The Art Of Letting Go

"Some birds are not meant to be caged, that’s all. Their feathers are too bright, their songs too sweet and wild. So you let them go, or when you open the cage to feed them they somehow fly out past you. And the part of you that knows it was wrong to imprison them in the first place rejoices, but still, the place where you live is that much more drab and empty for their departure." —  Stephen King, Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption: A Story from Different Seasons 

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Everyone has heard the line "you need to let go and move on" in their lifetime. Easy to say to someone, fucking difficult to do when you're the one living in the center of it. It’s a dark place. It hurts to hold on and it’s also a painful process to let go. It crushes you to your very core coming to the realization that someone you’ve loved is no longer a part of your life anymore. It's uncomfortable, it's dreaded emptiness, it’s glimpses of devastation, it’s suffering and sometimes self-destructive, it feels like you're drowning and you forgot how to swim, it's anxiety, madness and overthinking, it's a foreign place, a language you do not understand, and sometimes it's never getting closure. Every second, minute of the day feels like it's stretched out like the ocean shores whilst you’re trying to heal the brokenness that lives inside of you. Some people have mastered the art of letting go, while others remain stuck for what feels like an eternity, not knowing when the person they lost that continues living on inside of them will come out. It’s a soft-hearted sacrifice loving someone greater than you love yourself.  

 

But holding on to someone is like holding onto a rope whilst dangling above the earth. You’re full of fear that you’re going to fall, that you would die if you just let go. You’re holding on so tight that your hands start to weaken, you’re getting tired from putting all your strength into holding onto the rope, your grip loosens for a bit and you fall midway, skinning your hands on the way down as you desperately try to cling on. You breathe a sigh of relief because you thought you lost the rope. You try to climb back up again, only your skinned hands are in agony, it’s becoming incredibly painful to continue holding onto the rope, you can feel the skin on your hands breaking apart, you lose your grip again and fall to the ground. At first, yes, the fall hurts, but you are able to stand back up on your own two feet, dust yourself and look back up to the top of the rope in awe that you survived. See, at first you were fearful of letting go of the rope because you thought the fall would kill you, only it was holding onto the rope that caused you the most pain, ripped you apart and made you feel exhausted. 

 

I know it hurts to say goodbye to someone when all your heart wants to do is hold on for dear life. Your heart trashes around your chest like an angry Great White Shark in a cage, you’re pulled vigorously like a puppet on strings, you gasp for air because it feels like you’ve been kicked in lungs and punched in the throat. It's days, weeks, months and even years of emotions coming and going. But letting go and moving on is not about controlling the waves that come over you, let them come, because they will. Some will be a tsunami, others will be gentle waves kissing the shore, it’s about keeping your boat floating and moving forward to a safe haven, a place of peace and happiness.  

 

In order to let go you need to learn to accept. Accept that closure is truly a rare phenomenon. Accept you won’t ever get the answer you want to hear. You'll never get the apology you needed. Accept that this person is no longer a part of your life moving forward, but instead apart of your past, filled with wonderful memories. You’ll need to embrace change. Embrace that your daily routine will not involve seeing or talking to this person, instead give yourself something else to look forward to in the day, free yourself from the attachment that once was there. Embrace new relationships or new projects or hobbies that will help you grow, learn and heal in order to find inner peace and happiness again. You'll need to modify your expectations. This will keep you from becoming attached to a preconceived vision that is not guaranteed. Ask yourself what do you value? What type of person do you want to be? Who do you want to be around? If the next person who comes into your life doesn’t have what you value most, don’t waste your time. Remember what you deserve and know you are capable of love. You need to forget what hurt you but never forget what it taught you. Sadly, some of life’s greatest lessons come from the ones who loved and hurt us. And lastly, you need to know you’re not alone in this fight, and you never will be, many people will be feeling the same way you are. So, don’t give up, don’t close your heart to the world and don’t stop believing that tomorrow could be a better day.  

 

The process of letting go never happens overnight. You’ll need to master patience and trust the process. Some days you'll put up a really good fight but still lose, and that’s okay, spit the blood out from your mouth, get back up and try again. The day will come where you see everything differently, you’ll wake up one day and notice the pain in your chest has subsided, the heart feels like it’s mended, the fog around your head has cleared, and you’ll look back and be reminded that while it did hurt at the time, you've now changed, you've now grown, your heart that once was so heavy is lighter and everything worked out just as it should when your heart finally decided the day to let everything you held on to so tight go.  

  

  

  

Maybe the lost do come back, but you don’t have to answer

“I have learned that people will stay, leave, save, and destroy you, but by far the most dangerous thing they can ever do is come back”. - Beau Tauplin, The Arsenal 

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I didn't know it at the time, but I met the love of my life about ten years ago. He didn't come to me all shiny and wrapped in a red bow with a big neon sign pointing at him saying "this is your soulmate" either. It was far from that. He came wrapped in jumpers and a beanie with a big goofy smile on his face and brown eyes that glistened like melted chocolate. We met through a mutual friend over beers and a fire in the middle of winter. We became friends instantly. There was an undeniable click between us. We fooled around together for a little while and naturally feelings began developing over time, until the inevitable happened, right out of left field, it felt like a baseball had hit me in the temple...he found someone else. 

