Episode 260: Big Ideas | Letting Go
“The spiritualities of all great world religions teach us letting go, or how to step aside,” writes Richard Rohr. Letting go is an intentional process. We may let go of our emotional attachments, limiting beliefs, or past events. We may give up control, the need to be successful, or the need to be right. It’s an ongoing process of surrendering to what is, and adjusting accordingly. In Episode 260, Susan and Cynthia take on this big idea, a central theme in spiritual practice.
Notes & Quotes:
ALSSI News, 5/11/2023
Crisis Contemplation, by Rev. Dr. Barbara A. Holmes
The Importance of Letting Go—But Not Right Away, by TyaCamellia Allred, LMFT, Roots Relational Therapy
Simplicity: The Freedom of Letting Go, by Richard Rohr
Apatheia, Wikipedia
An Early Resurrection: Life in Christ before You Die, by Adam S. Miller
Eager to Love: The Alternative Way of Francis of Assisi, by Richard Rohr
Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life, by Richard Rohr
Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith, by Anne Lamott
At Last She Said It: Honest Conversations about Faith, Church, and Everything In Between, by Susan Hinckley and Cynthia Winward
Walking Away, by Dana Vanderlugt, Reformed Journal, 1/23/2025
Ch ch Changes, by Nadia Bolz-Weber, The Corners, 3/16/2026
Jesus’ Alternative Plan: The Sermon on the Mount, by Richard Rohr
Barking to the Choir: The Power of Radical Kinship, by Gregory Boyle
Words of Good Hope: A Conversation with Nadia Bolz-Weber, Part II, by Jane Ratcliffe, 6/26/2024
Wild Mercy: Living the Fierce and Tender Wisdom of the Women Mystics, by Mirabai Starr
Letting Go, by Jack Kornfield, 7/1/2022
“Life is such that everyone's life, sometimes, is almost more than you can bear.” —Jim Finley
“True liberation is letting go of our small self, letting go of our cultural biases, letting go of our fear of loss and death. Freedom is letting go of wanting more and better things, and it's letting go of our need to control and manipulate God and others. It's even letting go of our need to know and our need to be right, which we only discover with our maturity. We become free as we let go of our three primary energy centers…as described by Thomas Keating: a need for power, control; a need for safety, security; and our need for affection and esteem.” —Dr. Barbara Holmes
“Letting go and giving up are not the same thing. When we let go, we recognize our arrogance, our myths of control, and we realize that the only constants are God's love and God's promise that we will never be left alone.” —Dr. Barbara Holmes
“What can be more futile, more insane, than to create inner resistance to what already is?” —Eckhart Tolle
“Letting go is profoundly honest. It is grounded firmly in the truth of what is. That’s why it’s such a release.” —Sharon Salzberg
“Be with that shit
Deal with that shit
Heal from that shit
And then, when you’re ready—Let that shit go.” —TyaCamellia Allred
“Unless we learn to let go of our feelings, we don’t have the feelings, the feelings have us. [...] Don’t misunderstand me: I’m not saying that you should suppress and deny your feelings. I’m challenging you to name them, identify them, and observe them. But don’t fight them and don’t identify with them. [...] —Richard Rohr, Simplicity, (p. 44 Kindle)
“Love is hard because it’s a kind of death. To love, I have to be willing to die. I have to be willing to let go of my life and give myself to caring for the lives of others. And, then, to continually live in love, I have to be willing to die every day, every hour, in ways that are big and small, again and again. I yield on the freeway. I bite my tongue when I want to criticize. I put down what I’m doing and read to my kids. I stay up late and finish the dishes. I get up early and drive my daughter to seminary. I grade the next paper. I put on my running shoes. I exhale. I surrender my life. Crucified with Christ, I practice surrendering all day long until my days are filled with the rest of the Lord. I practice dying as a way of life. And I keep practicing until I find the kind of rest that comes only from living my life in the form of a thousand daily deaths.” —Adam Miller, Early Resurrection, (p. 44)
“If suffering is ‘whenever we are not in control’ (which is my definition), then you see why some form of suffering is absolutely necessary to teach us how to live beyond the illusion of control and to give that control back to God.” —Richard Rohr, Eager to Love
“We come to God not by addition, but by subtraction, letting go.” —Richard Rohr, Falling Upward
“Sometimes grace works like water wings when you feel you are sinking.” —Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually)
“In my opinion, there are 3 primary things that we have to let go of. First is the compulsion to be successful. Second is the compulsion to be right—even, and especially, to be theologically right. [...] Finally there is the compulsion to be powerful, to have everything under control.” —Richard Rohr, Simplicity, (p. 42 Kindle)
“There’s always a lot of anxiety and insecurity in letting go of your current images of yourselves and your images of God. Only God can lead you, and all you can do is let go. The spiritualities of all great world religions teach us letting go, or how to step aside.” —Richard Rohr, Simplicity, (p. 25 Kindle)
