saying goodbye to things you love

So, here’s the scene. Sunday night. Cooking myself dinner. Bison burgers, roasted sweet potatoes, and an arugula salad. Black Panther is playing, food is cooking. A chill, quarantined Sunday night. The only thoughts running through my head were things like, “what if I had a vibranium suit, that would be so cool, maybe I could be a superhero,” and, “I wonder what Michael B. Jordan ate to get so shredded?” Nothing consequential. 

I finished cooking and sat down to eat. I finished eating before the movie ended so I just stayed there to watch. I’ve seen Black Panther like ten times at this point so I was admittedly a little checked out. At some point though, my gaze moved toward the window and I looked outside to the azalea tree in front my house. The vibrant magenta blooms were covered in 7:30 pm Seattle summer golden hour. I’m convinced that Seattle summers are more beautiful than anywhere on earth, and this particular sunset was really showing off. I don’t know if it was the warm, orangey sunset, or the bright pink flowers, or just a whole host nostalgia, but I was suddenly overcome with this surge of emotion. I started crying out of nowhere. I realized in that moment how sad I was to be leaving Seattle. I realized that I am actually in fact, leaving. I guess it all just hit me. I started scrolling through the 15,000 + photos in my phone from the last four years and tears streamed down my face as I realized just how much life I’ve lived here. The memories are countless. The people are priceless. I’ve lived a whole lifetime of wonderful, challenging, invigorating moments in these last four years. I’ve been insecure, and in love, and heartbroken, and excited, and confident, and self-assured. I’ve changed more in the last four years than any other four years of my life. I mean I guess it makes sense. When I moved here, I was newly twenty-three and I’ll leave here freshly twenty-seven. Those are formative years, and I spent them all here, in a place that really has been in every meaning of the word, “home” for me. 

If you don’t know, next month, I am moving from Seattle, Washington to Los Angeles, California. I’m from LA originally, so I guess the move isn’t all that surprising, but it definitely surprised me. These past four years have been unequivocally the best, most fun, most exciting, heart-wrenching years of my life. It’s been bliss, but I would be retreating into fear if I stayed in Seattle any longer. I just know that it’s time, and that’s a hard thing to know. Knowing that I should go, doesn’t make leaving a single bit easier. I know that it’s right, and I’m not caught up in indecision, but I am sad. 

Leaving Seattle saddens me. Leaving Seattle frightens me. I know that it’s right, but the scared little girl in me wants to cling to every ounce of safe and familiar. 

I think the reason that saying goodbye to things is hard is because the future is so unknown. When we say goodbye to one thing, we’re saying hello to something else. But there are no guarantees of what that, “something else” may be. What if we don’t like that, “something else?” What then? And does the fear of what that “something else,” might be, keep us from finding out what it really is?

A while ago I wrote a letter to an ex-boyfriend and a great friend of mine. To date, it is my favorite letter I’ve ever written. We had decided to take some time to think about whether or not we should proceed in our relationship and I spent those two weeks praying, thinking, and crafting this letter. I think about these words often. I think it’s because, in retrospect, I wrote this letter from my purest heart. When my anxious mind has taken over, these words have helped me. And now, I’m sharing some of them with you, in hopes that they help you too. 

 So, I wrote this, “I was reading in Deuteronomy 1 and thinking about Moses and the Israelites. It talks about how afraid the Israelites were to enter into the land God had promised them for fear of what was on the other side. 

I think sometimes, I’ve held onto you because I really believed that we were supposed to be a part of each other’s futures. I think I believed it so much, and I became so attached to the idea of “us” that I was afraid to let you go. The truth is though, I never want to hold onto you in fear. I think I thought I was functioning in faith and really believing in what I felt like was the God dream for my life, but in all of it, I’ve allowed, and caused, and participated in things that were certainly not God’s best for me or for you. 

 And so, I think about the Israelites, wandering around in the wilderness for forty years, and they decide to send spies to scout out the land, and the spies return and declare that the land is, “good.” And of course, it’s good. All of God’s promises are so much better than anything we could build with our own hands or concoct in our own minds. 

But the Israelites were crippled with fear of what might come against them on the way into the promised land. They were so consumed with the things they thought they couldn't control or foresee that they wanted to just stay exactly where they were, in the wilderness. They thought of a thousand “what ifs,” to explain away their lack of faith. 

So, here’s me, putting to death all the “what ifs” in my mind and heart and deciding that the promise of God for you and for me, whatever that is, is so much better than walking around afraid in the wilderness. 

In verse 29 in the Message version Moses says to the Israelites, ‘I tried to relieve your fears: Don’t be terrified of them. God, your God is leading the way, He’s fighting for you. You saw with your own eyes what He did for you in Egypt; you saw what He did in the wilderness, how God, your God, carried you as a father carries his child, carried you the whole way until you arrived here. But now that you’re here, you won’t trust God, your God-this same God who goes ahead of you in your travels to scout out a place to pitch camp, a fire by night, and a cloud by day to show you the way to go.’

So now that I’m here, in a conversation I never wanted to have, I will choose to trust God. The same God that has carried me the whole way. The same God who saved us, the same God who has guided us to this very moment. The same God who is watching over all our words right now. The same God who is guarding our hearts and minds with His peace. That God, I choose to trust Him today. 

