The peace and power of letting go.

My wife and I know a couple who are in their 80s, with a wonderful home near the beach, who really should sell and move into a smaller place. But they can’t. The inertia of all the stuff they have, and the energy required of a big change, overwhelm them when they think of moving, and they can’t overcome that transition state energy barrier. Similarly, my mother-in-law and I were on a walk last weekend, and saw a property with a number of cars with no engines, only shells. “Why don’t they get rid of those?” she asked. I responded sadly, “Because it would cost them more to remove them, than what they would get for the metal.” They were stuck. They couldn’t part with those cars, because they lacked the funds.

We can get stuck when our assets, our nostalgic memories, our practices (including innovation processes) or our reputation become “too expensive to get rid of”. Even some people in their careers lament that they cannot change careers, because they have spent too long building a reputation in their current job, and cannot give that up. This is especially true for many tenured professors! Tenure can be a trap for many! Parting with that lifetime appointment is too hard, so they stay put.

I know people in homes, with stuff, or in careers, who cannot move on -- despite the fact that even they would like to do so -- because some things have become too expensive to get rid of. I love the quote by Conrad Hilton in his autobiography “Be My Guest”: If you find even one [possession] that you can’t live without -- hasten to give it away. Don’t wait until you’re too old, too attached, too anything … to release the old and embrace the new. Don’t wait until it’s “too hard to part”.