Let Go Of Your Plans
“We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.” ~ Joseph Campbell
The hardest lesson to learn and the hardest thing to do for a frail human being is to let go. That doesn’t seem to be a part of our human nature. We are not people who let go. We’re people who grab on, who hold on tight, and who refuse to let go no matter the cost.
We associate letting go with pain.
We may have experienced the pain of letting go in the loss of someone we have loved. It may have been a parent, a sibling, another relative, or a good friend that we had to let go because of their death. We experienced pain at their loss and may experience it months or years later.
We may have experienced pain of letting go in the separation of another. Parents often experience that in the empty-nest syndrome when their last child leaves home. Others experience that when a best friend moves away. Still others experience that pain of separation when a significant other leaves because of the break up of a friendship or in divorce.
We may have experienced the pain of letting go in giving up control of situations. We are planners and we like to be in charge. When we find that we are not, that we have to take marching orders from someone else, it can make us uneasy and disoriented.
Loss, letting go, separation, these can markedly affect us. However, in all those situations, God is standing at the ready to guide us, to love us, and to comfort us. Campbell reminds us that “We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.” God has something in store for us. It is much better than what we would chose for ourselves. Let’s try to be directed by God today rather than by our own wishes and desires.
FAITH ACTION: Ask God for the grace of discernment so that you can let go of the things that may hinder you from accepting what God has waiting for you.