In 2 Corinthians 5:7 it says, ‘It’s what we trust in but don’t yet see that keeps us going.’

So today I choose to trust in Jesus. I choose to trust that His plan for my life and for yours is perfect and that He’s not going to let either of us miss it. I choose to trust that I’m on my way to heaven to spend eternity with Him, and so everything that happens here, is all just His gifts and goodness. I won’t hold on to anything but Heaven.”

I’m gonna do the cringiest thing a writer can, and quote and commentate on some of my own writing.

- “All of God’s promises are so much better than anything we could build with our own hands or concoct in our own minds.” 

 This. Your future doesn’t need your micromanaging, it needs your trust. Your trust in the fact that what God can do is a whole lot better than what you can try to do yourself. Don’t try your hardest to predict it. Life is supposed to surprise you. 

My best friend Kayleen and I used to walk along my favorite hidden dock in Seattle every summers eve. We would talk about our futures amid notebook-esque swampy trees and sparkling waters. I thought I would get engaged on that dock. I really believed I would live in Seattle for a long time. Well, it’s been two years since those sunset strolls and a year ago, I stood next to Kayleen as she married the love of her love. And now another year later I’ll soon be flying to Connecticut to meet her newborn baby. Next month I move to LA, I didn’t get engaged, and nothing has happened the way I thought. I’m a combination of excited and nervous for what’s to come, but I’m won’t stay here because I’m afraid of what might be out there. I’m saying goodbye to Seattle, but I’m saying hello to something else. 

So, my question is, what are you holding onto in fear? And, is it time to say goodbye to it?

- “They were so consumed with the things they thought they couldn't control or foresee that they wanted to just stay exactly where they were, in the wilderness. They thought of a thousand “what if’s” to explain away their lack of faith.”

What would you do if you weren’t afraid of the outcome? Where would you go if you trusted that the other side was full of wonderful things? 

What fears are holding you back?

There’s a cheesy romantic comedy I love called, “Letters to Juliet.” I won’t rehash the plot for you here, but at the end of the movie a letter from the main character is read aloud and it says this, “What” and “If" are two words as non-threatening as words can be. But put them together side-by-side and they have the power to haunt you for the rest of your life: What... if? What, if? What *if*...?”

There are a lot of “what if’s,” in my mind right now. What if I never find friends as good as the ones I have here in Seattle? What if I’m unhappy in LA? Oh God, what about LA dating culture? What will my career hold? What if I don’t want to start over?

But, what if, “the best is yet to come,” isn’t just a saying, what if it’s the truth? What if you knew something better was always on its way? Would you take that chance? Would you make that choice? Would say that thing? Would you do that thing that you’ve always wanted? Would you do something that really scares you? Would you bet on yourself? Would you choose your own life? 

There are better, “what ifs,” than the ones your worried mind fixates on. 

What if the best things you’ll ever experience were on the other side of a goodbye? 

- “I choose to trust that I’m on my way to heaven to spend eternity with Him, and so everything that happens here, is all just His gifts and goodness. I won’t hold on to anything but Heaven.”

What if life wasn’t all so cosmic? What if life was meant to be enjoyed? What if God made you to enjoy a good burger, a good beer, and a good laugh? 

What if at the end of your life you’d end up in heaven? Wouldn’t that make earth a little more fun? Wouldn’t it make everything less of a, “big deal?”

 Wouldn’t the guarantee of an eternity in heaven make your unknown future here on earth less daunting? 

It does for me. 

The reality is, the future is headed towards you wherever you choose to be. The future will find you in the familiar, just like it will find you in the unknown. Sometimes you may end up in conversations you never wanted to have. Most times things won’t pan out the way you thought. A full life is full of a lot of goodbyes. But goodbyes aren’t a bad thing. They aren’t something to avoid. I’m grateful that my goodbye is in some ways sorrowful, because what I’m saying goodbye to has been wonderful. Sometimes we have to say goodbye to things we love. Sometimes things we love have to say goodbye to us. 

I spent a fair amount of time researching the terms, “goodbye,” and “moving on.” Sometimes finding objective definitions helps me put to words my own feelings. I found that “goodbye,” is actually a derivative of, “farewell.” And I found this information on, “goodbyes.”  

 “Go well; originally applied to a person departing, but by custom now applied both to those who depart and those who remain. It expresses a kind wish, a wish of happiness to those who leave or those who are left.” 

So “goodbye,” isn’t just for the person leaving, it’s for those who stay.

 Sometimes we will have to say goodbye to things we love. Sometimes we will have to say goodbye to places we love. Sometimes we will have to say goodbye to people we love. And sometimes, things we love will have to say goodbye to us. “Goodbye,” isn’t the expression used to signify something ending. “Goodbye,” is a release. “Goodbye,” means you release yourself to go, and others send you on your way. Saying goodbye to things you love is hard, but they’re saying goodbye to us too. And that sense that you aren’t “leaving,” but being wished well on your way, it makes that whole “goodbye,” thing a whole lot more bearable. 

So, to Seattle, this is goodbye. I love you a lot, and I’m sure I’ll see you soon. 

 And to you, on the other end of this page, I hope you get to say goodbye to a lot of great things in your life and I hope there are always better hello’s waiting for you.