Letting Go

Buddhist Ideas for Holding Life Lightly

Introduction: The Weight in Our Hands

Imagine holding a glass of water at arm's length. At first, it feels light. After a minute, your arm begins to ache a little. After ten minutes, the ache becomes hard to ignore. After an hour, your whole arm trembles, and the glass, which weighs exactly the same as it did at the beginning, feels almost unbearable. The water has not changed. What has changed is how long you have been holding it.

Many of us carry our lives in a similar way. We hold on to old hurts, to worries about the future, to ideas about how things should be, to possessions, to plans, to people, to an image of who we ought to be. Each of these may be light at first. But held tightly, for a long time, they become heavy. We grow tired without quite knowing why. We feel tense, disappointed, stuck. Often, the problem is not the thing itself, but the grip.

This book is about loosening that grip. It draws on a very old body of ideas: the teachings of the Buddha, who lived about two and a half thousand years ago, and of the traditions that grew from his teaching. At the centre of these teachings is a simple and radical observation: much of our suffering comes from clinging to things that cannot be held, because everything changes. And there is another observation, just as important: it is possible to hold life more lightly, and to find in that lightness a kind of peace and freedom that does not depend on everything going our way.

I present these ideas as a practical philosophy, a set of insights and practices that anyone can test in their own life. Buddhism is also a living religious tradition, followed by many millions of people in many forms, and I hope to treat it with respect. You do not need to become a Buddhist, or to believe anything in particular, to find these ideas useful. The Buddha himself is remembered for encouraging people not to accept teachings simply because they were told to, but to test them against their own experience. That is the spirit in which this book is offered.

One more thing should be said at the start. Letting go is not the same as giving up, and it is not the same as not caring. A person who lets go of a grudge has not stopped caring about justice. A parent who lets a grown child live their own life has not stopped loving them. A person who lets go of a fixed plan has not stopped hoping. Letting go, in the sense of this book, means loosening the grip of the mind, so that we can care, love and hope with open hands rather than clenched fists.

How to Use This Book

Each chapter begins with an ordinary moment of holding on. It then explains one Buddhist idea in plain words, retells a story or a short passage from the old texts, shows how the idea can help in different kinds of lives and ends with practical steps, a short practice, answers to questions people often ask and a brief summary.

The old texts quoted in this book are retold in my own words, and I give the name of each discourse and the collection it belongs to, with its number where the numbering is standard, so that you can find them if you wish. Some stories come not from the Buddha's own discourses but from later traditions, and I say so when that is the case. Several popular sayings that are often presented as the Buddha's words were not spoken by him, and I have tried not to repeat them.

You can read the chapters in order, or begin with whichever one speaks to what you are holding today. The short practices are the heart of the book. They are simple and need only a few quiet minutes, a notebook and some honesty. Letting go is not learned by reading, but by trying, again and again, in the middle of ordinary life.

The people in the examples are imagined. Their names and lives are invented, but the things they hold on to are common to people of every age and in many places. You may recognize some of your own weights in theirs.

Some chapters of this book touch on grief, anger and painful memories. If you are going through a very hard time, please reach out to people you trust and to a doctor or another qualified professional. And if you ever feel unable to keep yourself safe, contact a crisis helpline or your local emergency services right away.

Now, if you are holding something as you read this, perhaps a cup or a phone, notice your grip for a moment. Is it tighter than it needs to be? Let it soften a little. That small softening is where this book begins.

Chapter 1: Why Our Hands Get Tired

Holding Everything Together

Marisa is forty-five and manages building projects for a construction company. She is known as someone who holds everything together. At work, she checks every detail of every plan, answers every email within the hour and rarely lets her team make decisions without her. At home, she organizes the family calendar, plans the meals, reminds her teenage children of their homework, sorts out her husband's appointments and phones her elderly mother every evening to make sure she has taken her medicine.

People admire her. "I do not know how you do it," her friends say. Marisa does not know either. She feels as if she is holding a dozen ropes, each one tied to something that might fall if she lets go. If she stops checking the plans, a mistake might slip through. If she stops reminding the children, they might fail. If she misses a call to her mother, something terrible might happen.

