Guided Meditation For Letting Go With Script
I created this meditation after months of being trapped—my mind wouldn’t release old pain, future fears, or impossible standards. I replayed mistakes endlessly, couldn’t relax, couldn’t feel grounded. It’s exhausting—and it’s the kind of grip that makes even simple meditation feel impossible.
That was twenty five years ago, before I started teaching meditation.
When one of my students came to me today in that same state—caught in loops, drowning in pressure—I gave them this exact script. And it helped. Not by pushing the thoughts away, but by softening the grip. By loosening the emotional tension underneath.
Letting go isn’t pretending things don’t matter. It’s releasing the tight grip of self-stories, fears, and expectations—but doing it alone can feel impossible. Without guidance, it’s easy to drift back into old loops, thinking you’re ‘failing’ at letting go. Sometimes the problem isn’t that we can’t let go. It’s that we’re unknowingly learning to disconnect instead of release.
If this all sounds familiar, let me share the exact script I gave my student. As you go through the steps below, take a moment to reflect on what letting go really means for you. And if you have any questions, feel free to ask.
Let Go Meditation
Letting Go Meditation Script
If you’ve been trying to let go but keep finding yourself stuck in the same mental loops, this is something I help people work through in private meditation lessons — and I’ll show you the exact process I use below.
1: [1 minute] Assume a proper meditation position.
Sit comfortably, allowing your weight to sink into the floor and your spine to be straight but relaxed.
As you might know, the mind is inexorably linked to the body. What the mind thinks, the body feels, and vice versa. That’s why I always tell my students that if you want to let go psychologically, you need to release yourself physically too.
So, sit with good posture.
I can always tell whether or not I have good posture because my body will feel stable and relaxed and I can feel the floor (or seat) taking my weight.
At the same time, I dont like to be too strict about posture. As Dogen explains in the Fuken Zazengi, posture is only one small part of meditation.
[For more on this see: Opening the mind through the body: The effects of posture on creative processes, by Valentina Rita, Andolfi Chiara Di Nuzzo, Alessandro Antonietti, published in the Thinking Skills and Creativity Journal].
2: [1 minute] Set the intention to let go. Recite the mantra, “I am letting go”
We want to set our intention before we begin to meditate. That way, we have a clear idea of what we are going to accomplish through our meditation. Like Wayne Dyer said, “Our intention creates our reality.”
My students and I like to say a simple phrase like “I permit myself to let go”.
You might notice your mind wandering, your doubts rising, or your body tensing. That’s a common struggle in meditation and is one reason why personal guidance can help, because having a teacher can help you stay present and release without judgment.
I will say that for me a mantra is optional. However, mantras can help to focus the mind according to research by Rozalyn Simon et. al published in the Journal of Cognitive Enhancement.
3: [5 minutes – 10 minutes] Close your eyes and meditate on your breath
I usually recommend that my students start their meditations with mindful breathing (Buddhist Anapanasati).
The reason is that you need to begin to relax your mind before you can truly meditate. You can’t just go from your regular attached existence to non-attachment ( which Buddhists call nekkhamma).
You need to relax and open your mind. That’s why mindful breathing is so helpful. So spend 5 to 10 minutes breathing mindfully. Allow the subtle flow of the breath to relax your mind and body.
4: [5 minutes] Continue to breathe mindfully while also labelling your thoughts and detaching from them
Next we will use our meditation to let go of thoughts, feelings, and beliefs.
Often in life, we view mental phenomena (such as thoughts and feelings) as being a part of us. Because we identify with them, we attach to them. We need to change this.
To release emotions, thoughts, beliefs, and feelings, observe them and label them. Notice how thoughts and feelings come into your conscious awareness and then dissipate. Their coming and going is normal. They are not permanent. They are ethereal.
We want to observe our thoughts and feelings as though they were just abstract things floating by.
Research shows that labelling thoughts makes us less reactive to them, which in turn helps us to release them. [University of California – Los Angeles. “Putting Feelings Into Words Produces Therapeutic Effects In The Brain, Matthew D. Lieberman et. al.”].
On the surface this step seems simple.
But this is where many people subtly move from healthy release into emotional distancing without realizing it. Indeed many people come to me because they have gone too far and actually started dissociating. So be cautious.
5: [5 minutes – 10 minutes] Move your conscious awareness away from your body. View the body as something separate from yourself
Many of the things that we become attached to relate to the body. For instance, we can be attached to our body image, or certain body conditions, or even certain sensations that occur in the body.
We identify aspects of the body as being part of the self. Because we view them as part of the self, we cling to them, which prevents us from letting go. That is what this part of our script is about.
Zoom out of your body and view it as a separate object.
To do this, begin by noticing where your mind is. Where is the centre of your awareness? Imagine that awareness is a physical thing.
I like to gently move my consciousness away from my body while observing the body. Aim to view your body as something separate to yourself. Observe it as you would observe a regular object (an object that is not part of your “self”).
If you’d like, I can guide you through this stage to ensure you truly let go instead of distancing. Reach out to me to schedule a private session.
6: [10 minutes] Let go and surrender to the universe. Do this by performing “open meditation”. That is, let the entire world enter your mind freely, without judgment.
When we talk about “letting go” in meditation, what we really mean is surrendering to the universe. And to surrender to the universe means to let the universe flow freely through us, without trying to block it, without fighting it, and without judging.
To achieve this state of letting go, we want to perform an open meditation.
To do this, imagine that you are dropping your mind. You are releasing conscious control and simply placing your mind at rest.
Now, let the entirety of your surroundings flow through your mind. I often ask my students to imagine that they’ve come to a complete stop, that that don’t exist, and that the world is simply occurring around them while they lie there.
There’s a reason we use open meditation for letting go. It is the best meditation for detaching from our regular modes of thinking, and it opens the mind to new possibilities. [Focused attention, open monitoring, and loving kindness meditation: effects on attention, conflict monitoring, and creativity – A review, Dominique P. Lippelt, Bernhard Hommel and Lorenza S. Colzato, Cognitive Psychology Unit, Institute for Psychological Research and Leiden Institute for Brain and Cognition, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands].
Many people spend years practicing this stage believing they are “letting go”… when in reality they’re learning to step back from life rather than soften into it. The shift from distancing to true release is subtle — and often invisible from the inside.
7: [1 minute] Open your eyes. Now tell yourself that you are going to roll with the universe
To finish this meditation, slowly open your eyes and tell yourself that you are releasing and opening yourself up to the universe.
And that’s it!
When I finish this meditation, I don’t rush to open my eyes. I sit there a little longer—feeling where I’m still gripping, and where something in me has softened. That’s the whole point for me: not to “release to the universe,” but to get honest about what I’m still holding.
Sometimes that’s all it takes to feel a little lighter.
Pause and notice what shifted—and what’s still held tightly. Letting go is a moment-by-moment choice. It isn’t just about the practice — it’s about knowing what your mind is actually doing while you practice. Sometimes what feels like release is actually withdrawal. And that distinction can be hard to see when youre just practising by yourself. So, if you’ve tried letting go but still feel tense, stuck, or oddly detached… I can help you learn the difference between disconnecting and truly releasing. Book a private session with me today.
Paul Harrison is a meditation teacher with 25 years of experience and a deep passion for helping others. Known for his empathy and authentic approach, he’s dedicated to guiding individuals and teams toward mindfulness, clarity, and well-being.
