Developing a Deeper Sense of Letting Go

Letting go isn’t an event. It’s a practice.

This piece comes from my recovery writing, but it’s really about something broader: learning how to loosen our grip on things that no longer serve us

Letting go gets a fair amount of discussion in recovery circles. It’s the kind of thing you’ll hear over coffee after a meeting or scribbled in the margins of a Big Book.

“Let go and let God.”

“Hold on loosely.”

“Detach with love.”

Recently I wrote down a phrase that surprised me: developing a deeper sense of letting go. Not letting go but developing a deeper sense of it.

That wording stuck with me. Because it points to something important:

Letting go isn’t an event. It’s a practice.

It’s not a single gesture—it’s a lifelong deepening.

Not Just Letting Go, but How You Let Go

Early in recovery, letting go meant white knuckling through cravings. Deleting phone numbers. Avoiding old haunts. Biting my tongue. It was surface-level—and it needed to be. Survival lives at the surface.

Over time, though, I learned that real freedom comes from a different kind of letting go. One that happens inside. Releasing control. Letting go of outcomes. Accepting that I don’t know what’s best for everyone least of all myself sometimes.

Now, 38 years later, I see that letting go isn’t something I did once. It’s something I keep doing. And I keep discovering new places where I’m still holding on.

What Do We Hold Onto?

We hold onto:

· The illusion of control.

· The need to be right.

· Old identities that no longer serve us.

· Resentments that feel protective.

· Expectations we didn’t even know we had.

Sometimes we hold on so tightly we don’t notice until something, or someone, opens our hand.

Depth Has Layers

A deeper sense means you’re no longer just changing behavior. You’re letting go emotionally, psychologically-sometimes existentially.

· Letting go of managing other people’s reactions.

· Letting go of needing credit.

· Letting go of urgency.

· Even letting go of what “letting go” is supposed to look like.

It doesn’t mean you stop caring. It means you stop clinging. Not detachment in the cold sense—detachment in the wise sense. You don’t carry what isn’t yours. You don’t force what doesn’t want to move.

When Different Traditions Agree

I studied philosophy in college, and I’m struck by how often different traditions arrive at the same place. The Stoics talked about focusing only on what’s within our control. Buddhism points to attachment as the source of suffering. AA says, simply, “turn it over.”

The older I get, the less these sound-like theories and the more they sound like instructions for peace.

What I’m Still Letting Go Of

Even now, I catch myself:

· Holding on to control in my family life.

· Wanting applause instead of quiet self-respect.

· Trying to prove something long after it matters

So, I come back to that phrase: developing a deeper sense of letting go.

It reminds me that I’m not done. And that’s not failure—it’s growth.