Letting go of that which no longer serves is a lifelong process: like our reptilian ancestors we shed the skin that doesn’t fit. Letting go often happens without our consent: people leave town, children grow up and move away, jobs disappear—if we’re healthy enough we grieve those losses while allowing our hearts to be open to the new: new people, places, or opportunities.
Sometimes letting go happens because of a choice we make: we decide to let go. When letting go is our own choice, can we grieve that loss? Even though we CHOSE to lose something?
We can grieve even if we “choose to lose”. We can grieve the “letting go” that we are not ready for, that we didn’t see coming, that we hoped would never happen. We can grieve the challenging choices—the choice between 2 things when neither is desired.
As adults we carry grief deeply in our bodies, fearing its upwelling –as if somehow our own grief was toxic. It is not. Crying (tears) releases excess cortisol, a stress hormone. Releasing grief can restore sleep: sympathetic activation increases cortisol, crying releases that cortisol. After a grief storm we feel the calming ‘rest and digest’ or the parasympathetic nervous system.
Why do we run from grief when releasing it is healing? Children are at their most vulnerable when they are sad, when they are hurt and in emotional pain, or when they have experienced a loss. If that vulnerability was not met with kindness, caring, and compassion but instead with neglect, abandonment, or abuse, we learn to fear that vulnerability. We learn to fear our own pain and sadness.
If we cannot feel our own sadness and pain, we become numb. Numb to our pain means numb to our joy. Chronic emotional numbing leads to poor relationship outcomes; our partners feel our emotional unavailability when we’re shutdown.
Emotional numbing can become chronic; poor ‘body to mind’ connections result. When we can’t listen to the signals emanating from our bodies—signals that tell us our bodies require care, feeding, rest, play, social connection—then we are cut off from our source of health.
Emotions are the messenger network between body and mind.
AFFIRMATION: If I know what I feel, I can take care of myself. If I am tired, I can rest. If I am lonely, I can call a friend. If I am hungry, I can eat. I can take care of myself by listening and honoring my emotions.