One Saturday morning, she wakes with a pain in her jaw. The dentist tells her that she has been grinding her teeth at night, probably for months. "Stress," he says. "You are clenching." On the drive home, Marisa notices that her hands are gripping the steering wheel so tightly that her knuckles are white. She loosens them and feels, for a moment, how tense her whole body is: shoulders raised, stomach tight, jaw set. She is holding on, not only with her mind, but with every muscle.

She parks outside her house and sits for a while. She thinks: what would happen if I let go of just one rope? The thought frightens her. It also, strangely, makes her want to cry with relief. This chapter is about that fear and that relief, and about an ancient teaching that has a great deal to say about why our hands, and our hearts, get so tired from holding on.

The Grip of the Mind

Holding on is one of the most natural things a human being does. A baby grasps a finger as soon as it is born. Children cling to their favourite toys. Adults hold on to jobs, homes, relationships, opinions, memories and plans. In many ways, this is necessary and good. We need to hold on to what matters, to care for it and protect it.

But there is a kind of holding on that goes further than care. It is a grip that tightens out of fear: fear of losing something, fear of change, fear of what might happen if we are not in control. This grip often does not make things safer. Instead, it makes us tired, tense and anxious, and sometimes it damages the very things we are trying to protect. A parent who controls every detail of a child's life may stop the child from growing. A person who clings to a partner out of fear may push them away. A manager who cannot let go of any decision may exhaust both herself and her team.

The early Buddhist texts have a word for this kind of grip: upādāna, often translated as clinging or grasping. It comes from a root meaning to take up, and it was also used for the fuel that keeps a fire burning. In this sense, clinging is the fuel of much of our suffering. As long as we keep feeding the fire, it keeps burning.

The image is worth pausing on. Fire needs fuel. When the fuel is removed, the fire goes out by itself, not because anyone fights it, but because nothing is feeding it. The Buddhist teachings suggest that much of our distress works in the same way. When we stop feeding it with clinging, it can begin to cool and settle on its own.

This does not mean that all holding on is wrong, or that we should try to stop caring about anything. It means that there is a difference between holding something with an open hand and gripping it with a clenched fist. Learning to tell the difference, and to soften the fist, is what this book is about.

A Prince Who Left Home

The teachings in this book come from a man who is known to history as the Buddha, a title meaning "the awakened one". His personal name was Siddhattha Gotama, and he lived in northern India about two and a half thousand years ago. Many details of his life come to us through traditions that were passed down orally for generations before they were written, so it is wise to read them as a mixture of history and story. But the main outline has been preserved with great care.

According to the tradition, he was born into a ruling family and grew up in comfort, protected from the harsher sides of life. As a young man, he encountered for the first time the realities of ageing, illness and death, and he was deeply shaken. If everyone grows old, falls ill and dies, he wondered, what lasting happiness can there be? He decided to leave his comfortable life and search for an answer.

For several years, he studied with spiritual teachers and practised extreme self-denial, eating very little, enduring pain and pushing his body to its limits, as many seekers of his time did. He became so thin and weak that he nearly died. And he realized that this harsh path was not leading to the freedom he sought. Pleasure had not freed him, and neither had pain.

He took a different path. He ate a simple meal, regained his strength and sat down to meditate under a tree, determined to understand the nature of suffering and its end. According to the tradition, during that night he reached a deep understanding, which came to be called awakening or enlightenment. For the rest of his long life, more than forty years, he walked from place to place, teaching anyone who would listen: kings and beggars, merchants and farmers, men and women, people of every background.

What he taught was not a set of beliefs to be accepted, but a path to be walked: a way of understanding the mind and of living that, he said, could lead to freedom from suffering. At the heart of that path was the insight that much of our suffering comes from clinging, and that it is possible to let go.

