Why Stepping Back Can Help You Move Forward
About a year and a half ago, in December of 2020, I was in a car accident. It was a snowstorm and I had no business being out on the road, but I was determined to get to the gym for my training session.
Wouldn’t you know, when I got there, the gym wasn’t even open, so I turned around to go back and home and decided to take a slower, safer back road to do so.
I was fully stopped to take a left and a car started skidding at me, in slow motion, unable to stop.
I was literally watching out the window like you would a movie as they T-boned me and hit my driver side door. No one was hurt, we were both wearing our seatbelts and the cars needed a little repair but we were both OK.
I often think back on that moment like it was an omen from the Universe. Saying something along the lines of, “Things are going to hit you, with tremendous force… but you’re going to be ok. I got your back.”
And just as that moment predicted, that’s what happened the entirety of 2021 for me. The year was the most real life depiction of that metaphor you could ever imagine.
As the year unfolded, and I experienced some extremely hard circumstances in my personal life, business, and as a parent and wife.
It felt that the tremendous force and impacts just kept coming.
While I was going through this time of facing my fears and limitations (many of which I’d been long avoiding), I realized that this painful time helped to pave the path and establish the foundation for my next charge of life and where I wanted to go. It was about stepping back, letting go, and moving away from the things no longer serving me.
I had to really pay attention to where I was holding onto old ways of being that were outdated.
And I will say, it was not easy. People in my life wanted me to stay the way before. In some regards, I wanted me to stay the way I was before. As I experienced change, I also faced disappointments and resentments from others. This was a journey about letting go of all of that.
How Detachment Can Help You Grow
If you’re a passionate person (cough, cough - yes, I’m looking at you, business owners and leaders), you probably know the joy in having a plan. You love to view success in accordance with how things go according to the plan. You love to control, know what’s happening, measure, and cling to an outcome that you’re trying to achieve.
In my experience, this is not the key to bringing your vision into reality. This is not how you actually achieve the outcomes you desire.
In fact, it’s the opposite. It’s in letting go and detaching yourself from what you think should happen and are forcing it to happen and allowing whatever is meant to be happen instead.
When you do this, things flow with more ease. You can show up with better energy so the greatness of the vision, the infinite possibilities around it, can manifest themselves beyond your wildest imagination. I promise you, whatever your limited mindset can create, the Universe has MORE available to you, and can go even bigger.
During this year, my business coach, Julie Solomon told me, “When you don’t know what to do your vision does.”
That statement really resonated with me. Get clear on the vision and let the Universe do the rest. Step into your vision and stop forcing the answers about how and when it’s going to happen and who’s going to make it happen.
What Does Detachment Look Like?
Detachment is the art of withdrawing desire from things, people, places, goals, outcome, and letting them fall away so as to harness their power to reach new levels of growth.
You can detach from outcomes, desires, achievements, goals, areas of your work, and even when it comes to issues with your kids!
Detachment around goals and achievements might look like letting go of a specific way things need to happen in order to be “successful”. Or perhaps it’s letting go of things like money, belongings, and metrics and focusing on joy instead.
Detachment with our relationships (kids, friends, spouses, etc.) is a nudge to remember that we cannot control anyone outside of ourselves. We cannot determine their reactions or path, and we also do not need their validation to be worthy. Detachment in relationships is about setting and upholding boundaries, and not taking things so personally.
Another way I’ve been practicing detachment is with the concept of time. We wrap so much into our timelines, not enough time, trying to control time, and fretting when it passes too quickly. I did a podcast episode on Time-Bending which you can listen to here. We all have more than enough time and detaching from the rigidity around it can help you to change your experience with it so you can spend it better and maximize it.
Even detachment from our own thoughts and beliefs can be important. Questioning what you’ve known or believed to be true for so long, things that’ve been dictating your life with old stories and broken records. Your thoughts are not always an accurate reflection of reality and it’s important not to put that responsibility on them.
Detachment Requires Trust
Stepping back and untangling yourself from controlling the outcome requires trust. Trust in yourself and your decisions, trust in your vision and deepest desires, and trust in the Universe to care for you and hold you. Trust that the Universe has your back (even when you get T-boned) and you will be OK.
It might feel that you’re taking one step back, or possibly even more than one, but that very act of letting go will be the biggest step in propelling you forward.