How To Liberate Yourself From A Painful Relationship
“The best decisions in life are never the easy ones.”
My Mom gave me that advice one time as I struggled with a difficult choice.
She was right. And some of the most challenging—and best— decisions in my life have been deciding to let go of things I love: physical objects, relationships, jobs, and even ideas I’ve held about myself and the world.
I once wrote a poem titled “If Only Men Were More Like Yogurt.” It was basically about how it would be extremely convenient and helpful if relationships came with expiration dates. It would be so damn nice to be able to simply check the date and know whether it was time to let the relationship go or be confident that it still had a good shelf life.
While I wrote the poem to be humorous and light-hearted, it spoke to a more profound, burning question that so many of us face: How do you know when to let go?
In the past, this was a gut-wrenching, tear-filled, anxiety-producing question for me.
In my lifetime so far, I’ve married and divorced. Then, in a committed relationship that ended after five years and no marriage, followed by a decade of being mostly single. I say “mostly” because I had several short-term relationships but no long-term commitments. Then I spent several years not even dating, wholly single, and, more importantly, extremely happy.
Now, after fifteen-some years of non-cohabitation, I’m in the process of moving in with my boyfriend. As I’m packing up, I’m deciding what to take with me and what to let go of. And, I’m also wondering, “Will this be the last man in my life to share his HBO log-in with me?” I’m already wondering what the shelf life of this relationship is.
While packing, I’ve realized that I have been holding onto a lot of things unnecessarily. A lot of “stuff” that I’ve kept around because it was easier than taking the time and asking the question, “Is this essential, or is it time to let it go?”
Because I want this new relationship to be different than the ones I’ve had in the past, I realize that I have to show up differently than I have in the past. I don’t want to bring all of my “old stuff” with me. Not only the physical stuff that I’ve collected but also the emotional stuff. And now, all that “stuff” has to be gone through and sorted out: keep it or let it go?
I’ve decided to be extremely discerning about what I take with me to my new home. I’m letting go of a lot of things: the clothes I haven’t worn in years, all the trinkets I’ve collected, and the small kitchen appliances that merely collect dust. I’m also letting go of worrying about the outcome of this relationship. My only objective is to be a willing, cooperative component in its growth and development.
You Create Your Relationship
In the past, I didn’t understand that I was responsible for creating the relationship. I viewed an excellent relationship as something another person gave to you, and you were either “lucky” and got a good one or “unlucky” and got a bad one. I didn’t understand that every choice I made along the way was creating the relationship. Just like I let my physical stuff collect in the basement, I would tolerate certain behaviors from others and let my feelings collect in what I think of as the “basement of the soul.” That place where I collect emotional things I don’t want to deal with.
Going to business school helped me see this pattern. One of the things I learned there was the ability to analyze failure. Whenever something does not go as planned or as expected, I now quickly retrace the path back to the beginning to see if I can figure out where in the process things went off course. Can I pinpoint the moment of choice that may have led to a better outcome if I had chosen differently? I’ve learned to ask, “What can I learn from this experience so, if faced with a similar situation in the future, I might be able to create a different outcome?”
“I’ve learned to ask, What can I learn from this experience so, if faced with a similar situation in the future, I might be able to create a different outcome?”
Reflecting back, I now see that I was disempowering myself by choosing to tolerate behaviors that, in hindsight, I never should have accepted. I stayed in unhappy situations far too long because I was holding out hope for a particular outcome: a marriage proposal, starting a family, or, in the case of work, more money.
When dealing with life and relationships’ complexities, there are very few absolute rules to follow, except one: you are responsible for your happiness. If you are looking for any object, title, person, or particular circumstances to “make” you happy, you are going to be disappointed.
Today, I’m older and wiser; I now view relationships as a co-creative experience where individuals come together to create something more than they could make on their own. I’ve also redefined my definition of a successful relationship. We live in a culture that conditions us to believe that long-term monogamy and raising a family are the only path to happiness or that staying in one job or profession is a success.
But that hasn’t been my experience. Somewhere along the lines, I accepted that I was a serial monogamist. I don’t view my past relationships as failures but rather as experiences that allowed me to learn, grow, and shape me into the woman I am today. More importantly, the time between relationships allowed me to work on my relationship with myself and find my power.
We do not see many examples of women living a full, vibrant, meaningful life, enjoying our relationship with self. More importantly, the power of being vibrantly happy as a solo entity has mostly been obscured from us.
Why? Because empowered individuals are a powerful force. Empowered individuals are hard to control and manipulate. Empowered individuals don’t stay in situations or relationships or hold on to things that are no longer serving them. And by “serving them,” I mean in service to the greater good: creating joy, creating beauty, creating love, creating positive energy and forward momentum.