I was devastated, more upset than I thought I would be. Maybe I was in denial about how much I liked him? We stopped talking after that for a long period. There wasn’t a day that went by where I didn’t think of him or miss him; but I went on with my life, as did he, with her. So I dated other people with him still on my mind, I took gym and my health really seriously, went out with friends, worked my hours at work and before I knew it roughly six months had passed before that day came, the day he decided to come back into my life with a simple “hey, how have you been?” message that appeared on my phone. And this is the part I should have hit delete and continued on with my life but didn’t, because I knew right down to my very soul we weren’t meant to end there. Seeing his name gave me so many mixed emotions - I was pissed as all hell to the point I threw my phone across the room, I threw out a big “fuck you, why?!” to the universe, I wanted answers, yet I was also relieved I had him back in my life. But from that day forward I felt myself build a wall bigger than the Great Wall of China around my heart (or so I thought). From that day I refrained from showing any kind of emotion to him in order to protect myself. 

Weeks, months, years went on, where we’d talk about any anything and nothing, we never ran out of things to say. And even if there were spaces in between we’d pick back off where we left it. That’s the funny thing about soulmates, nothing ever goes away or gets fully lost, the energy from them stays lingering in your soul. I did however refrain myself from seeing him for a long time because I was scared of what I would feel for him if I were to lay my eyes on him, I knew that wall I built around me would come crashing down. We always knew something was there for us, but neither of us were willing to admit it to each other, though everyone could see it. So in the space of ten years we both got other partners and went on with our lives but always came back to one another because the pull was too strong. Our connection with each other was and has never been toxic. It’s very calming, like we knew each other from another life. We accepted each other’s flaws, we never fought, we’ve always supported one another. With him I’ve always felt safe, with him it feels like home. 

I didn’t want to admit it to myself but I knew for certain I was in love with him on his 30th birthday and I knew deep down he was in love with me...until he kissed another chick in front of my very eyes and to be fair we were just friends but I was back in heartbreak city all over again. I should have said my goodbyes then and there but I couldn’t, once again our connection was far too deep to throw it away, though I did shut him out a bit for months after this to protect myself again. The thing is with us, timing has never been on our side, he was always away for work or we both were in relationships and the universe just didn’t want us to line up and when we did line up I was too fearful of getting hurt again so it was best to just remain friends. We both knew somewhere along the way we fucked up some chances to be together but I always knew one day we'd finally get there when the timing was right.

Fast forward a year later and I get the message I never wanted to receive - “I’m moving interstate in a few weeks”. Well fuck, my stomach dropped, I’d be damned, my soul ached over this, this person was no longer going to be anywhere near me. So he moved away for work and we still kept in contact. Then I was hit with the news before Christmas that I had a cancerous tumor to my liver with a diagnosis of five to nine years to live and everything about us come into perspective. There was no way I was going to leave this earth without the person I knew I was meant to be with by my side because I was fearful of getting hurt. I loved him and I didn’t give a fuck about distance or timing anymore. This guy was my soulmate. What we had was just far too rare and too strong, I’ve never experienced it with any other person. He was the first person I called when I found out the news, he was there for me when I came out of ICU and was constantly checking up on me when I got to finally come home and for that I am forever grateful and can never repay him for the way he made me feel.

It was a bittersweet moment. We finally got our shit together after I was on the mend and admitted we were in love with each other and I was cancer free! It honestly was a very freeing moment, releasing years of built up emotions towards each other. He brought even more colour to my world. Kissing him again for the first time in ten years was euphoric. Each day and the time I had with him was precious. Until tragically, after a few months doing the long distance relationship, we parted ways. I could physically feel the pain in my chest, you’d think the next continent could hear the thrashing and breaking of my heart, it was so ferocious, it felt like my whole body had been swallowed up by quick sand as I stood in front of the person I loved for many years, tears swelling like I could drown in them. I had a lump in my throat with all the words I wanted to spit out but swallowed because I couldn’t even string a proper sentence together to explain the way I ached. It felt like my chest cavity got heavy, like someone put a 100 kilo vest on me and it was about to crush my bones around my heart. I wanted us to defy the odds until we could be together in the one place. He was my person. 

- 

I saw him for the first time, roughly three months after we ended. That knock on my door echoed through my body and I almost lost my breath for a minute. My blood was racing though my veins, pure adrenaline, as I was about to face the guy who broke my heart but yet the guy I loved with every fiber of my being. There he was, tired from his early morning flight, but as handsome as I remember since the last time I saw his face, the face I thought I’d never see again. His brown eyes were as dark as ever that morning, they change colour based on his mood. Sometimes they turn into a chestnut honey colour, other times they’re darker than my morning coffee. His scar under his eye creased as he smiled at me. I don’t know why but that scar gets me weak, it’s one of my favourite things on his body I love to kiss. I honestly can’t even remember what was said, but I remember feeling a whole lot of sadness and regret as he sat in front of me while tears were forming in my eyes ready to break. Regret we both didn’t just go for it sooner because timing, distance and fear was in the way, regret for holding back our feelings for one another for so long, regret for going round in circles like we were revolving doors, regret for not trying hard enough. The love is there and it's real and that’s what hurts the most, loving someone so much but you cannot be with them at this moment in life...and trust me I tried with every ounce of my being to fight for it, to fight for the person I love. 

So maybe you'll hug your loved ones a little longer, or call the person you're in love with and express to them how you feel, or try a little harder and put in more effort in your relationship after you read this. I wish I could say I had a happy ending to this story and I hope one day I will and I am able to share it. Maybe one day we’ll realize we can’t live without each other and we will give it another shot or maybe one day the lost does come back and maybe that’s the day I finally don’t answer.