My heart raced as I approached the intersection where the accident happened. I could still hear the screeching of the tires. The sound of the truck smashing into the back of my car rattled around my brain. My eyes constantly flicking up toward the rear view mirror – on high alert to see if there was anyone behind me driving a little too close for comfort.
And even though the accident happened a week earlier I couldn’t believe how fresh it still was within my mind. I needed to do something to get rid of this feeling. I needed a way to get back my love of driving. I needed to let go so I wouldn’t keep being dragged along.
Tons of problems in our lives can be solved by just letting go. It could be the past, our fears, people, expectations, pain and hurt.
All these things drag us along to where we don’t want to be. They take up too much energy, too much brain space, and distract us from what really matters in our life. They distract us from what we want. They distract us from the miracle that’s happening right now in the present moment.
We get dragged along by so many things. We get dragged along by people. We get dragged into their drama, into their hopes, into their fears. We get suckered into playing a bit part in their dramatic ups and downs. We get wrapped up into it. Sometimes you just have to let that go. You’ve got to step away from it. It’s not your business, it’s not your priority, it’s not what you want. At the end of the day most people complain. You can’t complain about what you permit. Don’t get dragged into the drama.
Another thing that we get dragged along by is our fears. We get dragged along into “what-if” situations, what could be. What are people going to think? How is this going to look? Our fears dictate so much of what we do and they just drag us along, dis-empowering us.
Another thing that drags us along is our expectations, expectations of how things should be. Expectations are not necessarily bad. It’s good to craft a vision of something, have your goals, and have a target to strive for. But, so many of the problems and stress that we have in our everyday lives are caused by thinking of the way that it SHOULD be, as opposed to the way that it is.
So much stress can just be let go of, by accepting what is, watching the rise and fall of the moment, and being impartial to it; in the sense that “I’m going to be of it but I’m not going to be in it“. I’m going to witness it, I’m going to see what’s happening, and I’m not going to get dragged along by how it should be playing out, how it should be happening. We can let go of that frustration.
Get Your Brain Space Back
We get dragged along, as well, by past pains. Things that happened in the past, have passed. Let them go; move on. If it’s still lingering within you, still taking so much of your brain space up then what can you learn from those past pains? What can you learn from those mistakes? There’s no such things as mistakes. There’s only feedback. Feedback on past actions that we have taken. Feedback on the thought process that we had in the past.
What can you learn from it? How can you grow from it?
Some good questions to ask yourself when you’re running into these painful memories or painful situations are:
What’s the opportunity here?
What can I learn from this situation?
How can I grow from it?
How can I empower myself from this moment in my life?
How can I make better choices?
How can I think about this differently?
You’ve got to let it go. You’ve got to move on. Stop being dragged along by all these things.
There’s so much more beautiful things in the world to take up your mind’s attention.
There’s your vision.
There’s your goals.
There’s the miracle of the moment.
There’s the beauty that’s happening right now.
The Mind-Flip
Through evolution, the brain looks for fearful or painful situations and gives a heightened awareness and attention to those situations and experiences. Something that we can do is flip a switch and start to train our brain to look for the positive in life. Keep an eye out and hunt down the good that’s actually happening in our lives, because it’s happening all the time.
There’s tons of good things you can be thankful for. Tons of fantastic experiences that are happening right now. But our past pains, our expectations, our fears, the drama of other people are dragging us along and taking up too much of our mind space. Keeping us from the beauty of our lives.
One of the simplest solutions, is to just let go.
You’ve got to let go, or you’re going to be dragged along.
Be awesome today!
Ian