“I’ve heard it said that we can only know God through an open mind, just like we can only see the sky through a clear window. We won’t see the sky if we’ve covered the glass with blue paint. The idea of painting the sky on a window before we look out so it appears exactly the way we want it to, or think it should, or hope it will, sounds silly. Yet sometimes, when I’m sitting in church surrounded by what feels and sounds like certainty about ideas that for me only point to larger questions, I have the vague feeling I’m looking at a painted sky. It’s pretty, sunny, warm and reliable, but if I could somehow just scrape away the blue paint, I might get a glimpse of what the sky really looks like. And if I were to open the window and lean out, I might see even further.” —Susan Hinckley, At Last She Said It, (pg 52)
“The path of descent…is not necessarily a one-time event, but for some of us, it's a cyclical experience.” —Mike Petrow
“What if fear [...] was replaced with faith that God could be offering something better—even if it’s different from what I initially believed? So maybe I’ve not completely learned how to love the sound of my feet walking away, but I am finding grace in slowing down, grounding the humility of my limitations, and better listening to my footsteps whichever way they’re pointed. [...] Let me hear the beauty of walking away from not only that which is not meant for me but the joy of walking toward that which has been created for all of us.” —Dana VanderLugt
“In the early 90s when I got sober I very much needed to get clean but the idea of becoming someone else terrified me, so I tried desperately to live the exact same life, in the same places and with the same people just without the drugs and alcohol. Because when change feels scary, familiarity can feel like safety, even when it’s not. But trying to just impersonate a previous version of myself ends up being more painful than just accepting that I’ve changed.” —Nadia Bolz-Weber
“Faith for Jesus is the opposite of anxiety. If we are anxious, if we are trying to control everything, if we are worried about many things, we don’t have faith, according to Jesus. We do not trust that God is good and on our side. We are trying to do it all ourselves, lift ourselves up by our own bootstraps.
The giveaway is control. That’s a good litmus test of the quality of our faith. People of faith don’t have to control everything, nor do they have to change people. We have the wisdom to know the difference, as the Twelve Step people say, We cannot ‘fix’ the soul. Matt 6:34 says: ’So do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself.” —Richard Rohr, Jesus’ Alternative Plan, (p. 27)
“Now you might ask: ‘What does this have to do with God? I thought prayer was supposed to be talking to God or searching for God. You seem to be saying that prayer is first of all about me and getting myself out of the way?’ That is exactly what I am saying. God is already present. God’s Spirit is dwelling within you. You cannot search for what you already have. You cannot talk God into ‘coming’ into you by longer and more urgent prayers. All you can do is become quieter, smaller, and less filled with your own self and its flurry of ideas and feelings. Then God will be obvious in the very now of things.” —Richard Rohr, Simplicity, (p. 44 Kindle)
“The discovery that awaits us is that paradise is contained in the here and now. We let go of the desire to expect anything beyond it. The awareness of this keeps us from the suffering generated by resisting life as it is.” —Gregory Boyle, Barking to the Choir, (p. 74)
“There have been times where I have fought, fought, fought because I was sure the story I was telling myself was right about myself and the world and other people. When everything collapses or something happens that was unexpected, I start thinking differently about it, I’ve got to let all of that stuff drop. And I can't even see the relief of it, because I'm so scared to let it go, because it's all I have.” —Nadia Bolz-Weber
“When religious ideologies and their associated spiritual practices begin to take us away from our lives instead of connecting us with the center of ourselves, we need to be willing to let them go. To not be in a hurry to replace them. Instead, we can shift our focus back to the ordinary and bless it with the gift of our full attention. Then watch in awe as it brims with holy light.” —Mirabai Starr, Wild Mercy
“Letting go is a central theme in spiritual practice, as we see the preciousness and brevity of life. When letting go is called for, if we have not learned to do so, we suffer greatly, and when we get to the end of our life, we may have what is called a crash course. Sooner or later we have to learn to let go and allow the changing mystery of life to move through us without our fearing it, without holding and grasping.” —Jack Kornfield
“Perhaps the single most courageous act of contemplation is to feel the grief of letting go—grief that is a fruit of loving—and to continue to have an open heart. Somehow, mystically, doing so opens a door.” —Center for Action and Contemplation
“Letting go and moving through life from one change to another brings the maturing of our spiritual being. In the end we discover that to love and let go can be the same thing. Both ways do not seek to possess. Both allow us to touch each moment of this changing life and allow us to be there fully for whatever arises next.” —Jack Kornfield
“Letting go is an inside job, something we can only do for ourselves.” —Sharon Salzberg