Living Fully and Letting Go: Two Sides of the Same Coin

What are the times when you feel most alive? What are the most vivid times when you're in touch with your authentic self?

Maybe one or more of the following rings true for you...

• Laughing so deeply in the belly that happy tears run down your cheeks
• Running or rolling down a grassy hill like a carefree child
• Passionately making love with someone your share a soulful connection
• Singing your favorite song off the top of your lungs or wildly free dancing without a care of what others may think
• Lying in a meadow with arms stretched wide looking up at the clouds flowing by
• Giving birth or watching the birth of your child
• Crying so hard when you lose someone you cherish

And what do all of the above have in common? Letting go!

The times when we feel most alive and most in touch with our humanness, are the times when we live fully and also when we let go -- let go of fears, let go of worries, let go of trying to be a certain way, let go of expectations and judgments of ourselves and of others' expectations and judgments of us (to be right, to be liked, to be perfect, to not screw up, to be beautiful, etc.), and let go of attachment to outcome.

When we let go, we can simply be... allowing our true selves to flow and shine.

I am reminded of the words by John Welwood in his poem Forget about Enlightenment:

You're already more and less
Than whatever you can know.
Breathe out,
Look in,
Let go.

So living fully and letting go are two sides of the same coin.

When do you feel most alive?