You can't get to the big stuff until you practice on the small stuff.
Something happens. A driver cuts you off. A plan falls apart. A deal goes sideways. In the space between that moment and your next move, something else happens — quieter, faster, and far more costly than the event itself. The internal escalation begins. The narrative spins up. The energy flows, not toward a solution, but toward resistance.
LET GO is not about defeat, apathy, lowering your standards, avoiding accountability, or pretending things don't matter. It is about recognizing that the reaction you are carrying is costing you something — and that you get to decide whether it's worth it.
Start small. The driver in front of you who can't hear you yelling is a perfect place to begin. If you can't let go of that, how do you ever expect to let go of the things that actually matter?
Think about the last time you were stuck in traffic, cut off, or delayed for reasons entirely outside your control. How long did the frustration linger after the moment passed? How much mental energy went into the replay?
The person gripping the wheel, yelling at a driver who cannot hear them, blood pressure rising, ruining the next hour of their own day. What did it change? What did it solve? The other driver moved on. The only person still in the reaction is the one who couldn't let go. This is where the practice begins — not with the big things. With the driver.
The LET GO framework is not a personality overhaul. It is a brief, repeatable process — five steps that interrupt the automatic escalation and redirect energy toward what actually matters.
Notice you are reacting. Name what you feel — frustration, irritation, urgency, disappointment. Naming creates distance. You are the one observing the reaction. You are not the reaction.
Strip away the narrative. What is objectively true? The closing was delayed. The driver is slow. The filing had an error. Facts require action. Stories require energy. Know which one you're dealing with.
Ask the one question that cuts through almost everything: does holding onto this thought change the outcome? If the answer is no — and it almost always is — the narrative has no utility. Set it down.
What happened, happened. It will not un-happen. This is not resignation. It is the most precise move available: accepting the facts as fixed, and building your next step from there.
Now act. From this grounded, clear-eyed place — address the issue directly, communicate precisely, and move forward without the residue of reaction.
You are running late. The car in front of you is moving too slowly, changing lanes without signaling, doing everything wrong. The frustration is real. But the driver cannot hear you. They are entirely unaffected by your reaction. The only person being impacted is you. This is where the practice begins — not because it is high stakes, but because it is low stakes. Master the small releases first. They build the muscle for the ones that matter.
LET GO was originally written for attorneys — a profession built on control, precision, and high-stakes outcomes. The same internal friction that costs a lawyer a negotiation can cost you a conversation, a relationship, a good night's sleep. Read the original CT Lawyer piece →
LET GO was born from a driver, a highway, and a two-hour shutdown on I-95. Read the full story →
Think of something recent — minor, mundane, not worth a second thought in hindsight (by now you might have given it a third and fourth thought). Notice that you are still thinking about it. That is the practice. Not the dramatic release of a life-defining burden. The quiet decision, in an ordinary moment, to stop spending energy on someone who can't hear you or something that won't change. Start there. The bigger things will follow.
Frankl observed that between stimulus and response there is a space — and in that space lies our freedom. LET GO is a deliberate expansion of that space. The framework doesn't eliminate the stimulus. It gives you something to do with the space.
Developed by Dr. Steven Hayes through Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, psychological flexibility is the ability to stay present and take values-driven action even when difficult thoughts and emotions arise. Unlike personality, it is trainable. LET GO is psychological flexibility made practical.
Studies on driving behavior consistently show that aggressive responses to traffic frustration — honking, tailgating, verbal outbursts — have no effect on traffic flow and measurable negative effects on the driver's own cardiovascular system and mood. The reaction costs the reactor; the other drivers are already gone.
Enjoyed this piece?
This is part of the Tanisms™ collection — ideas worth sitting with. Each one is a different handle on the same door.