How much stress are you carrying around? Do you feel burdened by life's circumstances and emotional issues? Becoming more grounded and happy starts with letting go of worry and stress. I learned this in my own journey, through overcoming drug addictions, healing myself from depression, and walking away from a career in corporate to follow my heart and be a successful writer and life coach. In the process, I had to let go of a lot of things to become the person I am today.

Physically, spiritually and emotionally, I had to learn how to let go of the person I thought I should be in order to be the person I really wanted to be. Letting go of anything in life can be a little scary, but it can also be an amazing act of self-love.

Letting go of my worries and stress made a difference for me; of course I still dip in and out of some of my stress jar from time to time, but I've found this list a good reminder of what I need to strive for each day in order to reach unlimited happiness.

Here are 20 things to let go of in order to reach unlimited happiness.

1. Let go of all thoughts that don't make you feel empowered and strong.

2. Let go of feeling guilty for doing what you truly want to do.

3. Let go of the fear of the unknown; take one small step and watch the path reveal itself.

4. Let go of regrets; at one point in your life, that “whatever" was exactly what you wanted.

5. Let go of worrying; worrying is like praying for what you don't want.

6. Let go of blaming anyone for anything; be accountable for your own life. If you don't like something, you have two choices, accept it or change it.

7. Let go of thinking you are damaged; you matter, and the world needs you just as you are.

8. Let go of thinking your dreams are not important; always follow your heart.

9. Let go of being the “go-to person" for everyone, all the time; stop blowing yourself off and take care of yourself first … because you matter.

10. Let go of thinking everyone else is happier, more successful or better off than you. You are right where you need to be. Your journey is unfolding perfectly for you.

11. Let go of thinking there's a right and wrong way to do things or to see the world. Enjoy the contrast and celebrate the diversity and richness of life.

12. Let go of cheating on your future with your past. It's time to move on and tell a new story.

13. Let go of thinking you are not where you should be. You are right where you need to be to get to where you want to go, so start asking yourself where you want to go.

14. Let go of anger toward ex lovers and family. We all deserve happiness and love; just because it is over doesn't mean the love was wrong.

15. Let go of the need to do more and be more; for today, you've done the best you can, and that's enough.

16. Let go of thinking you have to know how to make it happen; we learn the way on the way.

17. Let go of your money woes — make a plan to pay off debt and focus on your abundance.

18. Let go of trying to save or change people. Everyone has her own path, and the best thing you can do is work on yourself and stop focusing on others.

19. Let go of trying to fit in and be accepted by everyone. Your uniqueness is what makes you outstanding.

20. Let go of self-hate. You are not the shape of your body or the number on the scale. Who you are matters, and the world needs you as you are. Celebrate you!

There’s no one to hold me
To tell me “It’ll be alright”
No one to love me
Or to kiss me goodnight

I’m always alone
With no one to care
Longing for someone
Who isn’t there

Wishing for love
On every star
Looking for comfort
From near or far

Hoping for someone
Who will honestly care
Waiting for someone
Who will always be there

Wanting to love
And be loved just the same
For someone to know me
Not just my name

Longing and searching
In vain so it seems
Only ever finding love
In my dreams

Am I destined
To be alone?
To wonder through life
Unloved and unknown?

So hungry for love
Someone to call mine
Desperately hoping
For some kind of sign

Something to tell me
He’s on his way
He’s searching for me
And he’ll find me one day

That someone will love me
That someone will care
That I won’t be alone
That he will be there

Waiting and hoping
For it to be true
I guess for now
That’s all I can do

I Dreamt a Dream! what can it mean?
And that I was a maiden Queen:
Guarded by an Angel mild;
Witless woe, was neer beguil’d!

And I wept both night and day
And he wip’d my tears away
And I wept both day and night
And hid from him my hearts delight

So he took his wings and fled:
Then the morn blush’d rosy red:
I dried my tears & armd my fears,
With ten thousand shields and spears.

