[Alfred Hitchcock’s “North By Northwest” 1959 – the Mount Rushmore scene]

I had no idea that letting go of the past and my destructive behavioral patterns would be this hard to do.  It is very painful and so difficult to break through the fear that has been my stalking shadow for almost 20 years. Letting go of the past and the person I was back then is actually much harder to do than when I was dealing with it in therapy. Then I was investigating myself and the tragic events that had happened to me. With the understanding that followed I had to accept the things I found. Once I knew something new about myself, it was impossible to go back to the way I used to be. I have been moving forward, mentally and emotionally, for years. Every day.

But even if I can’t go back to how my I used to live my life – it is difficult to start something new, with a new ‘thinking style’, new behavior, new boundaries and new perspective on things (and myself). Here is the place to change and it doesn’t happened just because you reached that place. You need to work hard. Harder, than ever. To let go, is to stop holding on to things that are familiar to you, everything you know about yourself and the world around you.

And you have to decide whether you want to hold on to things that are uncomfortably comfortable, things that makes you feel safe and trapped at the same time, or if you want to let go and it’s scary as hell and you don’t know what’s waiting on the other side but you know you just can’t go on like this anymore.

It leaves you dangling on the edge of a cliff for a while. That’s where I am right now. Looking down to see if I can ensure myself that once I let go, I won’t hurt myself, but I can’t see anything, my fear is blocking the view like a heavy fog.

As long as I am fooling myself that I am more safe on the edge of the cliff than to risk hurting myself when I fall, I won’t be able to let go.

I am feeling so vulnerable and fragile right now, dangling off this cliff and here – at this very place, where I am so exposed, I have to fight my fear, like fighting a dragon, to finally just let go and hope for the best.

I know I am being brave, but I just feel like crying.