🌿 When holding on hurts: feeling safe to let go

[0:29] Hi there, hello and welcome to a new episode of Inner Impact.

[0:35] Well, first of all, I want to thank you, because many of you shared with me your feedback and kind words about the first episode, so I am really grateful. I really appreciated, you know, hearing from you, so thank you so much. Well, let’s start exploring today’s topic.

[1:05] And it is a topic that I think can resonate a lot, above all during this autumn season, If you’re living autumn season, I always, when I think about it, I always think about the trees shedding their leaves. And the topic is letting go. Okay, how does it land with you? What is coming up for you when I say letting go? So I chose this topic because it came up over and over again in many conversations with my clients and also in my inner conversation and my conversation with my therapist. And when When I say letting go, I can sense my whole body contracting, so like doing the exact opposite thing that I picture when I picture someone who’s letting go, right?

[2:08] So I thought about this concept lately and I want to share with you something that I hope won’t sound like a super cringy LinkedIn post because I’m about to do an analogy or, you know, I’m about to talk about physical therapy and then link it to the idea of letting go. So I really hope I won’t end up in that LinkedIn lunatic subreddit. Anyhoo, so I have a tendinopathy to both my shoulders, so I’ve been in pain for quite some time, and last week I started physical therapy. And when I thought about it, I was like, oh wow, I’m gonna go there, when I’m going to do exercises that will help me get some strength back and this and that.

[3:11] And then I learned that no, it doesn’t work like that. We did something that is called mobilization, which basically is that you need to leave, you know, all the weight of your limb, in my case, my arms to the physical therapist, who then will move your arm for you. And you need to let go completely of the arm, of its weight. You need not to participate in the movement at all.

[3:51] And this was like, I’m not sure I can do that. How can I do that? So the first two sessions, we’ve been meeting every day since the beginning of last week. And the first two sessions, I was like, oh, this is, I mean, this is so unusual for me. And of course, the therapist told me that it’s normal because I am feeling pain. So my brain is trying to keep me safe because we don’t like pain, right? And it’s made me think about how this all, you know, doing this mobilization exercise was an intense exercise in letting go. Because what I needed to do was learn to let go all the weight on my arm to the physical therapist. And it wasn’t like, okay, yeah, now I let go so I can think about something else. I needed to really focus and intentionally keep on letting go, keep on letting go. So it made me think how this letting go thing is a practice.

[5:11] In other areas of our lives, too. And also, there’s another thing that is coming to mind right now, which is something that a physical therapist told me. And it is about the fact, you know, you need to let go all the weight of your arm to me, and you need not to use your muscle to move your arm, because otherwise you will get hurt. So what is coming up for me right now is that my brain was trying to keep me safe, but was trying to make me do something that would have got hurt, would have hurt me, right? So if I use my muscles, I actually felt pain. So, in this specific case, letting go of control was perceived as unsafe, but not letting go of control was the actual unsafe thing. Oh, I’m having a kind of realization light bulb moment here. What is coming up for you? Because I believe that a lot of this, you know.

[6:31] Letting go experience, which is, you know, it can be letting go of control, letting go of expectations, letting go generally. And the fact that it is hard to do, I believe it has a lot to do with our sense of safety.

[6:53] So it is an interesting reframe, thinking that actually, sometimes, not always, but sometimes not letting go is the unsafe thing and is the thing that will get us hurt. Hmm how does that sound does it resonate with you and thinking about safety what’s coming up for me is a conversation I had with a client some time ago and at some point their mind was like, saying out loud, I know that I’m okay, I just need to remind myself that I’m okay. But I could see that their body, their non-verbal communication wasn’t in sync with that train of thought. So what I perceived was more a contraction and a feeling of not feeling safe in that moment.

[8:09] And this made me think that we need to involve our bodies to nurture our sense of safety. And I mean, there are thousands of amazing somatic practitioners out there who can teach us a lot about this.