Soon my Angel came again;
I was arm’d, he came in vain:
For the time of youth was fled
And grey hairs were on my head

One step leads to the next.
Propels us
Compels us
to do more
despite what rewards we reap for idleness.

Don't forget it
you have to remember.

Another night of lost scarves and broken glass?
Another autumn wrapping winter in foiled paper?
Another snowflake to break the camel's back.
Another night  to be propelled
and compelled
to continue.

Stepping into another day
is much like stepping into a tunnel.
Our insecurities hidden
and our dreams in the distance.

There is a light.
There must be.

Those endorphic nights,
wrapped like snakes,
Shared blood in one soul,
we made our promise, carved it in stone,
now it just cuts me down to the bone.

Played our end game, created the path,
‘mongst the spirits, grasping rain,
midnight tears so cold and alone,
It will always cut me down to the bone.


© H V Swan

~~
In touch of you,
one day, thousands of dreams grew on me
after that you left me in halfway
then little by little I have almost forgotten my dreams
forgotten that dreamy highway where there we walked together

Today I'm walking alone,
so alone,
towards an unknown way,
where there I hear my wounded dreams
and my love calling me,
calling me as if they are in a trap
As if they are in a cage
where there I see a narrow way,
I never go through such a way,
very congested,
little bit hazy,
too shadow,
dark,
and a few footsteps that I have seen
where there my dreams calling,
my lost love calling,
calling too loudly

Again I feel my heart has overflowed
floating over my lost dreams,
flooding over my lost love

I'm walking through that narrow way
little by little that sound has seemed strong,
little by little I have heard her voice to grow long
may be I am so close to my love,
so close to my dreams
my right hand moving,
moving through the dark
I try to break the shadow,
try to catch my dreams
I have become tired,
Try to take a little breath
and finally,
I break the shadow,
shatter the dark
and finding her within the dark
seeking my dreams within the shadow
but I can't see anything,

Yet the clock moving on--
still I'm uttering her name
and dreaming within my thousands of daydreams
where I had left one long spring--
~~
@Musfiq us shaleheen


---------------------------------
হাজারো স্বপ্ন ও একটি ভালবাসা
---------------------------------
তোমার স্পর্শে
একদিন যখন হাজারো স্বপ্ন
বুদবুদ করতো--  
তারপর মাঝ রাস্তায় রেখে
চলে গেলে তুমি--
আস্তে আস্তে
ভুলে যেতে থাকলাম সপ্ন গুলোকে,
ভুলে যেতে থাকলাম সেই স্বপ্নের রাজপথ
যে পথে হাটতাম আমরা -

আজ আমি একা
বড় একা-
এক অচেনা রাস্তায় হাটি,
যেখানে শুনতে পাই,
আমার আহত সপ্নেরা,
আমার হারানো ভালবাসা,
আমায় ডাকে-
শুনে যেন মনে হয়
তারা বড় অসহায়,  
মনে হই তারা বন্দী,
সেখানে একটা সরু রাস্তা দেখতে পাই
এমন রাস্তায় আগে কখনো যাই নাই
খুবিই দমবন্ধ করা-
খুবিই দুর্ভেদ্য-
ঘন ছায়া,
অন্ধকার,
ঔইখানে কিছু পদচিন্হ দেখি
সেখানে স্বপ্নরা ডাকে,
হারানো ভালবাসা ডাকে,
উচু স্বরে ডাকে-

আবার হৃদয় প্লাবিত হয়
যা ভাসছে হারানো সপ্নের উপর
প্লাবিত হচ্চে হারানো ভালোবাসের উপর

