"Holding on" and "Letting go"

In the fight of holding on and letting go, one can easily make a wrong choice about what to do with a particular thing or a person. How to choose? What to choose? Should we ask another individual? Should we seek any sort of advice? No matter what, we do turn to a certain individual who matters in our life for some sort of support or an advice. Or there are a lot of people who are the free advice experts. So advice floats in from all the directions, either we want them or not. But then again, should we listen to it? Frankly, it's a tough call because we don't know whether that person went through the same situation. If they did, were the circumstances the same as ours. Or did that thing/person mattered to them as much as it does to us. There are countless questions, to which sometimes we never get any answers.

Life is a battle, and everyone has their own custom made battles as well as the battle shoes (no doubt, even the outfit as well, but i guess i like the shoes more therefore highlighting "battle shoes"). No two battles are the same, like no two individuals are. We are all known by the differences i.e. how are we different from the others. If everyone looked the same and had the same nature, i personally think that the world wont be a pretty place to live in (i mean, we cant even have the same kind of food for all the three meals in a day. can we?). No one loves monotony. If they do, then we have started with a new phase of human evolution in which they have started becoming machines. Thus, an advise given by another individual, albeit his experiences, may or may not apply to us.

Sometimes, even the emotional set up of the individual differs (well, not sometimes, it always is different; we all don't have the same brains except the anatomical structure). Like some people are headstrong in one aspect of life and letting go in that aspect is easy, which may not be true for someone who is sensitive or emotional regarding the said aspect. Therefore, in the choice of holding on and letting go, the decision becomes completely ours. It depends on the experience that we have had and also on the experiences that we have listened to and learnt from others. But, in the later case, one usually tries to mold the situation according to oneself and then take whatever decision seems apt.

Choice between holding on and letting go is a difficult one because a right decision can lead to positive outcomes while the wrong ones can cause trouble. No matter what we decide, adds to our experience, which might help in the future. But as i said earlier, no two situations are the same and it is not likely that we face the same circumstances twice.

Occasionally, there are certain things which we want to hold on, no matter how much they hurt. this is for the precise reason that we don't want to lose the last essence of what we have already lost. People say that you need to let it go, but somewhere inside we know that it's not possible and you have to learn to live with that as a part of your life. Holding it close to your heart every night and day, until you are really ready to let it go. Well, i don't know what is meant by 'being ready'and haven't experienced any such state where i am ready to let go what i hold onto so preciously as if my existence depends on it. But, when it comes to a certain individuals in my life, i am aware when to let go. and i can't say the same in case of memories. Even with this awareness, i am bound to make mistakes, for we all are human after all. We all are bound to make mistakes in our choices and decisions.

For all i know is that we never let go of anything or anyone completely, we are not computers that a person, a memory can be erased from the system like a file. What happens is, that we start living with it as a part of our life. Initially, they tend to hurt and cause pain in the remote corners of our insides, generating emotional responses which we are not aware that our emotional centers in the brain are capable of. We start getting used to those memories that come up time and again. And then, one fine day we realize that these memories don't hurt anymore. We can go on with our life, carrying those memories with us on each step and phase of life. Of those memories, what is left becomes a sweet reminder of our past and signifies the struggle that we went through dealing with our small battles of choices, of which no one in the world knows.

At the end, it is the triumph of moving on in our life, no matter what our choice was and also taking what we held on to, without any pain.

Ishita Sidhu