Letting Go Friday

The absolute bin truck of emails arriving in my inbox tell me it’s Black Friday today. Although, they have been arriving for weeks so I can forgive myself for thinking it had already happened last week, and wondering if time had managed to rewind itself in some sort of horrific endless consumerist loop.

Luckily, today is still today. And prompted by the absolute excessive shouting to buy more or be more, I felt a need to sit quietly, with the rain lashing the windows outside, and to begin to let go of something, in a tiny, freeing protest.

That something ended up being my Bluesky accounts and a large percentage of Instagram follows. I felt a little jolt, a small renewal, to slip away from who the unnamed algorithm currently thinks I am and to start afresh. I can be whoever I want, as I click unfollow on lists after lists of accounts all very, very similar to each other, and that didn’t stand out in my memory. It’s quite fun gaming the algorithm. You can reinvent yourself every few months.

Over two accounts I culled 600 follows. I didn’t expect to feel so light, so happy, so free. Then, there was nothing to check, no new updates, no new stories (my downfall). So I made another cup of tea and stood outside and breathed real air in between the rain showers.

I thought as well of other things I can let go of, other things to breathe out into that icy air and let the wild winds carry away. For me, it’s been a time of endings and recalibrations in life recently. Big, identity-forming roles have finished terms, and the future is calling in a way that is dragging me forward, forcing shifts, different thinking, leaving comfort behind for brand-new possibilities. All with that undercurrent of fear, but a slight excitement, too. In all this, realisations peel away. People, places, parts of self – it’s time to say thank you for what they have served me with, and step on boldy without them. Who thought that clicking a button on social media a few hundred times would lead to something more.

It’s not that I can decide ‘right, it’s time to change’ and suddenly be a whole new person. Life just happens and we ride through it as best we can, and maybe in a few years, or ten, or twenty, we can look back and say oh, wow, I have changed since then. I learned. I experienced new knowing. I am still me, but ‘me’ doesn’t always to be static. For me, it feels like I add layers, shed layers, connect layers. Everything at once, through time and space.

But even if we can’t put our finger on specifics, I think we are aware of times of change. When something bigger is shifting. We may not know how or why, or what is on the other side, but I think we know when to listen to those signs beyond our explanation.

As winter draws closer, it’s a good time for a bit of pruning. To uncover bare bones and see what grows come spring.