As anyone who has had to deal with trauma at some point in their life knows, it’s hard to let it go. It’s not that we want to hold onto it, it’s just that things in daily life sometimes stop us in our tracks and hit us like a tidal wave – a tidal wave of emotions and sometimes reliving an experience. With professional help and hope, those moments lessen, don’t last as long and eventually get pushed to the back of the line.

I had my share plus some of trauma from childhood and into adulthood. I’ve worked on releasing my past for many years; and for those who haven’t had devastating physical and/or emotional trauma, it’s not easy to release. My hope would be that more people had good experiences without trauma in their lives but I have learned that there are more people who have had traumatic experiences, similar to mine.

PTSD – is very real and not limited to military personnel and veterans. PTSD is serious. It causes anxiety, depression, discomfort among many other feelings and it’s different for everyone. My feeling is once I can get past being shaken by a memory, accept the memory and move forward in my activity, I can heal from PTSD. I speak for myself because I’m not trained in psychotherapy – I’ll leave the professionals to do their job.

Moving on to practicing small acts of letting go.

I recently had a situation that has no need for details to tell you what it did for me. In the past, I’d have been angry still and thinking about what that person did to me versus what the situation did for me. I’ve always been a glass half-full kind of gal. I usually give people the benefit of the doubt, see the good in people, ignore red flags and such. Over time more recent, I have been allowing myself to see people for whom they truly are rather than who I want them to be. This has become a huge release of negativity inside of me. I can honestly say that it has lifted my mind as well as my heart, stomach and lungs. Each time I release them from my emotional heart, it’s like a fresh air breeze hit me and twirled me around into a new space.

How can you do this? Take a small situation that upsets you and try to view it differently than your typical go-to reaction. Sure, allow yourself to be upset, but don’t let it fester. Instead of being stuck on the details of the situation, take a mental look at the person involved. Ask yourself if he/she is a taker, energy suck, if they seem to always act/react this way or if it was a once in a lifetime random flaw. When you see the person for who they truly are, you may be able to dislocate from them.

In doing this practice, it has been allowing my traumatic experiences in my past, be recognized and filed into files of the past. For so long I have thought that what happened to me, defined who I am today. By letting people in my current life go, it is helping me to move away from my past. I can’t honestly say that I have forgiven those people who hurt me, but I can see them for who they were instead of who I wanted them to be, who they should have been but weren’t. A few of them have died and I didn’t mourn their death, I mourned the fact that they would never be who I thought they should be; protective, loving and caring, because they are gone. I also came to realize that I am that person to my kids; I am the parent that I wish I had. I love my kids, will never hurt them and will never despise nor insult them. Even though they are adults now!

Start today. Try one small act of letting go. See a situation for exactly what it is or a person for exactly who they are to you. How someone treats you, says more about them than it does about you. Learn to free yourself from those who take advantage, who see you as weak or who think of only themselves.

Share your thoughts or ask me anything.

Each day starts new, you can too.