Mental Obsessions and Letting Go

I hate texting, but let’s talk about texting.

Let’s say you have a friend who is going through hard times. Wife crap, kid crap, job crap, other crap. You decide to send him a text:

“Hey man, just letting you know that I’m here for you. You can call anytime.”

And he doesn’t respond. What is your response to him not responding? Do you get mad? Do you get mad at the guy who is going through hell because he didn’t respond to your offer to help?

Some people would. Which would be dumb. Maybe he is too wound up in his own crap to respond to your text. Maybe he read it and appreciated it, but didn’t think it merited a response. Maybe a lot of things. The point is that you discharged your responsibility as a friend when you sent the text, and you should let go of the results, because we are not in the results business. You send the text and you let go. The rest is up to him.

Ninety-nine percent of people can’t do this. They can’t send a text and let go of the results. They can’t make a phone call and let go of the results. They can’t let go of any results. They get personally and emotionally involved in other people’s problems. They become codependent. They let other people’s actions determine their feelings.

It is all about letting go.

This is probably the one thing I have worked on the most in the last 20 years. Let’s say I have a business relationship with someone. There is something I want them to do, and they’re not doing it. You have two choices. You can let it consume you, where it is the last thing you think about before you fall asleep, and the first thing you think about when you wake up, and your daily thoughts are consumed with trying to figure out how to get this dick to do what you want them to do, and you can make yourself miserable in the process—or—after a certain amount of time passes, you can just say fuck you and go around and find someone else. The latter option requires a lot less mental energy. I don’t get emotional about this stuff anymore. I have a philosophy about situations like these—it is easier to go around than to go through. I spend much of my professional life going around people who aren’t doing what they’re supposed to be doing. I mean, if the incentives are there, everything works, but sometimes things don’t work even when the incentives are in place. But let me be clear: I don’t get upset. I don’t get anxious. I just find another solution. It’s not personal. This is an act of letting go.

I’m sure the Wall Street people will appreciate this. You think your bonus should be a million dollars. Your bonus turns out to be $600,000. Luxury problems, I know. What do you do? Do you get mad and resentful at your firm and management for screwing you out of $400,000? Does it consume you? Are you miserable at work? I assure you that it is not personal. So if it’s not personal for them, it’s not personal for you. Go find another job that pays more, and they really want to keep you, they will meet or exceed the offer you got away. And they shouldn’t get resentful at you, either. It’s not personal. There were a few people who were upset when I walked away from Barclays when Lehman went bankrupt. I always tell them the same thing: you should have paid me more! It would have made the decision a lot harder. Nothing personal: I have other things I want to do with my life. Walking away from Wall Street was the ultimate act of letting go.

You have a child who is addicted to drugs. Severely addicted. You believe their life is in danger. It is the last thing you think about before you fall asleep, and the first thing you think about when you wake up. It is a mental obsession. You find yourself getting personally involved in his or her problems. Their success or failure dictates your success or failure. You are codependent. This is where it is time to let go. You make some options available: A.A., rehab, etc., you encourage them to go, but that is all you have control of. You can’t make someone get sober if they don’t want to get sober. If they want to get sober, they will get sober. It is that simple. So level 99 of the letting go videogame is doing the footwork and stepping back and being willing to accept the possibility that your own offspring will fail, even if that means they lose their life. It's not on you. This is the toughest thing to do in the world. I find that the level of codependency is off the charts with parents these days. If the child doesn’t start on the traveling team, they internalize it. If they don’t get straight A’s, they internalize it. If they don’t get into an Ivy League school, they internalize it. I see a lot of miserable parents because their kids are not following the script that the parents laid out for them. As anyone who has kids knows, how your kids turn out is 95% nature and only 5% nurture. You really have no control over the results. So let go.

All of this falls into a category of what I would call mental obsessions. Mental obsessions are things that you think about all the time. I am a very obsessive person, and I have become very disciplined about mental obsessions over time. If I find myself obsessing about this or that thing, I quickly quiet the disturbance by redirecting my mind to something more productive. True story: I had a book signing for NIGHT MOVES at my house for the folks in my neighborhood last week. I sold very few books. For about 5-10 minutes, I found myself descending into despondency. Then, I realized what I was doing, and I quieted the disturbance, and redirected my mind to something positive. I let go. I then drove to Savannah and spoke to a few writing classes at the Savannah College of Art and Design, trying to inspire them to become great writers. I can tell you what the antidote is to obsessive fears or resentments: helping someone else. When you help another person, it’s like hitting the “clear” button on a calculator of all your obsessive thinking. If you didn’t get paid enough on Wall Street, pick up the phone and help someone else going through the same thing. If you’re worried about your child with a drug addiction, call the guy up the street who’s going through a horrible divorce. If you were in a room with 30 other people and you all put your problems in the middle of the room, chances are you would want your problems back, and you will get a sense of gratitude to go with it. That’s how it works.

Everyone gets mental obsessions. Letting go is the answer. I’m not going to tell you it’s easy. It’s not. Mental obsessions can be crippling. So-and-so didn’t return my phone call. He hates me! 99% of the time, this is a story that you made up and told yourself, and there is nothing wrong at all. 1% of the time, the person really hates you, and maybe you will get to the bottom of it, and maybe you won’t, but either way, everything is going to be fine. I had a guy ghosting me one time who really did end up hating my guts. I no longer have a relationship with that person, but I’m fine, and he’s fine, and everything’s fine. It was a little stressful for a few days, but you get through it. I have never heard the story of a person dying because a relationship ended. I haven’t heard that story yet. I have heard the stories of people who have killed themselves over mental obsessions. They didn’t have the ability to let go. Your body is not a weapon—your mind is a weapon, and you can use it and its wildly destructive powers against yourself.

I would say that the number one determinant of psychological well-being is the frequency and severity to which you get mental obsessions. And I would say that the frequency and severity of mental obsessions is the number one determinant of happiness. Another thing I’ve learned over the years; nobody gives a shit about me or what I’m doing. I don’t mean that in the pejorative sense--what I mean is that while I'm sitting here obsessing about whether someone’s going to text me back, they’re in Riviera Maya drinking out of a pineapple, not thinking about me. We tend to think that other people think about us all the time. Absolutely not the case. You’re self-absorbed, and so is everyone else. You’re thinking about your problems, and they’re thinking about their problems—not about you. You are the center of your universe. They are the center of their universe. I may not be much, but I’m all I think about, the saying goes.

If you are a person who is plagued with mental obsessions, if you are a person who is going through a mental obsession right now, know that there is an answer. Know that there is another way. I can’t teach you how to run an IronMan. I can’t teach you to deadlift 800 pounds. I can only tell you how I went from being one of the most psychologically sick people in the world to one of the most healthy, and to let you know that it is possible. Imagine a life free from mental obsessions. Imagine having the ability to let go. It is within reach—you just have to try.