Have you ever had good friends or family members walk out of your life?

I have. Sometimes the transition is understandable, and sometimes I'm left feeling hurt and confused. Over the last few years I've attempted to reconnect with various friends that I respect and care about who had vanished from my circle.

During the process, I've had many good and hard conversations, but in it all, I think I'm realizing this truth: There is a difference between reconciliation and closure.

I've always viewed reconciliation as a process of reconnecting with someone to work through hurt or conflict for the purpose of continuing on with that relationship. But closure has felt much different.

Closure has been good for me. It's allowed me to process grief and confusion for myself and has allowed the Holy Spirit to work peace inside me. If I could describe what closure is, it would be the action of reconnecting with someone to process and clarify each person's heart and really, walk away from the relationship with healing.

I choose the term "walkaway" instead of "ending" because walking away means I'm investing my time, effort and energy into other relationships, not ending or "killing" the relationship per say.

Why closure and not reconciliation?

Why are there some situations where I lean more toward closure vs reconciliation? Because there are some friends I love and care for deeply, but in reality we're all in different seasons of our lives.

Some people have moved away, gotten different jobs, attend different churches, deleted their social media, etc. These seasons may not even indicate that there's any conflict in our relationship - it's really just complications that make walking away necessary.

In some relationships (if I had to be perfectly honest with you) there are some people that I just don't want to associate with anymore. That sounds so harsh, and maybe it is. But who you surround yourself with heavily influences who you become.

Some people I've realized are extremely angry at life, and honestly I don't want to spend all my time with an angry person. Some people are extremely victim-minded, high-maintenance or self-centered. In these cases, I need to walk away. I love them and have no reason to speak ill of them to others, but for my own sake I need to remove them from my circle of influence.

And in some relationships, the person needs to walk away from me. As hard as it might be to admit, sometimes I'm not the best person to be a good friend to someone in their season of life. There have been some folks who I've hurt or offended.
I've apologized for actions I've taken in the past and have empathized and been remorseful for the pain I've caused a friend, but ultimately that's all I can do.

Stay open but prioritize your relationships

Reconciliation is always worth attempting, but it's never guaranteed because it requires the other person's cooperation. And some relationships probably aren't best to reconcile if they're more harmful than healthy.

But closure is something we all can achieve. Closure has helped me grieve the loss of what used to be and be hopeful for the future.

I think for me, closure is being open too.

It's not avoiding opportunities to connect with people from the past when it's a good thing. But I don't feel like I need to prioritize staying in touch with folks.