Letting Go

This week has been one of those challenging weeks. Ellie is in the last year of primary school- and as a move towards the independence that will come with secondary school she has started twice a week walking home with a friend.
Things haven't gone particularly smoothly, and mistakes have been made, to-days mistake ended in tears.  My natural reaction at that point is to go to 'if I had been there it wouldn't have happened', and then immediately go to the guilt. I also want to protect; maybe Ellie shouldn't walk home without me anymore, or at least not for a few months.
In yet, without allowing independence there is no opportunity to learn from mistakes, to do that 'growing up' of dealing with new situations, and learn from what happens.

At the moment I am following a series of readings on letting go; and it strikes me again how easy it is to keep hold of things, to live in the comfort and security of what we know.  As a parent I find it hard to let go of my children- I still crave their time, energy and conversation, yet I have to let go, knowing that this is so important to the route to adulthood.
At work it is sometimes hard to let go of things you have invested so much of yourself in, yet this week I have done that very thing. It is part of having to adapt to change, to not cling on.

Tonight I was given some acorns.

It was a reminder that as acorns become oak trees, so also we can grow to become the people we are meant to be, however old we are. I think letting go is part of that process.




Jane