Earlier this month, one of my kids graduated from college. On Thursday, my other kid will graduate from high school.
It’s a season of “lasts,” and we experienced another one on Friday.
There’s a short walk from our house to the bus stop on the corner. Much to our amazement, for the past 16 years, our kids wanted both (1) to ride the bus and (2) for us to walk out there with them every morning. And we did, nearly every school day for 16 years.
In the early years, we picked them up in the afternoon too, but that faded. Still, the morning walk endured. Like dinner together, it was just something we did. Rain, snow, wind, or sun, we showed up.
On Friday afternoon, we gathered at the stop one last time. We held brightly colored balloons and candy, as is our tradition on the final day of school. Only this year, the balloons said “graduate.”
As you might expect, I’m rather attached to this ritual. And I expect I’ll miss it.
Maybe you’ve had a ritual like this: quiet, consistent, and deeply meaningful, even if the world never noticed.
A Practice of Showing Up
I’ve come to think of that walk to the bus stop not just as a routine, but as a parenting practice. Like meditation. Like mindful breathing. Like yoga.
It required attention, devotion, and patience. It was shaped by love but carried out through consistency.
In the Yoga Sūtra, this kind of steady effort is called abhyāsa (ah-bee-YAH-sah), practice over time. It’s one of the two essential ingredients Patañjali gives us for calming the mind and living with clarity. The other ingredient is vairāgya.
What Is Vairāgya?
Vairāgya (vai-RAHG-yah) is often translated as non-attachment or dispassion, but it doesn’t mean not caring. It means we loosen our grip on results, roles, identities, and even on the rituals that bring us joy.
Letting go is not always dramatic. Sometimes, it’s just recognizing that a season has passed. That the form of the practice has changed. That love doesn’t have to look like it used to.
Vairāgya isn’t about rejecting what matters. It’s about staying rooted in love without clinging to how that love is expressed. It’s a core teaching in yoga and many other spiritual traditions.
Holding and Releasing
For sixteen years, I practiced showing up. That was my abhyāsa. Now, my practice is shifting—to letting go. But not of my kids. Not of love. Just of the ritual we shared, and the role I played in it.
Was that daily walk for them? For me? For both?
Probably both. It was an expression of love. But vairāgya reminds me: even love is not about control. Even devotion doesn’t require permanence.
We can show up without needing the moment to stay.
Letting Go Is a Yoga Practice
This is one of those parenting moments that yoga helps prepare us for: when letting go becomes the next pose.
Whether it’s children growing up, job roles shifting, or spiritual practices evolving, vairāgya invites us to ask:
What can I release, not out of rejection but as an act of love?
Sometimes we put things down not because they don’t matter, but because they do.
Letting go is not failure. It’s wisdom in motion. It’s yoga off the mat.
Walking On
I live on a cul de sac, so I’ll keep walking past that bus stop, sometimes multiple times a day. I imagine I’ll think of those mornings often. And smile.
My kids are so talented, so full of life. There won’t be any more “school nights” in our home, but my practice now is to keep learning from my kids, to keep cheering them on with encouragement and love. Wherever they go. Whatever they do.
Because even as the rituals change, the love remains.
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