Letting go is rarely an easy thing to do, especially when it is someone we love. Some say they hold on to protect that other person and others to save themselves. Save themselves from being alone, and from mental and emotional anguish. We get adjusted and comfortable with a type of lifestyle with that person, we know what to expect and it’s like clockwork. Other times we don’t let go because we want to feel wanted, we want to help.
You want to know how to let go of someone you love? In particular your boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, or wife? First figure out why you love them, and if it is really love that you feel. A lot of people think obtaining love, affection, monetary and domestic security as love. It can be! However, if not coupled with the proper ingredients than it’s not love for the person you have, but for what they can ONLY provide you. Have you been together for so long that you just think you belong to together because it’s all you’ve known. Are you with them and “love” them because you feel they are the best you can get. Do you negatively view and de-value yourself? Do you feel you don’t deserve better? Do you think you love them because they have been financially carrying you and you don’t think you can make it without them; that two incomes are better than one? If you answer yes to any of these questions, you need to re-evaluate yourself.
Next, you need to figure out how your life has been since you’ve been with them. Has it been better, the same, worse? Have you deviated from you normal self, your intended goals?
We sometimes get so lost in making and keeping the one we are with happy that we forget to do the same for ourselves. When you’ve lost track of yourself and your life, it’s time to re-focus time and energy in yourself.
I remember being in love, wanting to stay in love and not wanting to be alone, that I allowed myself to get derailed. All the plans I had of continuing school, saving money, and being financially stable shattered. It was love. Him and I were friends for years before we started dating. When you love someone you do anything for them, even giving all you have and then more…of what you don’t have. I was giving and giving and giving, mind, body, soul and since it wasn’t being reciprocated, eventually I had nothing else to give and had nothing left for myself. I was drained! I know realize that if someone really lovs you back, they wouldn’t let you get of course to help them get back on course.
It wasn’t easy letting him go, but I knew I needed to stop worrying about saving him, because no one was there to save me. I was thinking about it for months but I didn’t have the strength to say it, “We need space.” I didn’t have the courage to break up with him. So I did the next best thing I could think of. I got him to break up with me. I know it may sound immature, but I needed to be free from this burden, a burden I placed on myself. I didn’t want him to feel that I didn’t love or care about him, nor, that I was letting him go to fend for himself but in the same time, it was time for me to take care of me. I loved him, but I finally realized that I loved me more.
I knew him for a long time so I knew what made him tick, his fears, weaknesses. I knew what pushed his button and what things to say that would be a deal breaker for him. One should never use what someone shares with you against them, but this was a life and death situation. Lord knows I didn’t mean what I had said to him that night, but I knew I needed to say it to save myself. To let go of the heavy bag and shackles on my ankles that was carrying every where I went or shall I say, trying to go. It was slowing me down, holding me back. The next morning we broke up.
It has been almost two years since that night. Since then I had come clean about what I said and that I didn’t mean it but needed to say it because I knew it would make him do what I didn’t have the strength to do…let go!
As I write this I now have one year left before I graduate with my B.F.A., and for the most part compared to where I was when I was with him and the months after our break up, I am back on my two feet. German-Swiss poet Hermann Hesse once said, “Some of us think holding on makes us strong, but sometimes it is letting go.”, I couldn’t have said it better myself!
