Just Let It Go

“Just let it go”. Many victims of abuse, bullying, or wrongdoing are given this sage advice over and over and over again. “Just let it go.”

The problem is that it’s not an easy thing to just let it go. Victims want justice at the least. Some go so far as to want revenge or bitter vengeance. They know they were wronged and someone should suffer for the pain that they went through.

I see this often in the scam-fighting community. Scam victims seldom suffer small losses. Scammers go after everything they can get and typically wipe out their victims financially.

How can you tell someone who has lost every penny they own to a ruthless scammer to “just let it go”? Their life has been financially ruined by what is most likely a teenage kid with a computer.

Victims of abuse and bullying have had more intimate pain inflicted upon them. Bullies go after a victim’s self-esteem, making them feel worthless and not good enough. Abusers do the same thing. They go after the emotional and mental health of their targets.

Is “letting it go” a bad thing? No. It’s the healthiest thing any victim can do for themselves. It’s the only thing that will help them to move on in their life. Holding on to the anger and pain, demanding revenge only pours salt in an already painful wound.

Life isn’t fair. Oh, that it was! But sometimes the bad guys get away with being bad, and victims don’t get to see justice when they should.

I recently posted in my scam-fighting group Sleuths Deconstructing Scammers asking, “If you could have a conversation with any scammer, what would you say or ask?” The answers weren’t really surprising. Some wanted to tell them scamming doesn’t pay or ask if they even feel anything when they are scamming. Victims wanted scammers to know they were going to do anything they could to get their just due.

“Just let it go” doesn’t just apply to victims of scams or abuse. It can apply to any of us who are holding onto something that has caused us pain. We want to see the other person suffer for the pain that they caused us. They made us cry, so we want them to cry.

This is understandable human behavior, of course. However, it is also unhealthy for our mental and emotional lives. Over the years in my studies on narcissistic abuse, I have done a lot of reading about emotional health. Something that stuck out with me is that our brains can actually react to a reenactment of an event as if it were a real event.

What this means is that when we relive a painful event in our heads, our brain thinks we are living through it again in real life. And it causes us to go into “fight or flight” mode. Every single time we think about the wrong that was done to us, we let that person hurt us again because our brain doesn’t know the difference.

Yet, hearing someone else tell us to “just let it go” makes us feel defensive and as if the person has no idea of the pain we are dealing with. It feels insensitive to hear someone tell us to “move on” as if the past never happened.

The past DID happen. And we suffered for it. But if we are going to move forward with our life, we have to move past that event holding us stuck. So, “just let it go” is a good idea if we are in a place where we can do that.

Being in a good place means that we are ready to say, “OK, yes, it happened. But I’m not going to let it stop me from enjoying the life I have left.” It takes a while to get to that point. The sooner we get there, the better life we can lead.

Holding onto emotional pain, reliving the emotional pain, can increase our physical pain. Our bodies react to our mental and emotional states. Each affects the other.

At 56 years old, there have been things in my life that were hard to move past and let go of. Some things nobody ever knew or ever will know. I didn’t tell people what hurt me. But the pain was intense and soul-crushing. I wanted to hurt the other person.

Reliving events with that person made me upset all over again. The catch in my chest when the pain hit me. The tears flew to my eyes as if I had been attacked all over again. The desire to crawl into a hole and hide so I couldn’t be hurt again.

But, at some point, my rational mind kicked into gear. I realized that I’m only hurting myself by reliving those events. I can’t change them. And nothing I can say or do will make the other person feel sorry for what they did to me. They did it willingly and with full knowledge of what they were doing.

I could choose to stay stuck in that place in my head. If I did that, my life wouldn’t get any better. Their words and deeds would always make me feel like I’m not worth anything.

But I AM worthy of love and affection. And there are people out there who are willing to tell me that, to show me that. I have to be in a good place to accept their affection. To do that, I do have to just let it go.

If you identify with this, take time to consider my words. Think about how much pain you cause yourself every time you think about the harm done to you. Think about what life would be like if you did not allow yourself to think about those things anymore.

Choose a pleasant scenario to keep ready to flood your mind with when those bad events threaten to come back again. For me, I thought about all my wonderful memories of writing in the park. Every time a bad event threatened my mental health, I took myself to my favorite park and imagined myself sitting there writing in my journal. After a while, it became an automatic transfer in my brain.

And if you aren’t already seeing a therapist, it’s not a bad idea to find one to talk to. They can help you find your own strength to heal what’s broken.

When you are ready, then you will be able to “just let it go.”