How to let go and heal...

emotionally, spiritually and practically.

A user’s guide

I’ve learned the hard way that unblocking yourself and letting your emotions flow is akin to unblocking a really gross sink clog…

But I’ve also learned the hard way how messy it is to live with blockages, when you refuse to feel and process the big stuff, and how that messes up every aspect of your being.

It’s really common for us to compartmentalise, shut out and deny our hurts – mainly so we can carry on with our busy lives, but also so we don’t have to admit to ourselves and others that everything isn’t always fabulous.

The horror!

We were raised with unrealistic standards to uphold – and that has really let us down as a society.

It’s time to let go of that drive to always be okay, to always be moving and achieving, and instead to welcome in that middle bit that we all try to rush through or skip over.

If you believe, as I do, that we are here on planet earth for a full, rich and varied experience, then everything cannot be awesome all the time.  Things end and change happens, and it is part of the human experience to feel pain and process that.

Only by processing and letting go can we make room for the new stuff. 

And that doesn’t happen overnight.

One step at a time

Before I move on, this is really important: the new stuff you make room for can’t be all achievement-based. 

Society is so geared toward achievement and it’s so ingrained in us all, I can almost hear your mind busily planning away to replace whatever you just let go of with a shiny, upgraded version of the same thing.

Letting go of an old exhausting job doesn’t mean replacing it with a new exhausting job.

Letting go of a relationship doesn’t mean catapulting yourself into the land of dating to immediately replace it.

There is a place between the old and the new.  A magical place for learning and for healing.  This is the place where you are on holiday, spiritually speaking.  It is not time to work, or even to check your metaphorical emails.

It is a place for whimsy, wondering, and wandering too!

 

Seasonal changes

Since this was written in the magical season of autumn, and there were two full moons this month, this is a great time to talk rituals.

Personally, I’ve been through the enormously cleansing ritual of scrubbing, clearing, planning and creating my new home from top to bottom, after finally moving across the country to begin a new phase of my life.

Now I've done so, I'm not looking to immediately gather more items that will one day become the clutter I need to clear out again.  Instead, I’m honouring the place and space that I’m in.  Even if it feels a bit strange!

Buying more stuff is one of those mysterious things we do, believing it will make us feel better or somehow more secure.  It can seem almost as if we are using the physical weight of ‘stuff’ to anchor us in place.

I think this is one of the reasons that decluttering is such a spiritual experience, as we let go of perceived weight with the items we clear out, as well as their emotional heaviness.

So how will you mark this season of the year or this season of your life? 

If you too are in the process of letting someone or something (or both) go and beginning to heal, then may I suggest finding some fun and lighthearted ways to be in the present, to wonder and to wander.

Let’s have some fun

Since life can't be all hard work, no matter how much your societal conditioning wants that to be the case, I suppose (*sigh 😉) we'd better write some fun into the plan.

When you are healing from a life change, as many of us are this year, then you might not immediately recognise the role enjoyment can play here.  But bear with me.

In truth, nothing in life is binary. 

Grief isn’t all sadness – there are moments of laughter as you remember the good times.  And healing isn’t all shadow work and comfort eating – there too are moments of joy.

That joy might come from a fond memory, the realisation that you're growing spiritually and emotionally, or simply from allowing yourself to be present and peaceful.

Here’s the punchline…

We spend so much of our lives in a hurry that we deny ourselves fun and joy, believing we need to work harder in order to find our best path in life, our purpose, or that gold at the end of the rainbow.

But… it’s a trap!

In this never-ending push, we miss all the signs about our purpose.  We don’t spot the rainbows before they fade.  We were just too busy.

When we can be brave enough to ignore that societal pressure to push ourselves every waking second, and just be in the present, this is when the magic starts to happen for us.

In this space in between all the doing, we begin to hear ourselves think, and we begin to feel again.  This is where the best healing happens, and also where the best insights occur.

So let me wrap up by saying this.  If you want to heal, then you need to let go and allow.  

If you want to know what you should be doing with your life, you have to pause the endless doing and start feeling.  

And if you want to enjoy life, allow in some fun.