The Let Them Theory: A Life-Changing Tool That Millions of People Can't Stop Talking About

by Mel Robbins

The 5 Second Rule taught me that action is the answer. Thinking about your problems will never solve them. Waiting around to feel like doing something means you’ll never do it. It taught me that no one is coming to save you. You must save yourself from yourself. You have to force yourself to make little moves forward, all day, every day, especially when you don’t feel like it.

The problem with waiting is no one is coming. The only permission you need is your own.

Learning how to push yourself to take action when you are afraid or full of self-doubt or overwhelmed with excuses is a life skill you can learn. Once you master it, you’ll understand that you can achieve anything through small, consistent moves forward.

You’ll never feel ready to change your life. One day, you just get tired of your own excuses and force yourself to do

The 5 Second Rule works because it helps you win the internal battle you have with yourself.

The reality is, no matter how hard you try or what you do, you cannot control other people. And yet, you live your life as if you can.

The problem isn’t you. The problem is the power you unknowingly give to other people.

The truth is, other people hold no real power over you unless you give it to them.

Here’s why this works: When you stop trying to control things that aren’t yours to control, you stop wasting your energy. You reclaim your time, your peace of mind, and your focus. You realize that your happiness is tied to your actions, not someone else’s behavior, opinions, or mood.

So much time and energy is wasted on forcing other people to match our expectations. And the truth is, if somebody else—a person you’re dating, a business partner, a family member—if they’re not showing up how you need them to show up, do not try to force them to change. Let Them be themselves because they are revealing who they are to you. Just Let Them and then you get to choose what you do next.

All human beings have a hardwired need for control.

Feeling in control makes you feel comfortable and safe, so naturally you try to control everyone and everything around you—oftentimes, without even realizing it.

No matter how hard you try, you will never be able to control or change another person.

The only person you are in control of is you. Your thoughts, your actions, your feelings.

You find out that you weren’t included in something, and all you want is some kind of reassurance that there wasn’t something you had done wrong.

I will be honest with you: In these types of painful situations, you’re going to have to keep saying Let Them over and over, because when something hurts, the hurt doesn’t just disappear. It rises up again and again. So don’t be surprised when you find yourself having to repeat Let Them again and again.

Trying to control people and situations doesn’t calm your fears. It amplifies them. Any psychologist will tell you, the more you try to control something you can’t, the more anxious and stressed out you become.

choosing peace is not weakness—it is power.

‘Let them’ doesn’t mean giving away control; it means reclaiming it. By choosing how we respond—by not feeding anger, hatred, or negativity—we exercise the ultimate power over ourselves.

You reclaim your power by choosing how you respond.

When someone does something (like planning something and not including you) you will react in an either positive or negative way. If you react negatively—and have self-destructive thoughts or heavy emotions—it will weigh you down. Your reaction is what tips the scales and changes the dynamic between you and someone else.

When you say Let Them you free yourself from the weight of all the negativity that just made you sink. It’s like pushing off the ground on a seesaw.

It feels so good to rise above other people and the situations that bother you. That’s why people love saying Let Them, because when you’re up, you now feel this false sense of superiority and confidence. You push through those heavy emotions and rise up.

And here is the danger of only saying Let Them: If all you ever do is say Let Them, Let Them, Let Them, it will lead you to feel more isolated. It will make you want to withdraw or shut down.

if all you do is say Let Them you’re going to find yourself without a lot of friends, without a lot of social plans, and confused as to why the theory “isn’t working” in your favor.

Let Them is just the first half of the equation. You cannot stop there. There is a second, critical part to the theory—Let Me.

And there’s so much you can control: Your attitude. . . your behavior. . . your values, your needs, your desires, and what YOU want to do in response to what just happened.

It’s the opposite of judgment. Let Me is all about self-awareness, compassion, empowerment, and personal responsibility.

It’s not a license to give someone the silent treatment, ghost people, avoid hard conversations, or withdraw from your relationships.

When you’re an adult, your life, happiness, health, healing, social life, friendships, boundaries, needs, and success are all your responsibility.

You can’t control how other adults behave, and stressing about it diminishes your power. You’ll never reach the full potential of your life if you continue to allow stupid things or rude people to drain your life force.

“It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.”

life. You can’t control what is happening around you, but you can control how you respond to it.

stress causes you to doubt yourself, procrastinate, burn out, doom scroll, and struggle with comparison. If you’re having trouble focusing, feeling happy, or taking care of yourself, the reason is stress.

Catching your stress response using Let Them and Let Me empowers you to choose what you say, think, or do instead of allowing your emotions to hijack your response. No more rage texts, or snapping at your loved ones, or wasting hours crafting an email at work.

taking deep breaths has been scientifically proven to help lower your stress response. Breathing in fully, feeling the air expand your belly, stimulates the vagus nerve, which sends a message directly to your brain that says, “We can calm down.”

Every time you say Let Them, you acknowledge that you cannot control this situation that is stressing you out. When you say Let Me, you are following Dr. Aditi’s advice and focusing on what you can control, which is your response to these stressful situations.

Your response to every situation is going to be unique and different every time.

There will be moments when I just shrug my shoulders, say Let Them, and know it’s not worth my time and energy. And, when I get to the point where the dog has made its mess, I’ll Let Me be the bigger person, and I’ll take a baggie and pick it up.

You always get to choose how you respond.

Let Me is an opportunity for you to put your time, energy, and values at the center of your life. It’s where you get to choose what’s worth your attention and what isn’t.

The Let Them Theory really highlights this and empowers you to make better choices about what is worth your time and energy and what isn’t. This doesn’t mean avoiding difficult conversations or staying silent.

It doesn’t mean being a doormat and letting people walk all over you;

You get to choose when a job or relationship or issue is worth fighting for, and when it’s time to leave. You get to choose, and that is why you are always in control of what happens next.

When you allow your fear of what other people think to stop you from doing what you want to do, you become a prisoner to other people's opinions.

This fear impacts every aspect of your life. It makes you procrastinate. It makes you doubt yourself. It paralyzes you with perfectionism. It’s the reason you overthink.

You can’t control what another adult says, does, or thinks. Try to and you’ll regret it. The more you Let Them think what they want, the better your life gets.

Every time you edit what you post, or stay silent in class or at work, or hide in the back of the group photo, you are engaging in self-rejection. You’re the one telling yourself that you’re not good enough.

Here’s another truth: Just because someone has a negative opinion doesn’t mean they feel negatively about you as a whole.

Let Them think what they want. Let Me do what I want.