We’ve arrived at the final and most drastic Relationship Course Correction: Ending the Relationship. We’ll first discuss how to know when it’s time to end a relationship, and then some of the things to consider about how to bring them to a close.

When to End a Relationship

Relationships are hard work, and they require fortitude and painful, unflattering self-reflection. It’s easy to head for the exits. It’s easy to trust our own stories about how we are right and the other person is wrong. It’s important to stay engaged with the process for as long as we can. That’s why in my relationships I have adopted what I call the “Good to the Last Drop” principle. This means that I will stay with it until I have learned everything I possibly can from the relationship. For this reason, when I was dating, I was much more often the “dumpee” than the “dumper”, and I wore that as a badge of honor, because I was committed to staying in the kitchen, no matter how hot it got. Today, I have a partner who shares the same value that I do in this regard, and together we are able to bear the inevitable intensity of the process of building a life together.

No matter how willing you are to stay engaged in a relationship, there are still some telltale signs that you may need to bring it to an end:

The relationship is endangering your physical health. Clearly, if someone is physically abusing you, you should be seriously considering ending the relationship. But relationships can compromise our health in more subtle ways as well. Consider the person who is trying to get sober – it’s likely best for them to stop seeing their drinking buddies for quite some time. Also, a relationship with an overbearing boss or difficult client may be so stressful that it causes ulcers, heart problems or any of a myriad of other physical ailments.

The relationship has not responded to your attempts to improve it. If you’ve been steadily planning and executing interventions that have been aimed at improving the relationship, and learning as much as you can from each experiment that you make, and you still don’t see any improvement in the relationship, it may be time to move on.
You get a clear message from your body or soul that it’s time to move on. I’ll tell two stories here to illustrate what I mean. First, as a young man, I had just moved to Boston and was looking to make friends. I fell in with someone who immediately started buying me gifts and dinner and wanted to spend a lot of time with me. One night I had terrible nightmares about him. I knew from these dreams that this person was very bad for me and it would be dangerous for me to continue to see him. It was an unmistakable conviction that came from a very deep place inside me. I called him the next day and told him that I never wanted to see him again, and I have never regretted the decision.

Another time, it was my body that told me to end a relationship, this time, not with a person, but with a workplace. At a practical level, it made no sense for me to leave this job. Yet I became increasingly frozen in my role, and felt paralyzed whenever I tried to engage with it. Over time, I became the dictionary definition of “I just can’t,” and my mind’s protests that it was not the right time to leave my job was no match for my body’s knowledge that I could no longer continue. Eventually I had to humbly accept that my body knew something that I didn’t. Over time it became clearer to me that I had left at the right time and there would not have been any further learning or growth for me in continuing in that role.
Something better comes along. Sometimes, circumstances conspire to create an opportunity that is so evidently better than our current situation that we would be fools not to make a change that entails ending a relationship. I have seen people who, after diligently sweeping their own side of the street for a long period in therapy or coaching or some other context of personal development, grow to a higher level of self-respect and confidence. Serendipitously, at the same time the person finds a new job or romantic partner that is much better suited for them and where they are valued and respected at a higher level.

How to End a Relationship

That covers when the end a relationship, but what about how? Ending a relationship skillfully is challenging and there’s no single formula that applies. Still there are certain choice points and principles that you can attend to when you decide how to end a particular relationship:

Make time for good-byes. If at all possible, when ending a relationship, make sure there is a proper and respectful goodbye. It will make your own experience of the transition more graceful and make it easier for you to move forward in your life without this other person.
Make room for feelings. Even if this is a toxic relationship and you’re sure you’ll be well rid of the other person, your emotional reactions to the transition may still include sadness, anger, fear, and other difficult emotions. Opening to and being present with these emotions is going to serve you better than trying to deny and push them down.
Pace the Ending. You’ll need to consider how abruptly to end the relationship. In some circumstances, it’s appropriate to end a relationship very abruptly. Other times you’ll want to slowly taper off your interactions with the other person. Ideally these are choices you can make consciously with the other person, but you may not be able to. If you can tolerate a longer goodbye, it will allow you to learn more from the relationship, considering our “good to the last drop” principle.
How final is your decision? You have some decisions to make about any possible future with this person. Are there any circumstances in which you might consider resuming your relationship with this person? You might think of it as posing an initiatory challenge. What would the person need to do to demonstrate that they are ready to resume the relationship in a way that is healthy and productive for both of you? Getting to clarify about these questions can help you have the kind of ending that you want.
Mindfulness to the end. You may find yourself having the fantasy of really letting loose on the other person just as you say good-bye. This can be particularly true if you have been in a position of having to inhibit negative reactions towards them for a long period of time, and haven’t had any other opportunities to process those negative emotions. Listen to your better angels. If you burn your bridges or say something ugly as you’re leaving, you may live to regret it.
They’ll always be with you. It’s well known that people can “live rent free in our heads.” Even after saying goodbye, we’ll continue to relate to them, having imaginary conversations with them, or having our memories of them good and bad be triggered by any number of different associations. You may need to continue to practice serenity and study your relationship with them. Over time, and with mindful attention, these phantoms from the past will take up less bandwidth in your psyche and create less turmoil in your heart.

Ending a relationship is never easy. But if you’ve followed the “Good to the Last Drop” principle and you know it’s time to end it, attending to these principles should help.