"Letting Go"?

This talk about "letting go" of a person after they've died doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense. I mean really, the person is literally gone so there's nothing physically to "let go of" is there?

I think when you've lost someone it's really your *attachments* which you need to let go of. I don't mean you have to forget the memories of the person, but if they were really close to you then it's the relationship (albeit now one-sided) that lingers. This may be a person with whom you shared views of the world or "philosophies" - maybe spiritual, religious, political, moral. If not bound by views about "how the world works" then maybe you were bound by shared experiences. The two of you could have recounted the many times you'd spent together in some relationship: siblings, friends, partners, or maybe even as parent-child. Maybe your views were diametrically opposed yet that's what you enjoyed about each other's company.

I think that's what people often have the hardest time letting go of. They have the hardest time acknowledging that the relationship (at least within this world) no longer exists. They cling to the memory of what it was like to be with the person, the conversations they could have *if* the person were here now, the moments they could share *if* the person were here now.

It seems like the healing really starts progressing when you start building new relationships with the people who are here. Maybe with folks you've known all along or maybe with new folks. The people with whom you can create new memories, the people with whom you can have conversations now, the people with whom you can share the present.

I wonder if sometimes people hold on to their "attachment to the relationship" because it gives them an illusion of control. A level of control which wasn't available to keep their loved one alive in the first place.