Pathwalking 131
How do you let go when you are feeling defeated?
When you are at a loss, when you feel as though you have jumped hurdle after hurdle and still come away without a win, how do you let it go?
As I explored last week, whether you are a winner or a loser in a given situation, accepting it with bitterness or grace makes a tremendous difference in what will come next. It will also have a profound effect on how others in your life will be impacted.
Sometimes the gut reaction is to get angry. There are times you are going to be enraged, that you are going to be bitter and impassioned, and you might be taking matters deeply personally. This is natural, this is going to happen, it cannot be denied, it cannot be avoided. Nor should it be.
Once this occurs, however, the next step is where bitterness versus graciousness matters. If you let that initial reaction of outrage and indignation take ahold and influence all of your following moves, you create a negativity spiral that will bring about even more reasons to feel angry and displeased.
I am not in any way saying that you should never feel these negative emotions. You absolutely have to. Not feeling them in many respects is much worse for you, mentally and in time physically, than feeling them. Repressing negativity is dangerous to the psyche in innumerable ways.
Feeling them is important. But holding onto them is where the problems begin. When you let that bitter feeling, that rage, that indignation become your life, you create a space where you will draw more of that to you. Like attracts like, and I would presume that you know someone who is always negative, always bitter, always unhappy for the majority of their time. How does being around them make you feel?
Feeling the negative emotions is important. Acknowledge them, be angry, scream, yell, break something unimportant. But then – let it go. Don’t hold onto the negative, don’t get bitter and resolute in anger – let it go. Allow it to pass, allow it to run its course, and step away from it.
Be gracious. Accept it. Then leave it behind. Holding onto the negative emotions is where we develop a great deal of our unhappiness in life. It is here that it becomes imperative that you be gracious in loss, defeat, disappointment, or whatever negative matter has occurred.
What does that mean? It means that you say to yourself, “Ok. I did not enjoy that. I am angry, I am hurt, I am displeased. I cannot hold onto that, I have to let it go, I have to find my center again, and I need to move past this, and find another way.”
Some matters are easier to move past than others. That is a hard to accept truth. Some losses are more personal, more powerful, and more meaningful to us than others, and that just increases the depth of the anger, hurt, or other negative emotion generated.
Time is relative here. Some matters can be let go of relatively quickly. Some may take a while. What is important to this is discovering whether you are holding tightly onto something that does not serve you, whether emotionally, spiritually or physically – or if you are processing it and letting it go. Like many past topics, this of course is not simple nor easy to define.
The key is to ask yourself one important question. How do I feel? The answer to this question will give you the insight to make necessary choices in order to have the answer that will be the most satisfying.
We do not ask this question enough of ourselves. I know I do not ask this enough. How do I feel? The answer to that question will tell me my mindset, and help me to make choices in order to best find and walk the path I desire.
When the answer is a negative, I need to analyze this, and explore why I am feeling that way. When I can figure out what is making me feel a negative emotion, I can determine if I am simply reacting to a moment or holding on to bitterness. That is where I will know if I am working to turn matters around, or holding onto emotions that simply do not serve me.
How do you let go of that feeling of defeat? You need to recognize it, identify it, and then work on getting past it. There is no single, simple answer to this question, no singular path to enlightenment. What will work for me will not work for you, and what works in this situation may not work in that situation. However, there is one important step that will allow you to identify and work with whatever you are feeling.
You have to ask yourself How do I feel? You need to not just think it, ASK it. Really ask yourself that question, and then ANSWER it. You’d be surprised how far that one important question may take you. When you know you are feeling defeated, knowing the WHY and the HOW of it by questioning your feelings will help you to figure out how to turn matters around and score a victory.
This is challenging. I am working through this myself at the moment, and it is one of the greatest challenges I have ever emotionally faced. I believe, as I have throughout all the aspects of walking my own path, that I can find and make my way, and create the life I most dearly desire for myself. I can get past this feeling of defeat, and continue forward on a chosen path.
How do I feel? How do YOU feel?
This is the one-hundred thirty first entry in my series. These weekly posts are specifically about walking along the path of life, and my desire to make a difference in this world along the way. Feel free to re-blog and share. Thank you for joining me.
The first fifty-two weeks (Year One) of installments of Pathwalking is available in print and for your Kindle.
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