The Power of Letting Go

Day 24 (a day early) of Gwen Bell's Best of 2009 Blog Challenge:"Learning experience. What was a lesson you learned this year that changed you?" There wasn't one pivotal Oprah-like moment, but the big overarching lesson I learned this year was about the power of letting go. What can I say...I've lived a lot of years as a Type A, perfectionist, control freak. But I have learned -- in large part due to many conversations with my excellent therapist and my excellent (um, also a therapist) husband -- to let go of a lot of things this year; everything from the emotional (e.g., anger and resentment towards people I feel have wronged me in the past) to the tangible (e.g., perfect housekeeping) to the self-constructed and self-destructive (e.g., desire for a zeroed out inbox at the end of each day). It's rather paradoxical actually; we have the power (i.e., control) to be less controlling...it's all a matter of shifting perspective and expectations.

At the end of the day, the important stuff rises to the top and gets taken care of. And the best thing? When I let go of the frantic, dissatisfied energy, it makes room for the creative energy to come in and all sorts of cool stuff results.