Let it Go

How Do I Let Go? A Trauma-Informed Path to Releasing What No Longer Serves

“Just let it go.”

It’s advice we hear all the time. From well-meaning friends. From social media. From our own inner critic.

But for many women I work with — especially those carrying deep emotional histories, perfectionism, and patterns of overgiving — letting go doesn’t feel so simple.

In fact, it can feel confusing, even threatening.

Letting go of what?
How?
And what will happen to me if I do?

These are real, valid questions — especially if you've spent years holding everything together for everyone else. If you’ve been in survival mode. If your nervous system has learned that safety = control.

From a trauma-informed perspective, letting go isn’t just a mental choice — it’s a full-body, heart-and-soul process that unfolds with compassion, care, and time.

Why Letting Go Can Feel So Hard

Many of us carry beliefs like:

“If I stop worrying, something bad will happen.”
“If I don’t take care of it all, no one else will.”
“If I let go, I’ll fall apart.”

These beliefs don’t come from nowhere — they often arise from earlier life experiences where we had to hold on tightly to feel safe, loved, or accepted. Whether through trauma, attachment wounds, or simply being raised in a culture that equates control with worth, our systems learned that letting go = danger.

So we grip. We overthink. We carry the emotions of others. We hold onto identities, patterns, or relationships that are long past their time.

And when we try to let go but can’t, we shame ourselves. Which only keeps us more stuck.

What Letting Go Really Means

Letting go isn’t about erasing your past, numbing your feelings, or forcing forgiveness. It’s not a spiritual bypass or a checkbox on your healing to-do list.

Letting go is:

Releasing what no longer serves your nervous system, your truth, or your becoming
Honoring what you had to hold onto — and why — with compassion
Trusting that who you are becoming no longer needs what your past self once clung to

It happens not just in the mind, but in the body — in the breath, in the muscles, in the slow uncoiling of long-held tension.

3 Trauma-Informed Pathways to Letting Go

Here are three gentle ways to approach the process of letting go — rooted in nervous system care and emotional healing.

1. Somatic Letting Go: Listen to the Body’s Cues
The body holds what the mind can’t process. Letting go often begins by tuning in — not pushing through.

Try this:

Pause and bring your attention to your body. Notice: Where am I holding tension? Where am I bracing?
Soften one small part of your body — your jaw, your shoulders, your belly.
Exhale slowly. The exhale activates the parasympathetic nervous system — the part of us wired for release, rest, and repair.

This is not just relaxation. It’s repatterning. You’re teaching your system it’s safe to soften.

Over time, somatic practices like shaking, breathwork, movement, crying, or grounding in nature can support the body in metabolizing what words can’t touch.

2. Emotional Letting Go: Grieve What’s Ready to Leave

Letting go often includes grieving — something we’re rarely taught how to do.

Whether it's an old identity, a relationship, a coping pattern, or a belief you’ve outgrown, grief is part of the process.

Ask yourself:

What am I letting go of?
What am I letting go into?
What part of me still needs to be witnessed before it can release?

Write, cry, pray, scream in your car, or sit under a tree — whatever allows the emotion to move. Emotions are energy. They need motion, not suppression.

3. Psychological Letting Go: Change the Inner Narrative

The mind likes control. But true letting go means releasing old stories — especially the ones we’ve internalized from trauma or culture.

"I have to do it all or I’ll be abandoned."
"I can't trust others."
"If I slow down, I’ll be forgotten."

These stories may have once protected you. But ask gently: Are they true now?

You don’t have to force a new story. But you can begin to question the old one. You can speak to the part of you that’s still gripping and say: “Thank you for protecting me. We don’t need to hold so tightly anymore.”

Letting Go is a Practice, Not a Moment

Some days letting go feels like a full release — like shedding an old skin.

Other days, it’s simply loosening the grip by 1%. Breathing instead of bracing. Pausing instead of pushing.

It’s not about doing it perfectly. It’s about honoring the rhythm of your own healing.

Your nervous system will guide you — if you listen gently.

Letting go doesn’t mean giving up. It means opening up — to the next chapter of your life, your truth, your wholeness.

A Final Invitation

If you’re in a season of holding on and longing to release — know this: There is no rush. There is no shame.

Letting go is not something you force. It’s something you allow.

It begins with trust, and it deepens with compassion.

Let your body lead. Let your breath guide. Let your soul whisper: You are safe to soften.