I claim to not be a fan of drama, to be grateful for the circumstantial and relational peace that settled over my life post-divorce. And, trust me, I am. The chaos was constant and it was decades-long and it was killing me.

But something interesting recently happened.

I had an issue arise regarding one of my children. It brought out the Mama Bear in me and I was ticked. I had every intention of giving this person my two-cents (what we call in my family a “Klein letter”), writing it and rewriting it in my head. I even went so far as to attempt to schedule a meeting with the person to hash out my issue. I was sort of feeding off of it.

But then I stepped back for a couple days, and I asked myself, “What would happen if I just didn’t pursue this? If I didn’t stay tangled up in what was on the verge of becoming a messy situation? If I just let this go and I just moved on, even without closure, even without getting my way, even without saying my piece?”

And I realized that what would more than likely happen is that something would come to pass that I didn’t like but it wasn’t truly a big deal in the grand scheme of life, and in a couple weeks it would be behind me, and I’d be over it. My world would not, indeed, fall apart. And I would be just fine. As would said child. (What a concept.)

And I realized that if I did pursue it and write an email and set up a meeting, that I would be nervous for days and days. And I would be filling up my mental space with toxicity. And I would be wasting a heck of a lot of my time and emotional reserves. And I would be engaging in a dance with someone I consider to be a bully. And for what? Something pretty darn small in the big picture of life. Especially because I probably wasn’t going to end up with the outcome I was desiring.

So, I simply deleted “write —–” from my to-do list. And I told my husband I was letting it go, that I wasn’t going to say all the juicy things that I wanted to say to this person. And then I moved on.

Now, I do not always do this. In fact, this might have been a first. But I do think I might try this a bit more often. I tend to be like a dog with a bone, but if I can begin to train myself to drop those bones that taste disgusting in my mouth or that are hurting me or that are simply time-suckers and nothing else, my life and my heart and my mind will be freer, and my good relationships might even be a bit stronger, and I’ll have more time and space in my life to focus on what is real and true and life-giving.

Ask yourself these questions:
What will I accomplish by inserting myself into this escalating situation?
(If on the verge of emailing, calling or texting someone…) Do I NEED to know this information or do I simply WANT to know?
Is there an issue in my life that is consuming my thoughts that – if I were to take a step back – I could see that dropping it and moving on might just be the healthiest thing I could do?

…forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on…  –Philippians 3