"The Art of Letting Go" is a song by American singer and songwriter Mariah Carey for her fourteenth studio album, Me. I Am Mariah... The Elusive Chanteuse (2014). It was written and produced by Carey and Rodney "Darkchild" Jerkins, and premiered via Facebook on November 11, 2013, as the second single from the album, following a digital release the same day worldwide. Jermaine Dupri, Carey's longtime collaborator and her then-manager, had the idea to premiere the song via Facebook to attract her die hard fans, however, Carey faced problems when an unmastered version of the song was uploaded in place of its final mix, leading the singer to premiere the intended version hours later with an apology and explanation.

"The Art of Letting Go" is an orchestral old-school R&B song, with influences of gospel music, having piano, strings and guitar as its main instrumentation. Lyrically, the song talks about the art and the power of letting go of people and things that are not good in our lives, which can be hurtful and difficult, but extremely necessary. The song received largely positive reviews from music critics, who compared the song to her debut single, "Vision of Love" (1990), while also praising its minimalistic production and her vocals towards the end of the song. Despite the positive response, the song failed to impact the charts elsewhere, reaching the low regions of the countries it charted.

"The Art of Letting Go" was originally Carey's formerly-named fourteenth studio album, which was scheduled to be release during the spring of 2014, as well as it second single of the same name, following statements that she wasn't ready to release the album in 2013 since she didn't want to "exclude meaningful songs", as well as an injury on her shoulder while recording the music video for the remix of "#Beautiful", which led her to spend some time recovering. On October 28, 2013, Carey uploaded the single artwork on her Instagram, also revealing that the song was going to premiere first on Facebook. The revealed artwork shows Carey kneeling down on a beach in front of a sunset. Sam Lanksy on Idolator commanded the sexiness of Carey's emancipated body, commenting: [...]" Wearing a swimsuit thing on a beach against a golden sunset, sporting tousled waves, her body is emancipated — just like her spirit".

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