The First Teaching

According to the tradition, the Buddha's first teaching after his awakening was given to five companions who had practised self-denial with him. It is recorded in a discourse called the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta, which can be translated as "the discourse on setting the wheel of the teaching in motion". In the collections of early Buddhist texts, it is found in the Saṃyutta Nikāya, at number 56.11.

The discourse begins, in my own plain paraphrase, with the Buddha telling his companions that there are two extremes that a person seeking freedom should avoid. One is chasing pleasure, devoting oneself to the enjoyment of the senses. The other is self-torment, devoting oneself to harsh denial and pain. Both, he said, are unhelpful. Avoiding both extremes, he had found a middle way, which leads to understanding, peace and freedom.

This is worth noticing, because it tells us something about the spirit of the whole teaching. The Buddha had tried both comfort and severe hardship, and found that neither worked. The path he taught was not about punishing ourselves or giving up all enjoyment. It was about finding a wise balance. We will return to this idea, the middle way, later in this book. For now, it is enough to see that letting go, in the Buddhist sense, is not about harshness. It is about wisdom.

The discourse then sets out what became known as the Four Noble Truths. These four statements are often called the foundation of all Buddhist teaching. They are simple to state and take a lifetime to understand.

Four Truths in Plain Words

The first truth is about suffering, or in the Pali language of the early texts, dukkha. This word is hard to translate. It can mean suffering, but also unsatisfactoriness, stress, unease, the sense that something is not quite right. The first truth says, in effect: life contains dukkha. Birth, ageing, illness and death bring suffering. Being separated from what we love brings suffering. Being stuck with what we do not want brings suffering. Not getting what we want brings suffering. This is not a pessimistic statement. It is an honest one. Anyone who has lived for a while knows that these things are true.

The second truth is about the cause of suffering. The Buddha identified it as craving, in Pali taṇhā, a word that literally means thirst. It is the restless wanting that keeps us reaching for more, clinging to what we have and pushing away what we do not want. Thirst for pleasure, thirst for things to continue and thirst for things to go away: these, he taught, are the fuel of suffering.

The third truth is that suffering can end. When craving fades and clinging is released, suffering cools and settles. The Buddha described this ending with a word that has become famous: nibbāna, which literally refers to the going out of a flame. The fire goes out because its fuel is gone. This truth is the hopeful heart of the teaching. Our suffering is not fixed or inevitable in the form it takes. It can change.

The fourth truth is the path that leads to the end of suffering. The Buddha called it the Noble Eightfold Path, eight aspects of a wise life: right understanding, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right concentration. These are not eight separate steps to be done in order, but eight parts of a whole way of living, which support each other. The word "right" here means something like wise or skilful, not rigid rules.

Put very simply: life contains suffering; much of that suffering comes from craving and clinging; it is possible for suffering to ease when clinging is released; and there is a practical path for learning to release it. The rest of this book explores, chapter by chapter, what that releasing can look like in an ordinary life.

What Letting Go Is Not

Before going further, it is important to clear away a few misunderstandings, because the idea of letting go is easily misread.

Letting go is not giving up. A person who lets go of their desperate need for a particular outcome can still work hard toward a goal. In fact, they often work better, because they are less tense and fearful. Marisa does not need to stop caring about her projects or her family. She might simply loosen her need to control every detail.

Letting go is not indifference. Some people imagine that a person who has let go no longer feels anything, like a stone. But the Buddhist teachings place great value on compassion, kindness and care. Letting go of clinging makes room for a love that is warmer and less fearful, not for coldness.

Letting go is not pretending. It does not mean saying "I do not care" when we do, or smiling over pain. Real letting go begins with honestly feeling what we feel, and then loosening our grip on it, not covering it up.

Letting go is not accepting harm. Letting go of a grudge does not mean staying in a situation where we are being hurt. Letting go of control does not mean ignoring real dangers. Sometimes, the wisest thing we can do is hold firmly to a boundary, or act strongly to protect ourselves or others. The Buddhist path includes wise action, not passive acceptance of everything.

