152: Releasing What No Longer Serves You
What do you feel in your body when I talk about letting go of anger? Letting go of guilt? Letting go of sadness? Letting go of grief?
Notice the physical response in your body, maybe it was a tightening in your throat, a knot in your belly, a weight on your chest. Whatever it was, is your body’s physical reaction to the thought of letting go of something that you are not ready to let go of.As I’ve been sharing here, we are working through the Life After Child Loss Program together as a bonus inside of Grieving Moms haven. The Life After Child Loss Program follows my C.A.R.R.Y.ing Grief Method. And in August, we are diving into the second R, which is all about Releasing. Letting go of things that are no longer serving you.
I want to say this, I recently had an experience that was a reminder to me why it’s so important to actually work with someone, instead of just trying to do it yourself. You can work through all I teach and share here on your own. It’s a beautiful thing. I love that I can offer steps and tools to help you, but seriously, if you want deep and lasting change, and you want to feel the incredible experience that coaching is, that processing emotions in real time is, you have to join Grieving Moms Haven, or come to my in person Retreat this fall. There is nothing like taking what you’ve learned here, what you’ve experienced through this podcast, and taking it to the next level. If you have enjoyed this podcast, or even if this podcast has changed your life in some way, and helped you on your grief journey, you need to come to my in person Retreat. If your life is anything like mine, you are busy all day long, taking care of kids, their needs, going from one thing to next, before you’ve even had a chance to sit down, you realize it’s already 2 pm and you have to start thinking about supper. It can certainly feel like there is no time for you to take a moment to yourself, let alone take the time you need to grieve the loss of your child. It can be so difficult to make this time in your day to day life, so give yourself the gift of experience, of time to recharge, of time to heal, of time to process. You deserve this. You deserve a break. You deserve to take some time for yourself to be taken care of at this retreat. You deserve a time where you aren’t being pushed to be better, you aren’t being pushed to move on, a time where you can be exactly where you are without judgment. Come join us in person, and truly experience what it feels like to be with others walking the same journey as you, who also want to heal and learn how to live again after your child dies. Register at www.meganhillukka.com/retreat
Okay, so back to letting go of things no longer serving you.
Letting go of emotions, thoughts, beliefs that are keeping you stuck.
There is so much fear about letting go, because maybe you feel like someone is judging you or trying to force you to let go.
I will say this, there is no benefit to trying to let go until you are fully ready to. Until you’ve processed it, and you will come to a place in your body and mind where you can fully let it go.
Letting go feels like you are letting go of control. It feels like you are giving up a part of yourself, which essentially you are. If you’ve become this certain person, or a way of being, you have to let go of something, to keep moving forward.
The first part of this is this. You have held onto whatever you are holding on to, an emotion, a thought, a belief up until this point because it’s served you and supported you in some way or another. Let go of the judgment you might have of yourself about it. It’s serving you in some way, even if it feels painful. It has been there to support you, it’s been there for a reason. Can you first thank it for being there?
I often do a meditation where I guide the moms through imagining a wall around them, and sometimes we judge that wall as something bad, as it shouldn’t be there. But if you can take a moment to recognize that this wall has been there to protect you. Your body and brain does everything it can to protect you and keep you safe, and if you can take a moment to thank it, and see how it’s trying to help you, then you can open up to what’s underneath.
Ask yourself, why am I holding on to this? Why do I need this? How is this helping me? Give yourself some time and space to really pause around this question, as nothing will change until you are honest with yourself about it.
I like to share this story of a rocket ship going to space, when it starts out on the ground, it needs a lot of parts, but if it’s going to make it all the way to space, it has to release and let go of things as it continues its journey. It will not make it to space if it insists on holding on to every piece of it because it was there in front of the start.
As humans we shift, change, morph, become different people many times in our lives. Especially after your child dies, you change on a very deep level. You will become a different person whether you want to or not. In the beginning of grief, it feels like a crisis, because who you are is not who you were, and it’s a painful experience that needs to be grieved as well.
With this, you begin to process an emotion, let’s take guilt for example, when you work through the guilt, process it, feel it, allow it, there may come a time for you, as it did for me, when you are ready to let go of it. When you are ready to let go of the suffering that the guilt is bringing to your life. When you are ready to be done beating yourself up, and you just don’t go there in your mind anymore. But until then it can feel impossible. Like this is just the truth and the way it is.
So letting go and releasing isn’t for anyone else to come tell you it’s time to let go of something, it’s for you to do the work in your own life and decide if that’s something you want to do or not.
The other part of letting go has to do with fear. If you let go of an emotion, a way of being, a way of living, what are you afraid of?
Let’s take an example of sadness. If you let go of sitting in sadness every single day, of the heavy weight and cloud that covers you every single day, what would that mean about you?
Often, we are afraid to let go of guilt, anger, sadness, resentment, because of what we are afraid it makes us mean. For example, what kind of mom whose child died, would ever not be sad? Or if you let go of the guilt, maybe you are letting go of your child? If you let go of anger and forgive someone if you need to, are you okay with what happened, and are you moving on?
This is a huge layer underneath all of the fear of letting go, because if you don’t understand this about yourself, or see why you are holding on to it, then you will never let go. If you believe you deserve to suffer, then you will never let go of guilt. Guilt keeps you in suffering, cycling in struggle and pain. And if you believe you deserve it, and you don’t know who you would be without it, it’s very challenging to take those next steps forward into letting it go. That’s why Grieving Moms Haven is so helpful. It’s there for you to have guidance, tools, and support as you work through these layers and challenges in your grief journey.
I recently had a client tell me that she can’t do this alone. She needs guidance and help. It’s too much to work through this herself, and if you are feeling this way, maybe you are also struggling with the idea that you should be able to do it on your own. Yet, having a guide and someone to walk side by side with you not only is life changing, but it helps you have a place to hold onto when everything else is chaotic and falling apart around you.
Remember, no one can tell you when it’s time to let go of something, and maybe you are trying to let go of something before you are ready to. Maybe you want to be done with the pain, but you haven’t processed the pain, so your body and mind isn’t ready to let go. So- process the pain first, allow yourself to fully feel and move through the experience, this does not mean wallowing or cycling in it, but allowing it. And then at some point, you can ask yourself, what am I ready to let go of? What am I ready to release?
It’s so freeing to let go of the thoughts that cause so much suffering, and keep you cycling and stuck in grief. Even though it may feel impossible for you to ever let go of something, I promise it’s available to you, especially when you allow and process the pain. I’m always holding on to hope for you, until you are ready to hold on to it yourself.
Let me know what you think. I always love to connect with you, message me on Instagram at Cultivate Family, or share your podcast episode in stories on Instagram, I love to hear from you.
If you like this podcast, and found it helpful, I want to invite you come check out Grieving Moms Haven, my monthly community for Grieving moms, where you can learn positive coping mechanisms, find a safe space with others who understand, and learn life long skills that support you as you learn how to carry this weight of grief in your life.
There are group coaching calls where we do guided meditations, tapping meditations, breathwork, and just talk, knowing that everyone in the group is also walking the path of child loss
You can come check out Grieving Moms Haven at www.grievingmomshaven.com
