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Train Your Brain : The Five Essential Skills
© Rick Hanson, Ph.D., 2005
LETTING GO : Key Points
"Let go a little, you'll have a little happiness. Let go completely, you'll be completely happy."
Letting Go of Body Sensations
Ordinary breathing, focusing on exhalation, intending to let go
Diaphragm breathing.
Breath of fire
Heartmath: Breathing evenly through the heart with a positive emotion
Scanning the body and releasing tension. Progressive relaxation.
Using imagery to relax.
Letting Go of Thoughts
Two fundamental errors of thought:
- Overestimating the bad
- Underestimating the good
Systematically argue against errors of thought, on paper or in your mind
Identify "sub-personalities" generating errors of thought; thank them for sharing, ask if they have anything new to say, and then tell them to shut up
Letting Go of Emotions
As with any unpleasant experience, have compassion for yourself.
As you release negative emotions, sense positive feelings replacing them, like security replacing fear, worth replacing shame/guilt, peacefulness replacing anger.
Name the feeling, own it, and accept it. For bonus points, try to choose it.
Imagine/sense the emotion leaving on the exhalation, or draining out of the body, or being released to the universe or even to God/the mysterious Divine.
Use imagery, like standing in a cool mountain stream washing pain away.
Sense the underlying softer, deeper, younger feelings, and then let them go.
Venting safely, like writing letters you don't send, yelling, hitting something SAFE
Letting Go of Wants
Same methods as with releasing emotions: Naming and accepting. Draining out of the body. Releasing via imagery. Sense the underlying, positive wants, and respond to them.
Do a cost/benefit analysis, and choose what you really want.
Reflect on the suffering that is embedded, that's inevitable, in most desires
Letting Go of Self
Perspectives: The more we "self" experience - personalize it, identify with it, cling to it - the more we suffer: "no self, no problem." The degree of self varies; it's not an omnipresent fact; it's continually constructed. When self is minimal or absent, notice that it's not needed to function in life.
Observe the activity of self and experiment with reducing it.
When others are upset, see the ways it's not about you: They're on automatic; you're a bit player in their drama; they are already punishing themselves; you are separate, with good boundaries.
Each day, take time to sense the fact of your interconnectedness with everything
In General
Be the awareness of the experience, not the experience itself.
Notice that all experiences change.
Keep evoking positive feelings
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(Rick Hanson is a clinical psychologist, Jan Hanson is
an acupuncturist/nutritionist, and they are raising a daughter and
son, ages 12 and 14. With Ricki Pollycove, M.D., they are the
authors of Mother Nurture: A Mother's Guide to Health in Body, Mind,
and Intimate Relationships, published by Penguin. You can see their
website at www.nurturemom.com or email them with questions or
comments at info@nurturemom.com; unfortunately, a personal reply may
not always be possible.)
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