The Joy Jolt - Maybe it isn't about letting go. Maybe the real work is about letting in!!!

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve talked to friends, family members, clients, and even strangers about the importance of letting go.

Let go of the friendship.Let go of the bad habit.Let go of the guilt.Let go of the old story.Let go of the jeans that haven’t fit since 2014.

We hear it everywhere:

Let go of the past so you can make room for the future.

And honestly, it sounds wise. It sounds healing. It sounds evolved.

But lately I’ve started wondering…

Is letting go really the most important part of the equation?

Or is there another piece we don’t talk about enough?

What if the real shift happens when we stop obsessing over what we need to release and start becoming intentional about what we want to let in?

Today I had a visceral experience of this.

I woke up this morning carrying a little anxiety about the start of another week. Nothing dramatic. Just regular adult anxiety. The kind that could probably be connected to fifty different things happening in life all at once.

But then I walked into my son’s room while he was still sleeping.

Everything got quiet for a moment.

I stood there breathing in the sweetness of that moment, and I heard this thought so clearly inside myself:

Maybe it’s not about letting go. Maybe it’s more about letting in.

That thought stopped me.

Because the truth is, I don’t think I need to fight my anxiety all the time. Anxiety is part of being human. It visits. It moves through. Sometimes it lingers.

Maybe the goal isn’t to wage war against every uncomfortable feeling.

Maybe the practice is simply becoming more intentional about what we allow in alongside it.

Letting in the better feeling.Letting in the empowered version of the story.Letting in gratitude.Letting in playfulness.Letting in energy.Letting in possibility.

After I got the kids off to school, I sat down with my journal and decided to practice this.

At the top of the page I wrote:

Susan, Let In:

Joy.Play.Love.Happiness.Energy.Abundance.Fun.Openness.Aliveness.More me.Surprises.Magic.Laughter.Money.Travel.Connection.New experiences.Today.

And something shifted.

Not because my anxiety magically disappeared.

But because my focus changed.

Instead of spending my energy trying to force something out of me, I started inviting something into me.

My body felt lighter.My chest softened.I felt more open.More present.More loving toward myself.

It was such a simple pivot, but it felt profound.

And honestly, it felt joyful.

So maybe the next time you find yourself thinking, I just need to let this go, pause for a moment and ask yourself:

What do I want to let in?

Because maybe healing is not only about release.

Maybe it is also about receiving.

JOY — Just Open Yourself.

And maybe the practice of letting in is one beautiful, expansive place to begin.

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JOY FORWARD

Today in dance class the teacher asked us to dance as if we were seven years old again. Everyone around me seemed to naturally move into this playful childlike energy, but something unexpected happened to me today. Instead of imagining myself younger, I suddenly imagined myself older. Much older. I experienced myself as an 80 year old woman dancing.

And honestly, it felt so beautiful.

I could feel that as an 80 year old woman I was even more profoundly tapping into a deep sense of wonder and gratitude moving through my body. Gratitude for my body and that I was moving my body at 80. Enjoying my body at 80. Gratitude for the warmth of the sun on my aged skin and the feeling of the wind moving across my wrinkled arms. There was this awareness of time, aging, and life itself, but it did not feel sad. It felt rich. Full. Deep. Sacred. Alive. I realized that future version of me was not looking backward wishing for youth again. She was fully inside the moment she was living in and deeply enjoying.

It made me think about how often we connect joy to the past. We look backward as if that was as good as life gets. We revisit memories trying to reconnect to feelings we once had, almost treating joy like something that already happened instead of something that still exists ahead of us. But standing there dancing, I realized I want to give what is forward just as much permission to be joyful as what is behind me.

I do not want to spend my life grieving aging while I am still living. I want to envision myself as a joyful older woman. Wise. Experienced. Mature. Still curious. Still alive. Still capable of feeling wonder. Still able to deeply enjoy being here.

I think there is something powerful about allowing ourselves to look ahead with love instead of fear. Aging is not the opposite of living. It is living. It is the continuation of all the moments we have already experienced. I have been growing up my entire life, but now I feel like I am entering a season where I can truly appreciate what it means to be fully alive in the moment while also honoring the depth of time.

I want to keep celebrating this moment and the next one and the next one after that. I want to look back one day and know I actually allowed myself to enjoy my life instead of constantly waiting for some future moment to finally feel good enough, safe enough, or complete enough to relax into joy.

When I was very young, I remember hearing this deep feeling inside of me that said, “This life is going to feel good.” I did not know what happened before I got here and I do not know what happens when I leave, but I remember feeling certain that I was here to experience life fully. To feel it. To enjoy it. To be present for it.

Maybe that is what joy forward means.

Not only appreciating where you have been, but staying open to the possibility that some of the most meaningful, joyful, connected moments of your life may still be ahead of you.

JOY.

Just Open Yourself.

LOVE & JOY - Susan Patrick

The Joy Jolt is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.