Detach ( Friday 12 February 2010 )

If we can master attachment, we'd have control of our feelings and emotions and be able to lead happier, more fulfilled lives.

Publisher of Complete Wellbeing Manoj Khatri defines attachment as holding on to other people, places, or things to give your life meaning and direction. "When we're attached, we define ourselves, our purpose and happiness in terms of ideas, values, things, or people external to us - so much so we allow ourselves and our emotional states to be dictated by them."

He cites the root cause of all human misery as our tendency to become attached. Think how you feel about some of your most valued possessions, such as your car, jewellery, or mobile phone. Now, imagine losing any one of these possessions. If you're attached to your possession, you'll feel upset. Yet, rationally speaking, if there's nothing you can do to reverse the happening, there's no point in losing your calm, or feeling sad. We can be attached to our judgments, relationships, jobs, possessions, value systems, past or political ideologies.

Khatri says the only way out of attachments is to develop a conscious attitude of detachment.Detachment doesn't imply indifference. "It means enjoying your life and all its gifts without demanding that they always remain in your life exactly as you want. When you replace attachment with detachment, nothing changes except your own attitude. You can continue enjoying and appreciating everything without the accompanying fear of losing it. When you're detached, you place your life in a healthy, rational perspective and acknowledge that there's a need to retreat from those events and circumstances of life over which you have no control."

Dr Wayne Dyer defines detachment in relationships as "The ability and willingness to allow those that you care for to be what they choose for themselves, without any insistence that they satisfy you."

Khatri lists six steps to develop detachment: identify those relationships in which there's a dependency equation; seize control of your emotions from external sources such as people,places, or things; hand over situations which you can't change to whatever higher power you believe in; don't blame others for the way you feel; reduce the impact of guilt and other irrational beliefs which inhibit your ability to develop detachment in your life; relinquish the need to correct, fix, or make better the persons, places and things in life over which you have no control.

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