The Little Book of Letting Go. Hugh Prather
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around this room of horrors, I sensed that something was out of place. Although there were children of all ages present, most of them were 'tweens and teens, and as you might see at any party, they were gathering in groups of twos and threes, talking to each other. There was no entertainment as yet and the food had not been served, but as my eyes went from one child to the next, I realized that just as I would expect “healthy” children to be, these afflicted kids were happy. The “something” out of place was their attitude. The room was filled with their giggling and laughter.
Soon I found myself talking to a teenage girl named Lisa, who had worked very hard the last few years to perfect her skills as a model. Now half her body, including her face, was paralyzed from a car accident, and she was standing by means of aluminum crutches that clamped above her elbows. As two other adults and I talked to her, she suddenly lost her balance and fell straight backward, hitting the floor like a tree. When we got her to her feet, there were tears in her eyes from the pain. But Lisa smiled a crooked smile and said, “At least I'm finally getting a hard butt.”
“Getting a hard butt” is not spiritual language. But what could be more spiritual than this girl's reaction? I have no idea what Lisa's religious beliefs were. Nor do I know if any child in that room believed in God. But the light, the laughter, and the joy of the Divine poured from them all. They needed no belief for that to happen, but they did need to be in the present, as children so often are. What was especially instructive to me was that their healed minds were more real and important to them than the wreckage of their bodies.
To replicate a childlike approach to happiness is not to behave as children behave, but to see as they see. It is letting go of narrow perceptions and habitual responses. It is relaxing and restfully acknowledging that the people around us are the way they are and that we are here with them. To “become like a little child” is merely to relinquish our need to judge all things, change all things, and be right on all occasions. This removes the blocks we put on our capacity to enjoy, or at least to be still and at peace.
There are only three things you need to let go of: judging, controlling, and being right. Release these three and you will have the whole mind and twinkly heart of a child.
If nothing else, little children are direct. They feel what they feel; they know what they want. Clearly, they are connected to their cores, their basic natures. But children are not perfect and invulnerable. Actually they are more vulnerable than most parents seem to realize. They take on both the positive and negative lessons that their parents and early life experiences teach. They especially pick up the strong unspoken fears and urges of the adults around them.
You may look back now and remember that as a small child you could see that a certain approach to life on the part of one or both of your parents was a mistake. You may even remember thinking that you were not going to make that mistake when you were grown. Yet, as an adult, perhaps you have found yourself saying the very words or acting the same way you were determined to avoid. You took on a pattern even though you were aware it was a mistake! That's how vulnerable we are as children. As adults, we can become more conscious of the taking on and letting go process and thus take charge of the peace and well being of our minds.
Perhaps you know a child who has become judgmental and controlling at much too young an age. I'm not speaking of “the terrible twos,” because a close look at this stage shows that although it's filled with lots of “No”s and “I won't”s, there is really no bitterness or deep grievance behind any of this. The child is simply trying out “taking the wheel”—a good and necessary stage.
Yet there are children who learn judgment, even hatred, at a surprisingly young age. The need to control always comes along with censure and self-righteousness. You don't like what you see out there and you want to change it. In fact, you believe it's your moral duty to change it.
If you have seen this happen to children, you know that they also lose contact with their basic happiness and certainty. They have been taught to doubt others and they can't help but apply that lesson to themselves. Once they begin doubting themselves, they think they must control themselves. They are not reliable, and, naturally, no one else is either.
When our minds are given over to judging and being right, individuals of any age think they know how they want the world to look. But now their attention is riveted on what is outside of them. To “look in their hearts” becomes a strange, even frightening concept. It has been so long since they cast their gaze in that direction that they doubt that anything but darkness is there.
Letting Go of the Fear of Letting Go
Letting go of judgment and control has no downside. What possible harm could come from practicing the simplicity of not having to be somebody, and of not requiring our friends and family to be other than who they are? We can cross the street without becoming a “pedestrian.” We can drive to work without becoming a “commuter.” We can walk the dog without becoming a “pet owner.” And we can extend our hand to our child without becoming “the parent.”
We only need to be as we were created—effortless, present, and free. No additional history, status, or attitude is required. What need have we to make money, education, religion, or race the banner of our righteousness? What need have we to stand apart from one another, wrapped in our childhood damage like a bloody cloak? Our childhood is over. All our accumulated differences are like dust on the skin, and the members of our human family hold out their hearts to us each day.
If we could dine out without turning into the “customer,” we would have a chance of feeling our equality with the person serving us. If we could report for jury duty without turning into the “citizen” who must deal with a “county clerk,” we would have a chance of seeing our oneness with the person who stands before us. Our identity can change like the distorted reflections in a line of storefront windows—or it can remain the same, like the lovely image of a child held forever in the heart of a parent.
Those in our lives who make the most meaningful and enduring contributions to who we are have dared to take their place among equals. The world stares in amazement at the glittering adornments of the ego, but only those who walk beside us in love and equality reach our hearts and transform us.
Suggested time: 1 or more days
The next time you are in a store, restaurant, mall, workplace, or just walking down a crowded sidewalk, pick out one or, if you have time, two or three individuals, and, in turn, practice becoming them for a few moments. How does it feel to wear their clothes (can you feel the cloth against your skin?), to have their hair or no hair, to walk as they walk or cannot walk, to gesture as they gesture? Do their eyes occasionally look to the side or dart around like all of our eyes do, as if the one inside who is looking out is a little uncertain, a little vulnerable? It's a very big, unpredictable world out there. Without analysis, inferiority, condescension, or perspective—in other words, without thinking about it—what is it like to feel as they feel and think as they think?
Try doing this today, and if it is enjoyable, for the next few days. Perhaps you will be struck with ordinariness. Perhaps you will sense that we are pretty much alike, and that we are all in this together. And perhaps you will feel a little sad for the occasional person you see who tries so hard to stand rigidly apart, only to find loneliness and isolation.
Two
Letting Go of Mental Pollutants
Cleansing the body of toxins and releasing the muscles of tension are familiar procedures in holistic medicine. The need for physical purification is so obvious that, as a concept, it has become a dominant goal in self-treatment practices and within conventional medicine as well.
For example, many brand-name vitamins and nutritional supplements found in chain drugstores now are advertised as purifying and cleansing agents. Within alternative healing circles, numerous