আমি সেই সংকীর্ণ রাস্তা দিয়া হাটি
আস্তে আস্তে শব্দগুলো স্পষ্ট হয়
আস্তে আস্তে  তার সুর সুনতে পাই
হইত আমি ভালবাসার খুবই কাছে
হইত সপ্নের খুবই কাছে
ডান হাত সরছে
চলছে আধারের মধ্যে দিয়ে
চেষ্টা করি ওই ছায়াকে দূর করতে
চেষ্টা করি স্বপ্নকে ধরতে
দারুন ক্লান্ত,
চেষ্টা করি একটু শ্বাস নিতে
এবং শেষে,
মুছে ফেলি ওই ছায়া
বন্ধ করি ওই আধার
খুজি ওই আধারে ভালোবাসা
খুজি সপ্নকে  ওই ছায়াতে
কিন্তু পাইনা খুঁজে কিছুই-

এখনো ঘড়ির কাটা ঘুরে
প্রতিনিয়ত তার নাম উচার্রণ করি  
সপ্নদেখি শত সহস্র দিবাস্বপ্নের মাঝে  
যেখানে আমি ফেলে এসেছি দীর্ঘ এক বসন্ত--
~~
@মুসফিক উস সালেহীন

What do you have to hide,
some beautifully broken side?

Everything will always depart,
except what you want to leave.
And what stays
cannot bear to look you in the eye.
Because it knows it isn't welcome.

It just wants a home
to tear the walls down.
It just wants some flesh
to tear the soul out.

But who are you, friend?
Is your purpose to teach
something that earthly knowledge cannot fathom?
Or is your purpose motionless and hollow?
A boy sitting in the rain with a frozen gaze,
and no coat?

They say you must be a part of me,
not all of me.
But no matter how bright the days become,
no matter how many times you love me
(If anyone could actually loved me.),
you hold on with your bruised fingers
hopelessly interlocked.

The truth that I can't tell
and won't tell
(because I don't want to speak it
just as much as you don't want to hear it)
is that I actually hate me
more than I hate it.
Because while it flows through me
arbitrarily
like a black fog floating in the breeze,
I am sentient.
I have the power to stop it.
And I can't.

And so I must welcome it.
And once I do,
I still don't believe it will look me in the eye.
Because there's nothing to look at.

It was those blue eyes, sparkling with words
I dreamt about reading but believed it impossible
Too beautiful to be seen with nuclear nerds
In my breakable beaker, you'd never be soluble.

A mismatched juxtaposition, atom for atom.
Even if I permutate, molecule by molecule.
We could never have struck stable equilibrium,
I could never escape the premise of ridicule.

Spent too much time postulating the unknown
Spent far too long balancing tricky equations
Head dug too deep to realise a factor that had grown
An external variable that had encroached with similar intentions.

My hand slipped from the scale when your finger touched my own
I forgot the words "controlled reaction", momentarily
Seeing goosebumps on your skin, and other bumps now shown
I gently pushed your wayward hair behind your ear, daringly

A moment frozen in the range of sub-zeroes
Dare I forgo the mandatory steps and arrive at a conclusion?
If I do I'd garner the title, "the nerdiest of all heroes!"
My "spidey-sense" failed me this time, and awarded me with a "fist-meet-face" reaction!

Happened in a blur, nanoseconds that sang in mock.
What was it that left me in a twirl?
Propped myself up to see the wrath of a crimson-faced ****.
All fists, no brains who yelled, "Hands off my girl!"

All this hilarious yet passionately painful hullabaloo
Let me drop the beaker of sodium in the zinc basin
Forgetting not to get it wet, the moment, clearly now unglued
When suddenly, "BOOM" it sounded like a pending cremation

Jocks, and nerds, and screaming cheerleaders
Hit the ground like a lunchtime scene from downtown Baghdad
And Blondie whispers in my ear, like a gypsy mind reader
"Maybe we should cool it, for I am in love with another lad"

Her words hit home and burned like The Lindenburg on fire
Amidst the fracas, cracked voice stammered to mask my bruised latent ego
"Nothing improper... Just an attempt to save your locks from the Bunsen burner
Science is my only love, just so you know"

Thanked God for my eyes and the need for correction lenses
Those thick convexes made it easy to not reveal
Steadied my frames and packed in hasty pretences
Accusing eyes followed as I exited the room with tears concealed...

Pieter Meyer
**ryn