“My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”

Psalms 73:26

Whether it is a family member, friendship, or relationship. The question arises, why can’t we let go of someone, even though we know they’re not beneficial for us? Well, holding on is a natural human instinct. However, it does hold us back from realigning, achieving our true potential, and focusing on your goals.

May ask, why is letting go of people so hard?

One of the human instincts, is certainty and familiarity that can drive every decision you make. Moving on from a friendship, relationship, or family member leaves a lot of uncertainty. If the relationship reached a conclusion, both people were unhappy, or ended on bad terms. There’s still the familiarity that can make it hard to move forward with you life. It’s understandable when your feelings haven’t changed towards the person. The memories can justify things for you from moving forward, which will become apart of your story that will work against you.

Signs you need to let go of someone:

• You keep reliving memories or stalk them on social media
• Thoughts of what could’ve been or you think of the person continuously
• You talk about them to your friends or family
• When something tragic occurs in life, they are the first person you think of to reach out to
• You change your appearances or life goals to get their attention
• You have feelings of anger or get nervous when you come across them in person

What happens when you let go:

You may feel some hostility, love or resentment towards them. Often times, the reaction you’ll get will play with your consciousness to make you feel guilty. Anytime someone has the ability to control your emotions or your thoughts, means that they are still calling the shots in your life – instead of you. Having anyone else controlling your emotions will never lead to fulfillment and happiness for you. Learning how to let go of people you once love is the only way to truly design your own life. Overcoming that fear…you’ll feel relieved and free. You have the inner strength to overcome anything, to begin continuing your own purposefully path.

How to let go of someone:

1. Recognize that it’s time: This might be the biggest difficult part of the process. However, it’s important to let go of the memories to realize the life you truly deserve. You can look at the experiences as pain or a lesson. There will be a time of realization that will become easier when the time has come and your future is dependent upon your new start.
2. Change your story: The story that you tell yourself is what justifies your decisions based on the beliefs you have. Instead of looking at in a wider perspective; that you’re deserving of a healthy relationship that’s built on consistency, transparency , and genuine respect. Many people based their relationships with people due to past experiences. Example: Someone could’ve grew up in a toxic environment of arguing or having friendships that always lead to betrayal. You can use your past experiences to make excuses for your current state – you have the choice to change your story.
3. Identify your limited beliefs: If you ever have thoughts of ‘I will always be lonely’ or ‘I will never find someone that will love’ are limiting beliefs. Replace negative beliefs with encouraging ones, ‘I’m hope to what God has in store for me, because I love myself and deserve the best.’ Might feel weird, but with every change you come across in life. It’s going to feel awkward at first.
4. Stop the blame game: People who point the blame on others, I am sure your fingers are tired by now. Letting go of someone that was once in your life, doesn’t substitute the truth. It’s normal for people to point the finger of blame instead of taking accountability. Use the experiences as introspective and a tool to push you to grow so you can be healed to create healthy relationships with others.
5. Embrace empathy: Being able to master your emotions is essential to growth. When you let negative feelings take a toll, it can affect your physical and emotional well-being. Letting go of people that once gave you joy can be hard. Looking at the perspective of the other person, will bring more clarity. Everyone is human, so a point of view of compassion and empathy instead of thinking people did things towards you out of malice.
6. Gratitude: Let go of expectations and focus on how grateful you are for what you’ve learned or lessons you took from the experience. Many things in life happen for you, not against you. Taking the lessons from life, you will be grateful which will reduce any pain or anger you may feel towards the other person. Appreciate all that you have gained so you can continue to grow.
7. Take care of yourself: Talking about how you feel or what you experience with someone that you trust will bring more clarity. Also, will bring more reassurance on what God has in plan for you is greater than what you experienced. Taking care of your mental, by not keeping up with what they are doing on social media. Being away from social media, to avoid feeling like your missing out on things that other couples may post online. Take time to heal, fall in love with yourself again so you can be prepared for what God has for you around the corner. Time waits for no one. Therefore, the longer it takes for you to let go and heal, you push back the time for you to come across the people that are intended to be in your life.

Overall, what God has for you is always better than the experiences that you had to come across. Sometimes what we currently see with our eyes, feel like that’s all it is to life. However, God will give you greater than your own expectations. Holding on, hurts more than helps which keeps you back from enjoying life fully. Embrace being in the moment and be present along with understanding that any uncertainty is actually beautiful. In the not knowing, is where growth and evolving comes into play.

Keep faith. Keep believing. Keep hoping.