Letting Go of Control

Life seems to move between two sides—Side A and Side B—and often, we’re left unsure about which one is truly “right.” 

Masimaa and I in Kerala

Side A is acceptance. We're born into a life shaped by two people, without ever getting a say in it. We don’t choose the circumstances, the family, or the place—we just arrive, expected to accept it all as it is. Then comes Side B—belief. The moment we begin to understand the world around us, we're taught what to believe about ourselves, others, and life in general. And just like that, we’re handed a ready-made set of beliefs, without really being given the space to question or choose for ourselves.

Side C is Courage. It doesn’t arrive quietly—it shows up when life pushes you, when things feel unfair, or when you begin to question what you’ve always been told.

The choice, the real one, doesn’t come early in life. It only comes after you find the courage to step outside the lines, to challenge what’s been handed down to you. You have to fight for it. To break the stereotype, to make a choice that’s truly yours, you first need the guts to unlearn, to stand your ground, and to say, "No, this isn’t the only way."

Lately, I’ve been struggling with some family issues that have shaken me deeply. There’s a kind of pain that comes when you feel completely helpless, especially when it’s about someone who raised you. That feeling sticks. Some injustices don’t just pass; they leave marks that stay with you, quietly changing the way you see things. For me, it’s been especially hard to move on, because the very morals and ethics I believed in—those I thought would guide me through anything—just crumbled when faced with real-life injustice. And that’s a different kind of heartbreak.

Masimaa and Me

Life is messy. It rarely unfolds the way we want it to. But Masimaa’s life has been even more tangled, more complicated. It breaks my heart to think she never really got the chance to explore what else life could offer her. And now, when she’s finally making a choice, it doesn’t feel like freedom—it feels like yet another unfair compromise. Watching that happen, I feel stuck in a loop that can’t be broken, like I’m running in circles with no way out.

I keep asking myself—how can I stop her from making a choice that feels so deeply wrong? But then again, who am I to decide that for her? I'm caught in this unbearable space between wanting to protect her and knowing I might not have the right to intervene. It’s the kind of helplessness that hurts the most, watching someone you love step into something they don’t deserve, and standing there, unable to pull them back.

 That’s what Side A (Acceptance) really is. Not approval, not agreement—but the quiet, painful understanding that some things are just… the way they are.

But it also brings a sense of reality—one that’s completely out of our hands. It may not feel right, and it certainly doesn’t feel fair, but it’s the part of life we’re often pushed into by Side B—Belief, the idea that somehow, things will eventually fall into place.  And maybe that’s what Side A—Acceptance really means. Not giving in or agreeing with everything, but finding a calm, honest understanding that some things are simply beyond our control—and that’s okay. It’s the beginning of learning to let go, not with bitterness, but with a kind of peace that comes from knowing you don’t have to carry everything.

Maybe I can't change the decision she’s made for herself, even if it doesn’t sit right with me. But that doesn’t mean I can just walk away from her either. What feels like a bad decision to me might not feel the same to her, and maybe that’s the hardest part. Some choices aren’t ours to undo, no matter how much we wish we could.

There is a quote by Sylvia Plath that says, "I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead; I lift my lids and all is born again". Maybe that’s what letting go truly is. Not forgetting, not giving up—but learning to close our eyes to the chaos we can’t control, and opening them again to a new way of seeing.

Acceptance doesn’t erase the pain or the questions; it just softens their grip on us. And maybe, just maybe, that’s how we begin to move forward—not by fixing everything, but by loving people through their choices, even when we don't understand them, and finding peace in the quiet knowing that we did what we could, with all the love we had.