Emotional Baggage: How to Let Go

There's a box most of us own. It sits on a closet shelf, or in the attic, or tucked into a corner of the basement. Inside are memories we haven't been able to unpack, some happy and some not. A childhood Teddy bear. A medal from high school. Photographs, old letters, small keepsakes from people we've lost. We move houses, we have birthdays, and the box follows us. Stashed out of view, it stays quiet and doesn't bother anyone.

A box of keepsakes probably won't ruin your day. Still, keeping it around means the shelf it occupies can't be used for something that might actually serve you now. Picture your own box for a second. Which of those objects could you genuinely not part with? Then ask the harder question: what feelings have you fastened to each one?

We stockpile emotions the same way. Guilt, anger, sadness, grief, all tucked into the back of the mind. Sometimes it's worry about how someone else is behaving and the fact that we can't control it. We ache for a version of the past or stew over a future that hasn't arrived, when the only place worth being is right here. A nervous or negative phrase loops in our heads day after day, and that loop keeps us chained to the very things we'd be lighter without.

Why bother letting go at all? Because we tend to define ourselves by whatever we're feeling. "I'm scared." "I'm frustrated." Say it enough and the feeling stops being something passing through you and becomes who you are. You turn into a kind of emotional packrat. Positivity practices work by repeating hopeful messages until your outlook shifts toward the good; the self-defeating scripts we rehearse do the opposite, tuning our perception to catch only the bad.

You might tell yourself it's easier to play the victim or to duck away from what scares you, and you'd be right. Instant relief does feel good. For a moment the band-aid hides the hurt. But a wound left alone can turn septic and grow into something far worse than the original injury.

People hold on for reasons that make sense in the moment. Positive memories pull us backward: we keep replaying old romances, past paydays, the so-called glory days, hungry to feel the way we felt then. Security does it too. The urge to shield the people we love, afraid they'll be hurt or stumble, can lead a parent to stop a child from trying anything alone. Self-esteem plays a part when the need to be the best at work or in class curdles into dread of letting someone down, and the dread strangles the very productivity you were chasing. And then there are conflicting beliefs, the fight you keep rerunning in your head, either stacking evidence that you were right or marinating in guilt over how you acted.

Whatever fills your emotional baggage, it keeps you from the life in front of you. A little daydreaming is fine; obsession is paralyzing. There's real insight in studying your past mistakes, but gagging on old anger or embarrassment or pain does damage. When fear and frustration start steering your behavior, they box in the people around you too, your children, your spouse, your friends, and the strain can surface in the body. Depression can set in. Chronic negative emotion has been linked to back, chest, and head pain, to trouble with sex, to weight swinging up and down, and to digestive problems that run as far as ulcers.

Every one of us carries some mental and emotional clutter. For one person it's a single difficult relationship or a mood that will pass. For another it's years of self-criticism and emotional hoarding stacked up like a hoarder's garage. The size of the suitcase doesn't change the task. It's time to unpack. Getting rid of all of it may be impossible, since without our memories we're not really ourselves, but marinating in the negative wrecks any chance of feeling good in the present.

Begin by accepting it. The way any twelve-step program starts, you admit there's a problem. Name the emotions you feel and claim them as yours. Everyone has them; having them doesn't mean they get to run your life.

Next, figure out why you're keeping a particular emotion around. A frightened child grips a favorite blanket because the familiar soothes, and we do the same with our feelings. Part of letting go is conceding that no person and no event can actually hand you happiness. When you pin your mood on landing a better job, on more money, on the right person showing up, you're letting the absence of those things run the controls.

Then look squarely at what these emotions can't do for you, and what you could do instead. Ask what holding on actually buys you. Safety? Happiness? Most likely it's just burning your time. Replaying the past and fretting about the future both ignore one plain fact: there is nothing you can do about either. Nothing. So take hold of what is yours to move. Be straight with other people and with yourself.

Finally, open the bag and let it fall out. It sounds almost too simple, and in a way it is, but it asks for discipline and repetition. Go gentle on yourself and let whatever feelings arrive actually arrive. Harsh self-judgment is the worst move you can make here. Remember too that the present is the only stretch of time you have any say over, so the present is where you have to act.

One structured way through this is the Sedona Method. Picture the problem you want to release, and let whatever emotion comes sit with you, even if the emotion is a blank. Then put three questions to yourself: Could I let it go? Could I allow this feeling to be here? Could I welcome this feeling? Answer on instinct, right away, and "no" is a perfectly fine answer. Whatever you said, ask next whether you're willing to let it go. If the answer is no, ask yourself plainly whether you'd rather be rid of the feeling or keep carrying it. Then, again no matter what you've answered, ask when. If the answer is now, release what you can. If you still can't, you've at least reached recognition and acceptance, which counts. After that you repeat the whole thing, as many times as you want, on the same problem if you want. Loosening one knot might take an hour or it might take months. The point is that the moment you start, the improvement has already begun.

- Melissa Lavery, M.S.

References: Dwoskin, H. (n.d.). Letting Go for the Life You Want. Edberg, H. (n.d.). How to Let Go: 5 Essential Tips, Positivity Blog. Lickerman, A. (2013, September 29). How To Let Go, Psychology Today. Mazarin, J. (2012). 9 Practical and Spiritual Tips for Letting Go of Unhealthy Attachments, Psych Central. Mind/Body Connection: How Your Emotions Affect Your Health (2010), familydoctor.org. The Sedona Method, official site (2015).