When is it time to move on?

Lately, I have been calmly debating another life decision. I have often been grappled by the decision of whether or not to move on. Who hasn’t? right? There have been many times when I moved on too quickly and have scurried back, frantically trying and reverse my decision. Other times, it felt just right and I am glad I made the decision to cut bait. To properly move on from something in life is really an art form. It takes a sufficient amount of self awareness and impressive discipline. If we move on and do not have enough self-awareness, we tend to regret our decision. If we do not have enough discipline, we tend to move on in haste and we end up with an undesirable and destructive outcome.

As with everything in our lives, we need to strike a balance between discipline and self-awareness in order to properly move on from an era of our life. Once that balance is achieved, moving on just feels right even though at the time you know that by moving on, it will hurt and the result will likely sting. But what growth was ever achieved without a little pain? If moving on from a space in your life was easy and painless, then you had probably waited too long. You never really grew from the experience and at some point you had probably tarnished your legacy by holding on. If done properly, there is no “right time”, the only time is now.

So as I stand at yet another crossroad in my life, I know I cannot stand too long. Wisdom has taught me that by standing still, I have in effect chosen what road to choose. Far too many times in my life I have chosen the easy way, electing to wait for that perfect time to move on; but it never came. I had spent way too much time asking “when is it time to move on?” and far less time asking myself “what are you waiting for?”.