I came across an article about letting go of the lettuce in our lives from a motivational speaker named Catherine Devyries. It is a lettuce story of U.S.-based Delta Airlines. The gist of the story is simple, we hold on to the things which are not meant for us. We carry excess baggages, thus our load becomes heavier. There are things in our lives that we don’t have to hold on to. The best thing to do is to let go. The story explains why letting go in life isn’t necessarily a bad thing. 
In 1993, one of the cabin crew members of Delta Airlines suggested to take out the lettuce in the entrees of passengers because he observed that “no one was eating it anyway.” The chefs of the airline reacted differently which was very obvious that they were not amenable to the idea, considering that they were used to it and have been doing it for a long time. Why a sudden change?
“The menu is not impressive if we take lettuce out in our entrees,” said the airline chefs. However the management was open and amenable to try the suggestion. The story tells us that they were all surprised because the passengers didn’t complain. No one bothered asking about the missing lettuce, it seems they didn’t notice what was missing. Simply put, they didn’t really care.
For a long period of time, the management of Delta Airlines thought the lettuce was important, but to their surprise it wasn’t for the customers. After one year without the lettuce, Delta Airlines had a savings of 1.4 million US dollars. Yes, a stunning 1.4 million US dollars!
If we take this story in connection with our lives, our life is sometimes being surrounded by a lot of lettuces that we need to learn to let go. We keep on keeping and holding on to so many lettuces thinking they’re all important. We want so many things which we do not actually need. Our wants exceeds our needs. We want this, we want that because somebody else has. We try to become someone who we are not, we want to become like this person, etc.
We must bear in mind that God created us with a purpose and only him can guide us. All we have to do is to trust in him. There are lettuces in our lives which we think are making us feel better, but in reality they are nothing but a waste of time and effort. The reality is we can’t have everything that we want and want to be in life.
Time will come that we have to make a bold decision and a choice, and be committed to it. This simply means that we must sacrifice the things we need to let go so that we can give more way to the more important things. We really have to let go of the lettuce.
Warren Buffet, an American business magnate, investor and philanthropist who is widely respected globally, said it best. And I quote, “For every 100 opportunities presented to me, I decline to 99 of them and focus on one big thing that leads me to success.”

Letting go may be painful but it can also be the only way to greatness. Remember, for every “no” that you say, you become empowered to say “yes” to something else. And that something else should be the one that matters most to you in life./WDJ