from a larger, easier perspective I find.

For me, 'letting go' means accepting the situation for it is and not overanalyzing it or dreaming of a different outcome.

Accepting the event/circumstances for what they are is helpful.

I used to spend a lot of time imagining the past to be different. It took a lot of time to not think about it. Staying busy and keeping my mind occupied with other thoughts helped.

Placid wrote:Life is full of situations, good and bad. If there is deep meaning to what has happened, it is easy (I would say even natural) to fixate on it. But you have to find a way to make peace with what happened. Not only will you grow through that process, you will feel at ease again.

I feel as though that may be why I can't let it go because I haven't made peace with the situation. I still very much love the person that hurt me but I'm also still mad at what he did. I can't figure out a way to stop being mad about it I have said I forgiven him to myself and him and I truly fell like I do forgive him but that hasn't made much of a change in the way I think and feel about it.

-- Mon Dec 01, 2014 3:07 pm --

zalamander wrote:Well, something really embarassing happened to me in elementary school and I thought I was going to live with that embarassment for the rest of my life. Well, of course the memory is still there, but later on I just learned to accept it and be okay with it. It's not really about letting go, it's more like settling down with it. Same with grief and whatever. Enough time and effort makes you see anything from a larger, easier perspective I find.

I can definitely say I've been able to let things like that go with time but I also think it helped that as time passed all of that stayed in the past the difference for me now is I see this person all the time and I feel like I've never been able to get over something someone did unless they were completely out of my life to never see again but in this case that is not a possibility. So I need to find a way to put someone's actions in the past while I still have them in my life.

jaus tail wrote:For me, 'letting go' means accepting the situation for it is and not overanalyzing it or dreaming of a different outcome.

Accepting the event/circumstances for what they are is helpful.

I used to spend a lot of time imagining the past to be different. It took a lot of time to not think about it. Staying busy and keeping my mind occupied with other thoughts helped.

I agree that does help a lot it's strange though I am able to accept it for what it is for only a brief time it doesn't seem to last. I've also been using the "Thought Defusion" DBT skill to get some relief but again it doesn't stay gone. I guess I just want to totally forget it all together but I think I'm asking too much there unless maybe hypnosis could erase the memory! And also my focus on wishing it would just go away probably doesn't help much either :\

I spent entire last evening thinking about a different past. So i've realized that accepting the past is not easy and it's ok.

Some wounds are tough to heal and every person is different.

I guess i've learnt from my mistakes, so i try to use what i've learnt in my life.

Also, i write stories, so i'll often write about characters who havent made the mistakes that i have.

And i guess everyone makes mistakes. I dont believe in hell or heaven and if there is, then i will wait for death to come and then face hell for my mistakes but not now. I dont have to crucify myself. I also have to make sure that i dont repeat my mistakes.

Its tough. i often think that others are perfect since they havent made the mistakes that i made but its ok. maybe they have made mistakes and i dont know about it. who knows, the colleague sitting opposite me, might be still wetting his bed in sleep. or the woman in the other cabin might've broken the ceiling fan by hanging clothes by the fan blades and switching the fan on in an attempt to quickly dry the clothes

i try to be loyal to myself and look after myself. take care