The Importance of Letting Go to Move Forward

Evaluate and Appraise

The sense of going forward on a new path has me in a place of assessing everything in life. What that looks like in real time is I’m examining everything. I’m asking myself, ‘Is this something I want to bring forward into a new season of my life?’ While being spiritually minded, I am also quite pragmatic. I’m a “if it doesn’t fit anymore, get rid of it’ kind of person. At the same time, I have journals dating back to 1980’s.

Last week, I stumbled on THE FOUR TENDENCIES QUIZ by Gretchen Rubin. Of course I took the quiz. What did I discover? Something I already knew about myself. But I love this kind of stuff. I was intrigued. That sent me digging around her website. When I ran across her latest book Life in Five Senses. And of course, again, I just had to take the quiz. This time however I discovered something about myself that took me by surprise. The assessment was spot on. It just happens to fit rights into the phase of life examination in which I find myself.

My Journey

When my life went on the skids thirty five years ago, and I found myself in recovery for codependency I have been on a passionate quest of self development. I lived off the writings of John Bradshaw [On The Family], Pat Springle [Conquering Codependency], Melody Beattie [Codependent No More]and Pia Mellody [Facing Codependency].

It was the late 1980’s. The whole idea of codependency was new relatively new then. Thankfully the subject has gotten more attention over the years. Recovery and support groups offer incredible helped me in my search to disentangle from the enmeshment of codependency and family dysfunction.

Over the years I’ve read books by Henry Cloud and John Townsend, Brené Brown and more recently the happiness author, Gretchen Rubin. I’ve been an avid journaler for as long as I can remember. I’ve journaled through every step of my quest. When I was burned out I journaled my way through Eileen McDargh’s From Burnout to Breakthrough. I don’t want to just read it. I want the do the work. I want out the other side. My journey has taught me that if you are willing to do the work you will find yourself walking out the trappings of dysfunction.

As a Bible teacher why do I turn to the self help community for assistance?

Reason 1:

If I want to learn how to bake a cake I’m not going to ask a personal trainer. I’m going to ask someone who has experience in that field. If I want to learn how to rewire a light switch I’m going to ask an electrician. If I want to learn about faith I’m going to ask someone who has experience in having lived by faith. I’m not going to ask someone who doesn’t believe God is going to show up for them. If I want to develop a healthy frame of mind I’m not going to seek the counsel of someone who is always in a negative head space. If I want to learn how to set healthy life boundaries, I’m going to turn to boundary guru’s Henry Cloud and John Townsend.

Reason 2:

In my experience, unfortunately, I have found that many church environments can be just as dysfunctional as my abusive family of origin. I”m not going to take relationship advice from someone whose assessment of others through a religious lens that is critical, condemning and judgmental. I’m going to seek out those who are living a life anchored in the grace of God. I am also going to look for those who live by the values I have for my own life. Things like loving accountability, trustworthiness, emotional maturity, genuine and open dialog.

Making Decisions

Entering a new phase in life usually means having to making certain decisions. I’ve had to make some pretty tough relational decisions lately. Coming from a highly dysfunctional family we are often exposed to the destructive behavior of others. While I’m not one to dictate what I think someone else should do, I do set boundaries for my own life. That usually means I withdraw myself from situations that violate those boundaries. I don’t apologize for having boundaries. I don’t explain why I’ve set the boundaries I have. They simply are my boundaries.

For instance,

I refuse to be around someone who is being physically or verbally violent. I drew that line in my own life a number of years ago. My family of origin were known for lashing out both physically and verbally. In my effort to heal and recover I took a conflict management course. I needed to learn new skills. I not only had to learn how to get my own anger under control, I had to learn how to engage with someone who allowed their emotions to explode on me.

I had to make a decision. My decision was: ‘I’m done with that.’ I won’t be around it anymore. Now, I when faced with that kind of situation, I remove myself.

Physically and emotionally explosive people are not typically rational in the moment. After years of practice I can now say something like: “I’d love to discuss this with you when you are able to talk calmly.”

Assessing more than relationships with others

I’m also assessing my relationship with myself. I like something Gretchen Rubin wrote in 2020.

“I didn’t want to empty or quiet my mind; I wanted to flood my mind with sensations. I wanted to go on a quest though the world, to explore. I wanted new impressions to pour in, in ways that I couldn’t predict, to stir up the unexpected memories, remote associations, surprising connections, and overlooked facts. I wanted to reflect on the present and the future; I wanted to get back inside my body by getting outside my head. I wanted to feel free, to play.”

Gretchen Rubin

WHAT DO I WANT TO KEEP IN MY LIFE

I’m assessing not only what I want to do but how I want to show up for myself. I want to play. I might be 65 years old but I still enjoy playtime. I love drawing and coloring. I like going to the park. I love watching children play. They have such exuberance for it. There is so much freedom in play. Play frees the mind to imagine, improves brain function, relieves stress, helps with our sense of humor and sense of hope,

Everyone plays differently. I’m an explorer and a thinker. I like discovering something new. I love stimulating my mind. I love learning Not everyone does. But I do. I thrive on it. So one of the going forward decisions I’ve made is to find creative ways to explore through play.

Evaluating Commitment to Physical

I’m also reevaluating my commitment and approach to physical fitness. Several years ago I had a personal trainer. I loved it because it fit my personality. I know myself enough to know that if I pay for it, I’m going to follow through. After a while it wasn’t about building the habit. It was so much a part of my routine that it fell in the category of discipline. It was a life discipline until something interrupted my life. That interruption was living with the physical and mental restrictions of long covid symptoms. Once I make a decision about something I will follow through. I also happen to currently live with a personal trainer.

WHAT DO I WANT TO GET RID OF?

Okay, so the first thing I got rid of was all my old journals. I can hear the gasp from all my fellow journalers. It was not a rash decision. I’m at a very specific juncture in my life. I think many in the Ekklesia are. It’s time to step onto the new path.

The Past

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? – Isaiah 43:18-19

The old path got me to where I’m at now. But I have to make some changes in order to walk the new path ahead. That means there are going to be some things I’m going to have to let go of. A great resource is Henry Cloud’s book Necessary Endings.

Even the good things have to be examined with willingness to let go if necessary. My old journals is the chronicle of my old journey. It’s all the stuff I had to process through during the last season of my life. But I know God is taking me and others in a new direction. The old is over. The new is beginning.

Let’s get ready for the new

Everyone has to do what they feel God is leading them to do in order to position themselves for going forward.

Another big shift I did was eliminating three out of my four websites. I had to get real with myself. What was working and what isn’t. What is God saying. What am I holding on to that I really need to let go of? Once I made the decision to make the shift, the shift came easy. Once I let go of trying to keep up with it all I freed myself to focus on the one thing God has called me to do.

I’ve also had to come to terms with the fact that God hasn’t called me to do all the things other people think I should be doing. The path ahead has very specific boundaries. Anything that doesn’t fit within those boundaries gets eliminated.

Like many others I find myself in a phase of reassessment and evaluation. I am examining every aspect of life to determine what to bring forward into the new season. My self-development journey, has prepared me for making the changes I need to make today. The importance of seeking guidance from those with relevant experience has equipped me with the knowledge and skills I need to make changes. The process of letting go is preparing me for the new phase. My focus now is on the necessity of endings in order to step into the new beginning.

Here’s to the New Beginnings!

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