I am not saying that the minute something makes you unhappy, get rid of it. I am advocating to decide to be happy, no matter what. Make that the number one priority in your life. If you are not experiencing happiness in any relationship in your life—work, family, friend, significant other—you, and you alone, are the only one who has the power to change it.
Work On Your Relationship With Happiness and Your Self
I have worked hard to reach a state of happiness. I’m committed to that happiness because, ultimately, I’m of little good to anyone else when I’m unhappy. Permanent happiness grows from within and expands outward. Permanent happiness is not a result of never facing adversity or dealing with discomfort. Permanent happiness is patiently understanding that the discomfort is temporary and necessary. It’s that discomfort that motivates us to seek something more, a better version of ourselves, or our relationships.
I maintain my relationship with happiness by focusing on the most important relationship with another in my life: the relationship between me and myself. My relationship with self involves the aspect of me that shows up every day, and then there is the broader perspective of me that sees the big picture, even when the everyday me gets caught up in the drama or chaos of life.
Over the years, some of the most challenging relationships for me to let go of have been with aspects of myself that were no longer serving me. Like, the part of me that feared uncertainty. At one point, I wrote a letter to my fear, letting it know that I was ending our relationship. Rather than letting fear be my dominant internal relationship with self, I made a conscious decision to leave that relationship and focus on my relationship with my broader perspective instead, the one that is never afraid.
Over time, I’ve learned to rely on that broader perspective more and more. We connect through meditation, journaling, walking, mindfulness, journey work—a host of ways. I’ve learned to ask my broader perspective, “What is the best outcome for everyone?” And then I patiently wait for the answer. I’ve learned that the response is not always immediate. But I trust that when the right answer comes to me, I will know it.
I’ve found that by asking, “What’s best for all?” rather than placing requests or demands for getting what I want that I eliminate a lot of suffering for myself. Sure, I experience disappointment when things don’t go the way I would like or hope, but I accept and understand that it wasn’t what was best right now. I trust that my broader perspective can see what I can’t, know what I don’t yet know, and will lead me to exactly the right thing at precisely the right time in precisely the right way.
Ask Empowering Questions
Choice by choice, you have ended up where you are. If you don’t like what you have created, create something different. That’s empowerment. The knowing that you and you alone have the power to create and change your world. Instead of asking, “Is it time to let go?” Ask, instead, “Where do I want to go?” “What do I need to be happy?” And finally, “How does this relationship contribute to or take away from my happiness?”
These are empowering questions, questions that open you up to a greater potential.
Other questions I like to ask my broader perspective are:
Is holding on to this bogging me down? Does it feel like a burdensome weight that I am carrying around?
Am I willing to let go of this to make room for something more in my life?
Am I willing to venture into the unknown with excitement and curiosity, trusting that there could be more for me in the unknown, things far more significant than I could even conceive?
Am I willing to turn in the direction of all that is possible, or do I want to stay heavy and weighed down where I am?
Am I willing to risk never knowing something far greater because clinging to what I have or know is more comfortable than dealing with the discomfort of moving in the direction of something better?
Our lives are merely the sum of our choices. Rather than deciding if an option is “right” or “wrong,” choose only to make empowered choices. The choices that will take you in the direction that you want to go. As you move forward, only take with you the things that support you in creating what you want.
When You Know What You Need To Be Happy, Your Unwilling To Settle For Anything Less
As I prepare myself to cohabitate with the man that I love, ultimately, the only commitment I can make to him and myself is to commit to the process of creating a loving, supportive, vibrant, passionate relationship. These are the things I need in a relationship to be happy, so I commit to creating them. And in that commitment, I find freedom and power. In any situation in life, if I am giving my all to create something better and the other party is not, then the decision to let go becomes an easy one.
When we ask someone else to promise us “forever,” what we seek is security, the comfort of the known: this will always be here for me. But life and people are continually changing and evolving. When we cling to what we have because the unknown is too scary, we rob ourselves of opportunity—the opportunity to have or be more.
I can’t promise someone forever, nor do I expect someone to promise me forever. I’ve gotten comfortable with letting the future be unknown and focus on what I’m creating now: happiness, joy, peace, contentment; if our relationship can maintain that for the rest of our lives, excellent! If not, I’m not afraid to let go.
Sometimes we get so focused on whether one specific choice is right or wrong that we don’t see that there are many paths to the same goal. If you're committed to enjoying the creative process more than the outcome because you know that if you don’t get the result you had hoped for, all you can do is reflect, learn and try again anyway, then life opens up for you. You begin to see all the possibilities before you rather than one “right” or “wrong” way forward. Then the journey is the joy, not the destination.