Letting Go of Letting Go

by Jake Kessler

Although I am not a formal meditation teacher, I get an opportunity a few times a week to share my experience and to help facilitate a few groups with other aspiring practitioners. We all are bound by a belief that spiritual living is more than a coping mechanism. It’s a way of life. And with any way of life, it’s not a straight line.

Our group runs the experiential gamut. Some people got curious and found us. Some people like myself, were “rogue practitioners” creating a practice from suggestion, experience and self-inquiry without ascribing to a particular tradition. Some are longtime practitioners that want to have an opportunity to share what they have discovered and encourage those starting out.

Often times our discussions focus on the challenges of creating a practice or the challenges of maintaining one within the hectic rhythm and flow of life. Recently, someone asked a question that has piqued both my ire and my interest for many years: How exactly do you “let go?”

This is a hot topic in the meditation world. The only comment that comes up more in my experience is “I can’t get my mind to be quiet, am I bad at meditating?”

The minute someone gets exposed to meditation they immediately start thinking about letting go of thoughts or feelings or “self” (whatever that is…). Most of us realize that the minute we try to “let go” we begin to voraciously cling to that very thing. It’s as if an effort towards letting go does nothing but bring into sharp focus how much we DON’T actually want to let go. Of anything. Ever.

One of my teachers used to say that mindfulness will never add anything to your life, it will only reveal what is already there. My practice started with the breath. I would take two or three breaths, focusing my attention on the sensation of breath. And then I would try to let go of thought. In a splintered second my mind became a fire truck with all its sirens blaring in a circus tent in the middle of a football game (metaphorically speaking). I thought meditation was making me crazy until I realized that THAT was what my mind was like…all the time. No wonder peace seemed like such a foreign experience. How could anyone ever rest with that clamoring in their mind?

Over time, with consistent practice and encouragement, I reached a point where I could begin to slow my thoughts down until there began to be some space between them. I vividly remember the first time my brain went silent…for about 4 tenths of a second. I was driving to class in college, practicing “mindful driving” which consisted of leaving the radio off and trying to pay attention to the physical act of driving. My mind stopped and the silence was so jarring I almost swerved into the wrong lane. I learned a valuable lesson: don’t meditate and drive.

Most of us discover meditation through pain. It takes a certain amount of discomfort and distress to walk into a meditation centre or a mindfulness class. In America, we don’t really have a tradition of quiet introspection. Everything is outward facing. We seek meditation because the pain of loss or depression or addiction or dissatisfaction or disconnection becomes so intense, and the standard attempts to placate it so ineffective, that in desperation we reach for something radical. Something like sitting still doing nothing for extended periods of time. We find out that by practicing our lives get better and our inner critique gets softer.

But many of us inevitably find that the things which drove us to find meditation are disinclined to relinquish their rights to our lives entirely. I reached a point where I came up against a wall that seemed impassable. It requires a difficult admission. The things that brought me to seek peace are things I don’t want to let go of…entirely.

I like the story of “spiritual guy valiantly wrestling with inner demons”. I like the story of being just a little broken, a little dark, a little bit brooding, a bit mysterious. The truth is that the very things that I want and need to be rid of are the things that have provided me with a measure of identity. A friend of mine would often ask me if I would rather be happy or right and I always answered happy, but in my heart there were times I would rather be right.

So how do I let go? The first step is to understand and acknowledge that I don’t want to. I always disliked the translation that “life is suffering”. Rather, I connect with the translation that says “suffering exists”. Life is suffering means that I must be free of something. In my totally unqualified opinion it implies that somehow, under the right circumstances, I can transcend all suffering and float through life immune to the pain and difficulties everyone else has to endure, dispensing my wisdom to the masses. I can enlighten my way out of life and therefore not suffer anymore. “Suffering exists” means to me that we honestly acknowledge that we are suffering and that we are attached to that suffering, that our suffering is pervasive and integrated into the fabric of our lives. In the truth of this lies the key for me.

Strange and counter to all my social programing, the only way to let go of anything for me is to do nothing about it. When I practice long enough and regularly enough, the underlying yet fundamental bedrock of my life changes. The things I am clinging to naturally fall away from me as they become unnecessary.

I hate this answer. I want to be better now. I want to have agency in directly tackling my problems and beat them into submission. I want to be self-made or at least self-reliant. And yet the very real and very persistent problems of my life are oftentimes fed by my attempts to be rid of them. I was listening to a lecture and the speaker made a comment that stuck in my brain. “That which you renounce, you tie yourself to forever.” This describes my experience as well. When I demand to be rid of anxiety and fear, I am suddenly and intimately aware of all of things of which I am afraid. When I vow to forgo anger, I become keenly aware of all of the little things you do that I find irritating and how bad a driver everyone else is. It reminds me of when I quit smoking a few years ago. The first few months sans-cigarette, it seemed like everyone on the planet had started smoking. Same with when my daughter was born; suddenly everyone had babies.

Does this mean that I have to become a passive victim of my own life? That I cannot strive to do better or be happy? What about the big things? Death, work, health issues (both mental and physical)? Am I to be consigned to a life that is boring, painful and glum in an effort to “grow spiritually”?

Not in my experience. My problems do not lie in wanting the things in my life to be other than they are. My problems are in demanding that things in my life be other than they are right now. I can disagree or feel upset about things in my life without resorting to renunciation. I have difficulty with black and white thinking as a result of some of my challenges. When things are bad, I always feel like they will be bad forever. When there is pain, it is a pain that stretches from oblivion to infinity without respite or end.

It is in seeing the truth that everything is already changing, that today cannot not be different than yesterday, that the present moment is already passed by the time I focus on it, that I can let go. Because letting go is not letting go at all. It is merely acknowledging and dwelling in the truth of my life right now. There is no problem letting go because there is nothing to let go of.

As much as I believe the above statement to be true, I often fail to practice it. I am often overwhelmed by my challenges and by the wrong perceptions that I cultivate. I often swear that this challenge will never end and, when it doesn’t end right away or seems to transition into another unwanted detour in my life, I have my little “told you so” moment with the people around me. I say to myself (and anyone who is listening), “See, there’s no point in trying because something else horrible is going to happen anyway.” I let go all right. I just let go of the truth.

My improvement comes in being mindful of my thoughts and in examining them based on the facts of my life. Has anything I’ve been through ever not passed? Have I ever died from what was going on in my life? Do I still have the love and support of my friends and family? Does anything really last forever? In accepting my life as it is in this moment, good or bad, pain or ecstasy, wild or boring, letting go becomes a non-issue. It takes care of itself. My friend used to tell me “Live ‘til it hurts, then get a hug and live some more.” So don’t let go.

Jake Kessler is a teacher, mentor and consultant based in Salem, Massachusetts. He can be contacted at: Jakeknexuslearning@gmail.com