And letting go is not something done once and for all. It is a practice, repeated many times a day, in small ways. We let go, and then we notice we are holding on again, and we let go again. Like a muscle, the ability to let go grows with use.

A Teaching to Test

One of the features of the Buddha's teaching that many modern readers find attractive is his encouragement to test things for oneself. In a well-known discourse, the Kālāma Sutta, found in the Aṅguttara Nikāya at number 3.65, he speaks to a group of villagers who are confused, because many wandering teachers have visited them, each praising his own views and criticizing the others'. How, they ask, can they know whom to believe?

In my own paraphrase, the Buddha tells them not to accept a teaching simply because it has been handed down, because it is tradition, because it is written in a respected text, because it seems logical, because the teacher seems impressive or because the teacher is their own. Instead, he says, when you know for yourselves that certain ways of thinking and acting lead to harm and suffering, give them up. And when you know for yourselves that certain ways lead to well-being and happiness, take them up and live by them.

This advice has sometimes been stretched to mean that the Buddha taught people to believe whatever they personally like. That is not quite what he said. In the same discourse, he goes on to discuss greed, hatred and delusion and how they lead to suffering, and he expected people to look honestly at the results of their actions. But his central point is clear: do not simply believe; look, test and see.

This is the spirit in which you are invited to read this book. You do not need to accept any idea here because it is old or because it is Buddhist. Try it. Notice what happens when you hold on tightly and what happens when you loosen your grip. Let your own experience be your guide.

Four Lives, Four Grips

Jun is seventeen and made a careless mistake in an important exam: he misread a question and lost a whole section of marks. The exam is over, and nothing can change the result. But Jun cannot stop thinking about it. He replays the moment again and again, imagining how he should have read the question, blaming himself. He sleeps badly and loses interest in his other subjects. His grandmother, who practises Buddhist meditation, tells him: "You are still holding the exam paper in your hand, even though it was handed in weeks ago. Your hand must be tired." Jun laughs, but the image stays with him. Each time the memory returns, he imagines putting the paper down on a table and walking away. It does not work at once. But slowly, the grip loosens.

Bertrand is seventy and has not spoken to his brother for nine years, after an argument about their parents' house. He still remembers every word of that argument and feels a flush of anger whenever he thinks of it. His wife tells him that his brother has been ill. Bertrand realizes that he has been holding the argument for nine years, and that it has cost him a brother. He does not know whether reconciliation is possible. But he decides, at least, to stop feeding the anger, and to write a short letter wishing his brother well.

Asha is thirty and lives alone in a small flat that she keeps perfectly clean and tidy. If anything is out of place, she feels a wave of anxiety until she has fixed it. She cannot relax when friends visit, because she is watching for crumbs and fingerprints. One evening, after a friend accidentally spills wine on her rug, Asha feels her heart pound and her hands shake. Later, she realizes that her grip on perfection has become stronger than her enjoyment of her own home and her friends. She begins, very gently, to practise leaving one small thing undone each day, noticing the discomfort and letting it be.

Marisa, from the beginning of this chapter, decides to let go of one rope. She tells her team that, for the next month, they will make all decisions about small purchases without asking her. She is nervous. A few decisions are not the ones she would have made. But nothing falls apart, and her team seems more confident. She notices that she sleeps a little better. It is a small beginning, but she has discovered that letting go of one rope did not make everything collapse. It made her lighter.

Jun, Bertrand, Asha and Marisa were each holding something: an exam, an argument, a need for perfection, a need for control. Each grip had begun for understandable reasons. And each had become heavier than the thing it was holding. Loosening it did not solve every problem. But it gave each of them a little more room to breathe.

Practical Steps

First, notice your grip. Several times a day, pause and notice whether you are physically tense: jaw, shoulders, hands, stomach. Physical tension is often a sign of mental clinging. Let the muscles soften.

Second, name what you are holding. When you feel tense, worried or upset, ask yourself: what am I holding on to right now? A plan, a fear, a memory, an idea of how things should be? Naming it is the first step to loosening it.

