Updated: 23/01/2024 por Jennifer Delgado | Published: 25/07/2016
An ancient legend tells that a famous scientist went to visit a Zen master. On arrival, he introduced himself by enumerating all the titles that achieved and what he had learned during the years of study.
Then he asked the master to teach him the secrets of his philosophy. In response, the master simply invited him to sit down and offered him a cup of tea.
Apparently distracted, without showing any sign of concern, the master began to pour the tea into the cup of the scientist and continued even when the cup was full.
Puzzled by this behavior, the scientist warned the master that the cup was full and the tea was falling on the table.
The master replied calmly:
– Exactly. You already came with the full cup, how could you learn something?
In front of the incredulous expression of the scientist, the master remarked:
– Unless you empty your cup you will not learn anything.
As for the scientist, often we cling to some beliefs, habits, persons or ways of thinking that keep us from growing. But if we want to seize new opportunities, if we want to receive the gifts that the world still has to offer us, we must first learn to let go what we have. We can not grab new things, if our hands are already full.
Letting go is part of life
Life is always changing and moving forward means that we have to leave some things behind, if we don’t do it and continue to hold them those things will end turning into an unnecessary burden that will prevent us from continuing to reach our goal.
For example, people who move to live in a new country, but continue to feel nostalgia for what they have left, will continue to repeat the old habits and will not accept the new, ending up unhappy. Similarly, those who start a new relationship without having forgotten the previous one will condemn the new relationship to failure.
Of course, not all things of the past are negative, some memories may give us strength in difficult times and it is worth to keep them, but there are emotional ties that we must delete, to prepare for a new phase of life. In fact, letting go does not mean always giving up or forget, but simply to feel grateful for what we have experienced and turn the page consciously choosing to keep the good experiences and leaving behind us the emotions that do not bring us anything and keep us stuck and make us feel bad.
The interesting thing is that in most cases you must not burn the bridges behind us, because letting go does not always mean definitely to cut with a person or with our past, but make peace with ourselves. It means reformulating our ideas and, above all, our emotions, letting go the nostalgia, fear, resentment, or excessive attachment.
In other cases, letting go acquires a physical connotation. In fact, without realizing it we cling to many things that give us a false sense of security. Therefore, a good exercise to learn how to let go, is to get rid of all those things that we do not really need and occupy a place in our home just to make us not feel alone.
The magic of empty our cup from time to time
Our society encourages us to consume, this means accumulating many things and even relationships. But from time to time you need to empty your cup. When we do it consciously we experience a miracle because breaking those bonds that held us we can really take advantage of the new opportunities that arise. When we decide to leave behind the things that limit us, we are giving ourselves the opportunity to expand our “ego” to unimaginable universes.
Think that if you remain tied to a malicious couple’s relationship, you can never know a person that really enriches you and allows you to grow. If you remain tied to your habits, you can not discover new ways of doing things. If you remain clung to stereotypes, you will not enjoy the wonders that hides diversity. If remain clung to hatred and resentment, you will never love completely.
Do not forget that life is constantly changing and only when you have your hands free you will grasp the new opportunities that will arise.
Some of the things we have to learn to let go are:
– The need to control everything, especially people who surround us. Be yourself and let be.
– The need to be always right, because that way you will not learn anything new.
– The need to cling to the past, because that way you can not move a light step towards the future.
– Malicious feelings such as anger, hatred and resentment, because they keep you from loving and enjoy fully the present.
Remember that happiness is always a personal decision, and that life is full of incredible opportunities, but we must be ready to seize them.
