Letting Go Isn’t Giving Up

There’s a line I crossed this week—not out of anger, but out of clarity.

I stepped away from someone I deeply care about. Someone I’ve tried to help. Someone I’ve loved enough to hurt for.

She’s in self-destruction mode. Every time something good rises in her life, she tears it down before it can take root. I don’t fully understand it, but I’ve come to see it’s more than behavior—it’s a pattern. A belief system. A reflex born out of pain.

I’ve watched her repeat it. I’ve stood by, hoping this time would be different. I’ve given, listened, prayed, and showed up. But nothing changed—except the weight I kept carrying.

A man I respected once told me, “You have to do the hard things quickly, because you’re going to do them eventually.”

I didn’t do it quickly. I did it after hope got stretched thin.
But I did it.

I let go.

Not in bitterness. Not in spite.
But in love—and in truth.

Because love that enables destruction isn’t love. It’s codependence with a halo.

And I realized that staying close, trying to help, was only keeping her from hitting the ground hard enough to want to rise.

So I stepped back.

I’m not her fixer. I’m not her shield. I’m not her source.
That’s God’s role—and I’ve been in His way for too long.

Letting go doesn’t mean I’ve stopped caring.
It means I finally care enough to say: I won’t be part of this cycle anymore.

She may find someone else to lean on.
Maybe that’s her next chapter.

But if she ever chooses healing over habit, I’ll still be rooting for her.
Just from a healthier distance.

Because the truth is—some people will never change until everyone stops helping them stay the same.

And maybe that’s what grace looks like here:
Not holding on, but letting go.

Ecclesiastes 3:1–8 (NIV)

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,

     a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,

a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.