We spend our lifetime pretty much with the same people without unconsciously stopping to think whether the people we share our lives with are right for us. We assume they are without giving it a second’s thought.

It often takes a disagreement for us to recognise that the person we thought we knew, isn’t the person we’ve come to know. Moving on from people and situations takes guts, because they’re whom we've known. We’re comforted by what’s familiar, even if the familiar doesn’t always turn out to be right.

It's what we know but it’s not where we want or need to be. Sometimes life is about making different choices to move on. When would it be the right time for us to move on?

When the signs become obvious and we seem to be backing a one-horse pony. When we're becoming more and more disillusioned. Emotionally we’re beginning to struggle and we have no support coming in from those we thought we had support from. When we have a sense, a feeling about someone or something, it's definitely the right time for us to move on.

It’s a fact not all people will have our backs. The exceptions to the rule are our children of course, but generally speaking when we build our lives around people we may come away disappointed. It’s good to have people around us of course, life would be difficult without, but we must all work from the same page. Where we think we are, we sometimes find we're not.

We hold on because we fear letting go, because to let go brings uncertainty. I would rather have lived with uncertainty, than continue to hold on to people that weren’t right for me. We must be ready to introduce new changes if we feel the need and it’s right for us.

Ilana Estelle is a mental health and wellbeing advocate who combines educational insight with her personal experience of living with physical, mental, and emotional disabilities. She holds diplomas in Counselling, Diet and Nutrition, Nutritional Therapy, Psychotherapy and Counselling, and Stress Management. Through her writing, Ilana supports others in navigating their emotional, mental, and physical health challenges. In addition to writing for The CP Diary, her work has appeared in healthy lifestyle magazines. Ilana is also the author of three books: Cerebral Palsy: A Story – Finding the Calm After the Storm, Spirituality, Healing and Me, and Survival: The Covid Years – Time for Change.

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6 comments on “When it's time to move on”

  1. I believe that in most part I have moved on from my family. The person I have more communication with is my mom.

    My dad is stuck in his world of alcoholism and his old fashioned ways. Since seeing him in the state he is in, always causes me stress and it's difficult holding a conversation with him. I rarely visit with him.

    The same goes for my siblings. I was never close to them and it's still the same. Since they never have taken the time to come to know me and understand what I go through while living with CP, I decided to move on.

    1. Thanks Maria. I can resonate with your response totally, because until the age of 46 I didn't know I had CP. Even as a child my physical problems weren't aired or talked about, just brushed under the carpet, so I know how you feel.

      Even if our family's couldn't help us, a 'how are you feeling' and an 'I understand' wouldn't have gone amiss. Perhaps as time has moved on, families now do things differently.

      We cannot change what happened to us, but we can change life for ourselves and our own families, so that we do things better. It's good that you have moved on.

  2. There is something inside of us that tells us when it's time to move on; we feel it, we see it, we know precisely when we've had enough.

    It's okay to let go, move on and challenge life.

    1. Thanks Tim. Yes it's okay to let go. The problem we have is when we're too scared to let go, so we choose to hold on.

      Moving on is a challenge in itself; but one that's worth embracing if we are turn to turn our lives around.

  3. Things happen. Things come up in people's lives that have to be dealt with and time seems to fly by us.

    We get so busy with our lives, we tend to let go of relationships when we don't have much time to spare, but that doesn't mean the relationship should end.

    My best friend and I have a great relationship even though we go for weeks or months even, without communicating. When we do get a chance to talk we pick up where we left off.

    1. Thanks Lisa. It's lovely when are able to pick up the pieces and tap into our friend's lives like that, but for some of us that's not always an option open to us.

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