Third, distinguish caring from clinging. For each thing you hold on to, ask: am I caring for this with an open hand, or gripping it out of fear? You can keep caring while loosening the grip.

Fourth, let go of one small rope. Choose one small thing that you usually control or worry about, and decide to let it go for a week. Notice what happens, both in the situation and in yourself.

Fifth, test it for yourself. Do not take any idea in this book on trust. Try it, and observe honestly whether holding on or letting go leads to more peace, in your own experience.

Sixth, be patient. Letting go is a practice, not a single decision. Expect to find yourself holding on again and again. Each time you notice and soften, you are practising.

A Short Practice: Noticing the Grip

This practice takes about ten minutes. It helps you feel, in a simple physical way, the difference between holding on and letting go.

Sit comfortably. Take a small object in your hand, such as a stone, a pen or a key. Hold it gently in your palm. Now slowly close your hand around it and squeeze, a little at first, then more firmly, until you are gripping it tightly. Hold this grip for about a minute. Notice what happens: the tension in your fingers, then your hand, your wrist, perhaps your arm and shoulder. Notice whether your breathing changes. Notice how it feels.

Now slowly release the grip. Let your fingers open until the object rests on your open palm. Notice the feeling of release: the warmth, the tingling, the relaxation spreading up your arm. Notice that the object has not gone anywhere. It is still in your hand. You have not lost it. You are simply holding it without gripping.

Now close your eyes and bring to mind something you have been holding on to in your life: a worry, a plan, a hurt, an expectation. As you think of it, notice whether any part of your body tightens, as your hand did. Then, with your next out-breath, imagine opening your hand around this thing, just as you opened your hand around the stone. You do not have to throw it away. Just hold it more loosely. Notice whether anything changes, in your body or your mind.

Finish by taking a few slow breaths. Put the object somewhere you will see it during the day. Whenever you see it, let it remind you to notice your grip, and to soften it if you can.

Some people like to carry a small stone in their pocket for this reason. When they feel themselves clenching, they hold the stone, squeeze it and then let their hand open around it. It is a small, private reminder that letting go is always possible.

Questions People Often Ask

"If I let go, won't everything fall apart?" This is a very common fear, especially for people who hold a lot of responsibility. In practice, most people find that letting go of excessive control does not make things fall apart. Often, things go on much as before, and sometimes better, because others take on more and we become calmer. Start with small things, as Marisa did, and observe what actually happens. Your experience will be a better guide than your fear.

"Is Buddhism a religion or a philosophy?" It can be both, depending on how it is practised. For many millions of people, Buddhism is a religion, with temples, rituals, monks and nuns, and beliefs about the nature of existence. Many others, in many places, approach its teachings mainly as a philosophy and a set of practices for understanding the mind and living well. This book takes the second approach, while respecting the first.

"Does letting go mean I should have no desires at all?" Not exactly. The Buddhist teachings distinguish between craving, a restless, clinging thirst, and wholesome intentions, such as the wish to help others, to learn or to live well. The path itself involves effort and aspiration. The aim is not to become a person without any wishes, but to loosen the grip of the kind of wanting that causes suffering, and to hold even our good wishes with an open hand.

Chapter Summary

Holding on is natural and often necessary, but there is a kind of gripping, born of fear, that makes us tired and tense and can harm what we try to protect. The early Buddhist texts call it upādāna, clinging, a word also used for the fuel of a fire. The Buddha, who lived about two and a half thousand years ago, left a comfortable life, tried harsh self-denial and found a middle way between pleasure and pain.

In his first teaching (Saṃyutta Nikāya 56.11), he set out the Four Noble Truths: life contains suffering, or dukkha; craving is its main cause; suffering can end when clinging is released; and the Eightfold Path leads there. Letting go is not giving up, indifference, pretending or accepting harm, and it is practised again and again. In the Kālāma Sutta, the Buddha encouraged people to test teachings against their own experience.

In the next chapter, we look at one of the most practical teachings of all: the difference between the pain that life brings and the extra suffering we add to it, which the Buddha described as a second arrow.