A Different Kind of Letting Go

In his last post, the AWL spoke about the great love and courage possessed by a group of mothers who have given one or more of their children up for adoption. He is also beginning this post by speaking in the third person, because that's just what cool people like Karl Malone and the AWL do.

Today's post is about a different kind of letting go and one that is, likewise, motivated by love: breaking up with someone.

What?! you say. Dumping somebody is an act of love?! That miserable (guy/girl) who dumped me is a jerk and a poo-poo face and deserves to be tied down, smeared with peanut butter, and mauled by bears.

Yes, that is what I am saying.

This isn't always the case, of course. Some people are downright cruel when it comes to ending a relationship, taking the coward's way out. Rather than having "The Talk" with their significant others and trying to let them down as easily and as painlessly as possible, cowards instead take the indirect route, cutting off all communication (phone calls, texting, e-mails, de-friending the other person on Facebook, etc.), dive into the bushes to hide or wear a Groucho Marx disguise when the romantic partner approaches within a 100-yard radius, and basically go about ignoring and avoiding, hoping that the other person has enough horse sense to "get" the message. Some cowards may even go as far as moving to another state and legally changing their names.


If you think I'm making things up or exaggerating here, then either you don't know me very well, or you don't know some of the same people I know.

Another form of cowardice: Realizing that, for you, the relationship is all but over and you are sticking with it, but you are postponing and delaying breaking up because you don't want to "hurt" the other person. Unfortunately, this kind of behavior ends up hurting the other person a lot more than breaking it off sooner - and I'd be lying if I said I hadn't fallen into this pattern of thinking and behavior in the past, too.

On second thought, I suppose a better way of saying what I earlier tried to state may be that breaking up with somebody is an action that should be motivated by love. It's not one motivated by romantic love, of course, but one that is nevertheless motivated by love - love for the other person as a human being and as a child of God. It is a selfless rather than a selfish act. It is recognizing that the relationship is not making either or both of you truly happy, that it doesn't work, and that you can let that person go and yet have no hard feelings toward each other, thus giving you both an opportunity to find someone better.

Some people date and break up and get back together again and then repeat the cycle five or six more times (again, I'm not exaggerating here). It's much like that Taylor Swift song about never, ever getting back together - and yet it still happens. The truth is that there are only two options: The relationship either works, and you both move forward with it, or it doesn't. Sadly, many people break up, make up, and date again and again as if trying to make an elusive third option successfully work.

At any rate, I'm certainly no expert on the subject. I have also found myself on both sides of the equation. I think Howard Jones, as is the case many times with songs, says it much better than I can:

What is the greatest expression of love?
To let go and wish well

Since I am in my 30s and have the advantage of hindsight, I can look back on many of those relationships that didn't work out, and there is mainly only a sense of gratitude. It is a feeling that has replaced those negative feelings associated with both dumping someone else and being dumped. I have seen people I have dated go on to find a better relationship and marry someone else, and it's better for everyone involved; not that people are better than other people, but because people are different from each other.

My point is, I suppose, that it gets better.