Breathe, Stretch, Shake

… Let it go. *Harlem Shakes*

Over the past couple of years I’ve noticed that I progressively have become happier and happier. I attempted to pin point the root of my happiness but I soon realized that it was due to a plethora of reasons. One being, I’ve learned to let things go. So many of us hold onto grudges for days, weeks, months, and sometimes even years but that becomes so detrimental to ourselves that we sacrifice our happiness for our bitterness. I’m not referring to just romantic relationships, but friendships, relationships with family members and so forth. The worst thing you can do in most (but not all) situations is to let your feelings control you rather you controlling your feelings. When you let this bitterness, resentfulness, anger, etc. get the best of you, you’re letting your emotions consume you and you tend to lash out in anger to those who are innocent.

These past 3-4 years has actually been the best time of my life… aside from when I was a child and had no worries. Approximately 2 years ago I graduated from college, began grad school, and found myself a career I absolutely love, all in a span of 3 months. I lost friends, gained friends, got into relationships, got out of relationships, traveled, and everything in between. The best thing I learned about myself is that I had to take everything with a grain of salt depending on who it was from. I’ve been in situations where I’ve almost lost close friends and I can’t even remember what the heck happened. I used to hold grudges but I knew that for me it didn’t solve anything. I was asking myself questions such as, “what are you gaining from being upset?”, “if that person was gone tomorrow, could you be at peace?”, “is this really something to lose a friendship over?”, and everything in between. This is when I learned to let things go. I learned that I needed to be the better person, even if I was wrong. I learned that I needed to be the best person I can be and that by losing control of my emotions would not get me to where I wanted to be. Finally, I learned that I needed to let God be my vindicator. When we’re upset with someone or something, we typically find ways to seek revenge but we should only focus on things that we can control. If you’ve done everything you could do in your power to make things works and you put your maximal effort forth and it still didn’t work- let it go. Let God handle it.

You’re always going to receive advice from friends, family, acquaintances, colleagues, and sometimes even strangers but you need to be able to distinguish who really cares for you and who wants to see you fail. Believe it or not, even those closest to you will attempt to be your anchor and bring you down. It’s the ugly truth. People will betray you, talk behind your back, or if you’re lucky they’ll tell you exactly how it is. Through all of this, you need to be able to bloom where you’re planted. This just means that in certain situations you’re going to be stuck with nothing but weeds surrounding you, but don’t let that bring you down. Misery loves company. If you’re able to adapt to your surroundings and dust off the negativity, you’ll succeed. The best thing you can do for yourself is to trust your heart and when things take a wrong turn in your life, remember that “this too shall pass.”