[8:28] So it sounds like, you know, show, don’t tell, more like feel, don’t tell. Because if you tell your mind something that you cannot actually believe in, it won’t work. If I tell myself or if you tell yourself I am okay, but you don’t actually feel it in your body, I don’t think you’re going to feel safe enough to do something that you wanted to do and that you are willing to do even though it is making you feel unsafe. I don’t think you could be, and I too, could be able to do that thing in the end. But if we can help our body to feel safe, I think that’s a whole other story, right? And so now, what I am wondering is, what can help our bodies feel safe? And of course, it is going to be different for each and every person, but…

[9:39] I mean, it is, of course, this is not new. What I’m saying is not new, but it feels like right now I’m putting a mosaic

[9:48] or puzzle pieces together and it is all making sense. So how letting go is hard because it is tied and linked to our sense of safety and how we need to involve our bodies to foster and nurture our sense of safety. And so now the question is how can we do that and how do you usually do that if you do and maybe you do already but you you haven’t labeled that activity as something that helps you feel safe so oh yes okay here’s another and i’m not um i’m sorry.

[10:34] Here’s another thing that’s that’s coming up for me nature how about being in nature in whatever way you do that try and picture yourself in one of those moments I don’t know, sitting on the grass, standing on a beach. Maybe looking at the flowers in your garden, or walking in the woods, or sitting at your window while perceiving the breeze or the sun on your skin, or looking and listening to the birds flying over your house.

[11:25] I can already sense my heartbeat and my breath becoming calmer and more regular just by picturing those things in my head. What about you? How does being in nature usually feel for you? So, could being in nature be a way to nurture your sense of safety? And as I already said, being in nature could look like many different things. It doesn’t mean that you need to go for a hike. You could just, you know, smell the rosemary you planted in a vase and it’s on your windowsill, maybe. Or look outside at the trees or mountains or whatever you can see outside your window. Or whatever you can feel on your skin when you are outside.

[12:37] Or whatever, you can hear the leaves rustling, the birds singing. See, I’m like, yeah, I wasn’t thinking about that, but I’m noticing that I just mentioned all my senses. So, nature, being in nature, it is an embodied experience. And I’m not really sure why and how it helps us make, it helps us feel safe. I could research it a bit, but I know it can do that. It can have this kind of effect.

[13:21] And probably it is because it reminds us that we are part of nature. We are dwellers of the earth, and we are not different from nature, and that we are part of something bigger, and that we are not alone. And now I’m remembering, I’m thinking about the conversation I had with two Dear Business Connections a while ago, where we were exploring the idea of feeling supported by the universe. And one of them asked, when did we feel like that? And the other one told her, when I’m in nature, when I’m outside, outdoors in nature. And so the other person thought, oh, well, that’s true. It happens to me when I’m on the beach. And I thought, oh, Oh, that’s true. It happens to me when I look outside and look at my mountains. I feel like I am a little, a tiny bit of that mountain. I come from that mountain. The mountains are my ancestors. And I feel like I’m a part of a whole, if it makes sense. I don’t know if I’m making sense right now. Let me know.

[14:49] So, okay, let’s recap what we explored today. We explored how it is or it tends to be hard to let go and how letting go tends to be hard because it is usually linked to our sense of safety and how our sense of safety can be nurtured by caring for and nurturing our bodies and helping our bodies feel safe and how nature and being in nature is a great way to nurture that sense of safety. So before we part ways, I would like to invite you to think about, if maybe lately you’ve been wanting to let go of something or you’ve been noticing that something wasn’t helping you or serving you anymore and you may be ready to let it go and maybe you haven’t yet.

[16:05] And so, if you still want to let go of something, what could help you let go of it? And how can you nurture your sense of safety? To let go of it or in general? To, you know, go about your days in a more grounded, calm way? And there’s a third prompt completely optional but i think it can be interesting to play with it and it’s what about being nature how does being in nature make you feel how can you foster your connection with nature okay thanks for being with me today, i would love to hear what is coming up for you and you will find a speak pipe link to send me a voice note in the show notes or you can email me and you’ll find my email in the show notes i cannot wait to hear from you thank you so much talk soon.