Let Them.
Table of Contents
Let me tell you about a student I was thinking about too late at night trying to get to sleep.
He had not handed in his work. Again. I had reminded him. I had made myself available. I had sent an encouraging message. I had told his parents. I had rearranged my schedule. I had mentally rehearsed at least four different versions of a conversation I would have with him the next morning, ranging from warm and understanding to – if I am being honest – mildly exasperated.
He was at home, almost certainly not thinking about it at all.
That is the image I keep coming back to. The enormous gulf between the energy I was burning and the energy he was spending. I was exhausted by something I could not change, could not control, and – here is the part that took me longest to accept – was not actually mine to carry.
And then I read two words – from Mel Robbins – that changed that.
Two Words from Mel Robbins. That’s It.
Let. Them.
Mel Robbins – who has already made an appearance in my life through The Mel Robbins Podcast (you might remember my post on motivation and Dr. K, where she kept coming up) – has a way of making the devastatingly obvious feel like a revelation. The Let Them Theory started as a viral moment on social media, and I will be honest: I rolled my eyes a little. Two words? A theory? Come on.
Then I read it. Then I sat with it. Then I thought about my student, and my children, and this blog, and approximately seventeen other situations I had been mentally white-knuckling my way through. And I stopped rolling my eyes.
Let Them – What This Actually Means
The core of it is this: you cannot control other people. You know this. I know this. We all know this intellectually. And yet – we spend an extraordinary amount of time and energy trying to do exactly that.
Let them make the choice you would not make. Let them be disappointed in you. Let them not invite you. Let them have their opinion about your life. Let them cancel plans, not reply, not show up, not understand. Let them vote differently, parent differently, live differently.
This is not indifference. It is not giving up, and it is absolutely not the same as not caring. Mel Robbins is very clear on this – and it matters, because my first instinct was to read “let them” as “stop giving a damn.” It is not that.
It is the recognition that when you try to manage, fix, nudge, control, or reroute another person’s choices – you are burning energy that belongs to you. You are making yourself responsible for something that is genuinely not yours. And in doing so, you are often making the situation worse, the relationship more tense, and yourself quietly miserable.
Let them show you who they are. Let them make their mistakes. Let them live their life.
Full stop.
Let Me – The Part Everyone Forgets
Here is where I think the book earns its keep. Because “let them” without the second part is just resigned detachment. And that is not what this is.
The second part is: Let Me.
Let ME decide how I respond. Let ME focus on what I can actually control. Let ME invest in the relationships and projects that are already working. Let ME stop over-explaining my decisions to people who were never going to understand them anyway. Let ME show up for myself with the same energy I have been pouring into managing everyone else.
The theory liberates two people at once: the other person from your attempts to manage them, and you from the exhaustion of doing so. You reclaim the energy. You redirect it inward. That is where the real work begins.
The Places I’m Practising This
I say practising deliberately. I am not there yet. Far from it, trust me.
As a teacher: The student I mentioned at the top of this post – he is not the only one. Teaching is full of moments where you care more about a student’s outcome than they currently do. That is almost the job description. The hardest thing I am learning is that my investment in their success cannot substitute for their own. I can create the conditions. I can open the door. But I cannot walk through it for them. Let them decide what they do with the opportunity. Let me keep showing up and doing my job well.
As a parent: This one nearly breaks me. When your seven-year-old insists on wearing the wrong shoes in the rain, fine – let them. When your twelve-year-old makes a social choice you think is a mistake, and your fourteen-year-old starts pulling away in the way teenagers do – these are the moments where “let them” feels like it costs something real. But Mel Robbins is right. My children are not extensions of me. They have their own paths to walk. I can be present. I can be honest. I can hold the safety net. And then – I have to let them climb.
Building Notes from Soph: Oh, this one is close. Starting a blog, putting your actual thoughts on the internet, building something from scratch with no guarantee that anyone will care – it is profoundly vulnerable. What if people think it is silly? What if they judge the topics, the format, the very fact that I think I have something worth saying? Well. Let them. Let them scroll past. Let them not understand it. Let them raise an eyebrow. Let ME keep writing anyway. That is the deal I am trying to make with myself.
The French Complication
I have to add this because it would be dishonest not to.
There is a very particular French relationship with qu’est-ce qu’on va dire – what are people going to say. It runs deep. Opinion is not private in French culture; it is almost a civic responsibility. People have views, they share them, and there is a social weight to collective judgement that can be quietly suffocating if you let it.
I grew up shaped by that. The people-pleasing I have been untangling for years – it did not appear from nowhere. I was told, implicitly and sometimes explicitly, that other people’s opinions mattered. That what you do reflects on others. That you owe the group an explanation.
Mel Robbins is very American in her confidence that you can simply decide not to care. And I love her for it. But I also think this work is harder for some of us, depending on where we came from. Which means it is also more necessary.
Qu’est-ce qu’on va dire? Let them say it.
Practical Takeaways
- Notice the energy. When you catch yourself rehearsing a conversation, trying to predict someone’s reaction, or adjusting your behaviour to manage how someone else feels – pause. That is the moment. Say the words quietly: let them.
- Ask what “let me” looks like here. Once you release the attempt to control, where does that energy go? What do you actually want to do? Start there.
- Use it for low-stakes practice first. The friend who is late again. The colleague with the irritating habit. These are easier arenas than parenting or marriage. Build the muscle somewhere manageable.
- Distinguish between caring and controlling. You can love someone deeply and still let them make their own choices. These are not opposites. Let them is not withdrawal – it is respect.
- Come back to it. This is not a switch you flip once. It is a phrase you return to, repeatedly, in the middle of the moments when you most want to reach for control.
Why This Belongs in Mind
The Mind category on this blog is about thinking differently – about the mental patterns we inherit, carry, and – with effort – begin to question. The Let Them Theory belongs here because it addresses something at the root of so much anxiety, people-pleasing, and relational exhaustion: the belief that it is our job to manage other people’s choices, feelings, and reactions.
It connects to the NVC work I wrote about – empathy for others, yes, but not at the cost of yourself. It connects to the growth mindset posts – you cannot grow if you are spending your energy managing everyone else’s judgements of your growth. These ideas are not separate. They are building something together.
Notes from Soph
I still catch myself late at night, mentally rehearsing conversations with people who are asleep. I still adjust what I say based on how I think someone will receive it. I still feel the pull to smooth things over, to manage the temperature of a room, to make sure no one leaves feeling uncomfortable – even at my own expense.
The two words do not erase that. But they interrupt it. And in the interruption, there is space. Space to ask: whose responsibility is this, actually? Space to choose differently.
There is no turning back once you see it. And I am glad I read it.
Et toi – is there someone or something you have been trying to control that you already know, deep down, you need to let go of? I would love to hear it in the comments.
Notes from Soph | Learning, not perfection.
Have you read The Let Them Theory? Did it land differently for you than it did for me? Share your thoughts below – or if you know someone who is white-knuckling their way through something they cannot control, send them this post. It might be exactly the two words they need today.
Book Details:
The Let Them Theory: A Life-Changing Tool That Millions of People Can’t Stop Talking About – Mel Robbins & Sawyer Robbins
Published 2024 | Hay House UK
📚 Amazon https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1788176189/?tag=websitenote0f-21
🎧 Audible https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/The-Let-Them-Theory-Audiobook/B0DFMXWWX1
🌐 melrobbins.com
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