Jaime Richards: Everyone's on their own journey
ALL THINGS must pass — which, depending on how your life is going, can be either good or bad.
It's bad if your life is good, and it's good if your life is bad.
Crazy, huh?
But true. You don't want the good to end. And you certainly don't want the bad to last. Either way, the one constant is termination. Everything ends.
College students debate over which is better, the quarter or the semester system. To graduate from college, you need to attend and pass 12 full-time, 10-week quarters or eight full-time, 15-week semesters. Which would you prefer?
If you like a class, you want it to last. So semesters are better. If you don't like a class, you want it to end. So quarters are better.
Are relationships any different? Do we want them to last or end? Doesn't matter. We don't have a choice.
All relationships are temporary. Every single one of them ends.
Sorry to depress you, but you know it's true. As much as we want eternal friendship, we can't have it.
Think of all the people who were once in your life but no longer are. Where are they? Where did they go? Why are they gone?
Some relationships lasted longer than others, but none of them lasted. And neither will the ones we're in today.
Like it or not, this is how it's supposed to be.
From birth to death we're on a path. Along that path, different people will join our journey. Some travel with us for a short time — remember your first-grade buddy? — then they branch off on their own journeys.
Others stay with us longer. Eventually, though, their destinies will be their own. They'll go their way while we continue on ours.
It hurts deeply because the best part of life is people. But they're also the worst part.
Look: Ideally, the purpose of relationships is to enhance our lives. To make our journey more enjoyable.
When they don't, we need to cut them short. Sooner or later they're going to end anyway, so sometimes it's best to end them sooner. When a relationship hurts more than it helps, it's probably time to call it quits.
I'm no marriage and family therapist. This isn't about long-lasting, romantic connections or even lifelong, platonic bonds. Those you may have to fight for.
This is about those voluntary, come-and-go relationships that can engulf you. The key word being voluntary. You don't have to stay in frustrating, infuriating or depressing relationships.
So don't.
How do you break free? You just do.
Unless you're in a gang or having a "love" affair with a psycho, no one is going to beat you up when you want out. So get out.
After you do, your life will be better. You can do better. Believe that.
We're programmed to reject goodbye. So we cling to poisonous people like clutter, messing up our feng shui.
Don't. Let go. Break free.
Take it from me, it's the right thing to do. And I feel better about my decision with every passing minute.
People like that take everything and leave you with nothing. It is better just to move on and to stop giving those kind of people significance and importance in your life.
Honestly, people really should take what I say seriously. I do not say things I do not mean, so when I said that, at any given moment, if I decide I don't want someone in my life anymore and that I will drop them like they never mattered, I meant it.
I do not need toxicity in my life.
