“While it’s easy to destroy the past, it’s far more difficult to forget it.”
Suleika Jaouad, Between Two Kingdoms (Page 279)
Let Go Quotes
“Perhaps today will be the day when we experience happiness or wisdom. Don’t try to grab that moment and hold on to it with all your might. It’s not under your control how long it lasts. Enjoy it, recognize it, remember it. Having it for a moment is the same as having it forever.”
Ryan Holiday, The Daily Stoic (Page 346)
I must let go now. Let you go. Love is too often The answer for staying. Too seldom the reason For going. I drop the line And watch you drift away. All along You thought The fiery current Of your lover's breast Pulled you to the deep. But it was my heart-tide Releasing you To float adrift With seaweed.
~ Delia Owens, Where The Crawdads Sing (Page 213)
“The thing you earned, that you depend on, that was hard to do—it’s a gift from your former self. Just because you have a law degree, a travel agency or the ability to do calligraphy in Cyrillic doesn’t mean that your future self is obligated to accept that gift. We hold on to the old competencies and our hard-earned status roles far longer than we should. The only way to be creative is to do something new, and the path to something new requires leaving something else behind. New decisions based on new information are at the heart of leadership. But you can’t make those decisions if you’re also busy calculating how much the old decisions cost you.”
Seth Godin, Blog
“‘Letting go’ is only possible for short periods. We need some discipline to bring us to ‘letting be.’ We must walk a spiritual path. Ego must wear itself out like an old shoe, journeying from suffering to liberation.”
Chögyam Trungpa, via Sunbeams (Page 82)
“By forgiving the perpetrator, I release myself. I can revise the event. I can see it as something that gives me more compassion and understanding. I can let go of it. There is no benefit to establishing an imaginary judicial system in my own mind where I carry out punishments to people who have wronged me. By letting go of this long-held inner drama I become a little more liberated and useful. In essence it’s bad that it happened but it’s worse that I allow myself to be affected by it now. I cannot control the past but I can control the present through forgiveness.”
Russell Brand, Recovery (Page 134)
“Forgiveness is a powerful spiritual tool, without it we are damned as individuals and as a people. Forgiveness means letting go. It means being willing to accept that we are all mortals flawed and suffering, imperfectly made and trying our best. That sometimes there is a collision of instinct. Am I determined that the world must be as I decree. Do I see a future in that way of thinking, especially when it’s done nothing but bring me pain so far? What am I holding on to? What is gained by withholding forgiveness, for ruminating on a concluded event, by holding on to bygone pain and wishing ill upon a man just like me? Nothing.”
Russell Brand, Recovery (Page 134)