Why acting as if we’d never met was the best way for me to move on from toxic relationships

I write a lot about connection, the small moments that build trust, the pause before a hard conversation, the value of really seeing someone. Most posts, that's the whole story: connection is the goal.

This blog post is about the opposite. It's about the handful of people I've deliberately, permanently let go of — and why I think that's part of the same work.

I can count them on one hand. A controlling friend from college. A rage-filled neighbor. A questionable business partner. A fall out with an extended family member I never really got along with. People in my life that something happened that broke the relationship. I felt they treated me badly and often enough that for a time, I carried real hate for them. I replayed the hurt. I rehearsed the comeback I never got to deliver. I wanted them to see what they'd done, to change, to somehow become people who hadn't hurt me.

None of that ever happened. It was never going to.

At some point I realized something uncomfortable: I wasn't punishing them anymore. I was punishing myself. Most had moved on with their lives, while others seemed like they didn't. Whatever they were feeling — I just know I was still carrying it.

So, I changed the goal. Not reconciliation with these particular people, there's no capacity for that. If there had been, I would have taken it. Instead, I decided to treat it as if we'd never met. Not coldness, and not more anger dressed up as boundaries. The same neutral goodwill I'd offer a total stranger: I hope your life goes well, and I owe you nothing more than that.

It sounds like a small shift. But it didn't feel small. The frustration, and sometimes hate, I'd been carrying — knowing there would never be a reconciliation with someone I once had a relationship with — just wasn't there anymore. I stopped needing anything from the relationship. Not an apology. Not a reckoning. Not even a resolution. Just release.

If you want to apply that to your own life, here are some suggested actions to take:

• Stop rehearsing the conversations you'll never have. When you catch yourself replaying the things they did to you for the 100th time, wishing they would finally understand what they did to hurt you, just stop. Gently redirect your attention. You don't have to solve the past with this person anymore.

• Decide what distance looks like for you. This could not only ignoring an extended family member if you see them at a big event (holidays, wedding, funerals) but also not talking about them when others bring that person's name up to you. Maybe it's blocking them from your social media or declining small events that they might show up at. Do what feels best to you.

• Accept that you most likely will never receive the apology you have been wanting to hear. Better to move on and accept what happened. Leave the hurt in the past.

• Put the energy you used to hate or truly dislike this person into other more positive relationships. Invest in connections with people you can trust and have mutual respect.

There's research behind why this is so hard to do, and why it matters when we manage it. Holding onto resentment keeps the body in a low-grade stress response — and letting go of it, even without any reconciliation, is linked to better communication and higher satisfaction in other relationships, the ones you're actually still building. Forgiveness, researchers are careful to point out, is not the same thing as reconciliation. Reconciliation takes two people to rebuild trust. Release only takes one person and that can be you.

I used to think connection was the whole point of what I teach and believe. I still think that's mostly true. But I've learned the other half of it: not every relationship is meant to be kept, fixed, or forgiven in the traditional sense. Sometimes the most connected thing you can do is let one go completely — and give yourself back the headspace it was taking up.

If you want to try this yourself

Think of one relationship you're still carrying anger about. One with no realistic path to reconciliation. You don't have to forgive it, and you don't have to forget it. Just try writing down, in a sentence or two, what neutral goodwill toward that person would actually sound like. Not "I forgive you." Not "I hope you get what's coming to you." Something closer to: I hope your life goes well. I owe you nothing more than that. You may not feel it right away. I didn't. But naming it is often the first step toward actually releasing what you've been carrying.

Want a gentle next step? Letting go of what drains us makes room for the relationships that help us flourish. My free Fall Connection Check-In has 11 small ways to nurture the connections that matter, plus a nudge to set the boundaries we need. Get your worksheet here.