Just let it all go!
by Robert Meagher on 04/04/18
During January and February I had a blessed experience that
allowed me to practice the art of ‘letting go.’ I was having an experience with
another person that was not looking like or feeling collaborative. My
perception of the situation caused me some irritation, sometimes minor,
sometimes major. For the most part I was confused. I could not understand why
the other person was reacting, behaving, and communicating with me in the
manner they were.
About mid-way through January my disbelief in what was
unfolding gave way to the acceptance that not only did I not understand why the
other person was reacting, behaving, and communicating with me in the manner
they were, but that I could not understand. Oh sure, I could easily hypothesize
what was going on. And I could speak to the person and ask what was ‘really’
going on. But my acceptance was due, in part, to a realization that it was
arrogant of me to think I could understand what was happening. I realized that
it simply was not possible to fully understand all that was transpiring in the
other person’s life to have them behave the way they were behaving. It was
likely the other person was not aware either.
What this acceptance allowed me to do was to not get caught
up in the building emotional aspect to the unfolding. I simply ‘let it all go.’
All of it! My perceptions. My judgements. My belief in what was right or wrong.
I simply decided I was not going to allow myself to get drawn into any
continued unrest, dis-ease, or conflict.
As I stepped back and simply observed what was transpiring,
I was given the precious exercise and practice of not responding in anger to
what were sometimes loud and blasphemous outbursts from the other person. My
choice to not respond back with anger met with further invitations from the
other person to engage in the unfolding battle. The emotional energy kept
rising.
I realized, however, that the minor and major irritations I
had felt early in the unfolding were veiled attempts to mask and suppress my
own anger. You see…irritation, whether minor or major, is merely a flavor of
anger. It’s all anger. Very simply, if we are not in a state of love, we are in
a state of fear that most commonly manifests and expresses itself as anger, or
less blatant flavors of anger, like irritation. But make no mistake about
it—irritation is as much anger as all-out rage!
So I took my minor and major irritations into my meditation
each day and allowed my forgiveness mantras and prayers to cleanse and heal my
irritations and anger. This daily cleansing was such an important step in
allowing myself to forgive both the other and myself. It was only through this
forgiveness process that I could finally arrive at the place where there was no
other person that I was experiencing. There was only a mirror showing me my own
irritation and anger. This ultimate awareness was only possible by first
acknowledging my dis-ease, but then to choose to let it go. The choice to let
it all go gave me the little willingness I needed to heal through forgiveness.