On Caring, Worrying, and Letting Go

I don't remember living with my mother until I was six years old, when she married my stepfather and retrieved my sister and me from our grandmother's house. Looking back, my perception is that she never worried about anything except missing one of her soap operas, or spilling a drink. In fact she prided herself on not worrying. Not caring, for that matter. She took great personal satisfaction in being a "tough broad."

I, on the other hand, worry about everything, and care too much. Overcompensation, of course. Basic psychology. However, realizing that at some point I chose to worry and to care, so as not to be like her, gives me the ability to investigate the choice I made when I was young, and rethink it. I understand, for example, that I learned to worry from a woman named Mary, who seemed to me to be a very loving person who worried about everyone she loved. I, therefore, equated love with worry, and preferred Mary's example to my mother's.

At the same time I met Mary, my high school English teacher (the first male role model in my life who was not mean spirited and abusive), introduced to our class the concept of complacency. He spoke out against it of course, and because he was a hero in my eyes, my decision to care/worry was compounded. I chose to worry about not only those I knew and cared about personally, but about the state of the world in its entirety... all matters animate and inanimate. I developed the skill that, at the time, seemed an honorable and appropriate attribute.

Now it drives me nuts, and I've come to realize that I can care without worrying. Furthermore, I can care without being obsessive about it. Wow! Insight! Realization itself, however, isn't what gets the job done. Would that it were that simple. What it takes is vigilance and consistent practice. This means I now notice myself worrying needlessly or caring too much, and I make a concentrated effort to rein myself in. I do it with -- borrowing from psychobabble -- self-talk.

The ones I seem to talk to myself about most are my kids. Using the term kids loosely, since they range in age from 32 to almost 50. I worry about things that challenge them and scare me, mostly involving their physical and emotional safety. I worry about not being able to protect them and. realizing it's no longer my role to do so, I worry that I somehow fell short during the earlier stage of our relationship when it was my role. Enter the ugly monster... guilt.

So I talk to myself about caring, worrying, and feeling guilty. Makes for quite a conversation but at least it isn't about soap operas and whiskey and soda with a twist. I tell myself what I would tell a client, or a close friend, coming to me for advice... an effective communication technique. I tell myself, "You've done the best you could. Give yourself credit for what you did well. Stop berating yourself for falling short of perfection, since no human can be perfect. Your kids are smart and sound and finding their own way in life. You pointed them in the right direction, but you don't get to choose their path or lead the way. Let them go. It's your turn now to focus on your own path, which grows shorter every day."

I've learned that letting go is a process, less like dropping an object and more like trying to get gum off your shoe. So I work at it, and try not to work so hard that it monopolizes my life. Humor helps, so I finish my self talk with a phrase one of my yoga students shared with me years ago. She learned it from her mother in German, but the English translation is: Go with God. But go.

I've also learned that letting go leaves one not empty handed, but free. A wonderful reward for the ongoing effort required. Freedom -- you gotta work at it. And you gotta love it. Without it our lives weigh heavy on the scale of universal balance.