“Sometimes letting go is an act of far greater power than defending or hanging on.”

― Eckhart Tolle

I have had issues around control for as long as I can remember. When I was a child, I suffered from symptoms of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder like hand washing and needing to repeat certain behaviors. As an adult, I have overcome the need to engage in repetitive behaviors, but I have a strong need for order and to control my environment. In many ways, this perfectionism has actually benefited me and has allowed me to excel in certain areas of my life like academics and work. However, this need to control my environment has also resulted in a lot of stress and conflict.

Over the past 10 months, I have been engaged in two yoga teacher trainings and this has been a springboard for me to examine many of the unhelpful patterns in my life. My need for control has been near the top of the list. Interestingly, as part of the training, I have discovered that my “soul vow” in life is love. And my “key of action” (how to find my soul vow) is “let go.” Funny, how letting go is my biggest challenge, yet leads to my soul’s vow of love, right? Well, I don’t think it’s a coincidence at all!

Around two weeks ago, I watched the cheesy, but fun family movie, “Yes Day.” Essentially, it’s about parents who decide to say “yes” to everything their kids ask (unless it’s dangerous) for 24 hours. As you would expect from a family comedy, the day turned into a disaster but it had a happy ending where everyone learned some important lessons. My husband and I decided after watching the film that it was something that we wanted to try.

A few days later I ended up reading a wonderful book called “Hunt, Gather Parent” by Michaeleen Doucleff. She gives a beautiful description of parenting wisdom from various ancient cultures and also provides a practical way to implement these ideas. My husband and I started trying out some of the techniques with our one and two year old children. And guess what, they actually work!! One of the central themes of the book is about how much we control our children in Western culture. We are constantly telling our kids what to do and what not to do. Once I actually started counting how many times I do this in a day, I was floored. It hit me like a brick wall. I’m not only controlling my environment. I’m controlling my children.

“In the process of letting go you will lose many things from the past, but you will find yourself.”

– Deepak Chopra

So, my husband and I decided to do a little experiment where we stopped telling our kids what to do or not to do. We tried to only intervene if they were doing something dangerous. And you’ll never guess what happened! The tantrums almost completely stopped. Our 2 year old started helping with housework without us having to ask. And our entire life became amazingly harmonious. We had figured out a way to have yes day every day and it was magic!

This experiment worked so well with our kids that we decided to try it out on ourselves. I stopped telling my husband what to do and he stopped telling me what to do. In fact, we completely eradicated any commands from our vocabulary (except for with our dogs!). And guess what happened? The conflicts pretty much stopped. The arguments stopped. Everything just started flowing like a beautiful symphony!

We then decided to take this little experiment to the next level. I try to have a daily kundalini yoga practice, but it’s incredibly challenging with my two kids around. I had also always wanted to have my husband join in the yoga practice, but we always assumed this was an impossibility given our small children. So, we decided to just let go and try it. We committed to doing Sahibi Kriya (about a 20 minute Kundalini yoga practice) every day with our young children. And guess what happened? Well, we have gotten beaten up repeatedly. And peed on. And pooped on. And our living room has been dismantled piece by piece. And lights have been turned off. And sharp objects have been thrown. And fights have happened. But guess what else has happened? Our entire family has learned the gift of letting go. I have learned how to continue to focus on my breath despite having my nose being actively ripped off and a soggy diaper smashed into my face. I have learned how to let go and breathe when I see our living room being ripped to shreds. And guess what? Life didn’t end because some belongings got destroyed. The universe did not crumble to pieces because there was pee all over the floor. The results were so much more shocking than I could have ever imagined. All of this might not seem like very much. But I promise you, it’s actually quite huge.

All of this “letting go” has taught me some profound life lessons. I have learned that letting go is hard as shit. But I have also learned that on the other side of loosening the reins is everything that I’ve ever wanted. I have found peace and beauty and joy and so much love that my heart explodes!

“In the end, only three things matter: how much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you.”

– Buddha

How has “yes day” manifested for our family? Well, it has pretty much changed everything. And we have adopted several new fun activities, including “driveway dance parties.” On our daily walks around our neighborhood, my daughter now picks random driveways to stop in. (See above pics from our escapades.) She will say “dance party” and we all have to stop what we are doing, turn on music, and randomly dance in a driveway for a few minutes. We might get in trouble doing this some day. Or we might not. We might also just make someone’s day when they see two adults and two toddlers dancing to ABBA in their driveway. Who knows, we might just bring some love and joy to their hearts. Yes day might even be infectious.

Has “yes day” and letting go been an overwhelming success? Absolutely not. There have been some major challenges, and it has been far from rainbows and sunshine every day. We also have a hard time sticking to this approach 24/7 (especially by the end of the day when our energy is nonexisistent). But we are all growing and learning and expanding in ways we never even knew were possible. And I have learned that letting go is truly the key to a life full of love.

Curious as to what kundalini yoga with two young kids looks like? Please enjoy the video below!