The man in the last advice post left his lover of two years without explanation. I called him an “empty vessel”. Several people posted to disagree with me. That’s fine. I appreciate diverse opinions. But since so many argued for this man, I thought I’d explain my thinking.
If you are in a long-standing intimate love relationship and you want to leave it for any reason whatsoever, that’s fine. It’s your life. But I feel it’s common decency to face the person who has been your lover and tell them something.
This is a person who has loved and cared for you, and shared their body with you. If you can walk away without so much as a word, to leave them high and dry, wondering and traumatized… well as far as I am concerned this is a soulless thing to do. It’s horrible. It’s horrific. It’s shameful. It’s putrid.
When your heart is wired to your soul or to yourself or however you want to say it… well you just don’t do this to another human being, especially someone you love, who has loved you so deeply. “I’m going to just quit calling and he’ll figure it out…” There is no way a whole person with their heart functioning could or would do this to another human being.
Oh! And being gay, is no excuse. If anything this should increase sensitivity to the partner’s feelings. Like this man who got left doesn’t have enough to deal with! Sorry, man. There is no excuse for being a worm.
Have you ever dumped or been dumped in this manner? Where is your Venus?
I’m 300% with you on this one, Elsa.
I voted NO! If you’re still attached at the umbilical cord then perhaps it’s best for everyone who is not that you stay in (or near) the womb.
There is no excuse for abusing a partner psychologically. It’s just plain cruel and irresponsible.
I think the term is aptly applied in such a situation. I do not sense that Elsa is trying to malign his character (he has none) or point fingers. She is just stating the obvious. At least that is how I took it.
Black and white answers are comforting but we’ve all been violator and victim at one point or another. The reality is that sometimes people are in bad situations and wind up making things worse. It happens. I’m not saying that its right or it excuses it, but it DOES mean that everyone deserves some understanding and forgiveness.
Marc, there is nothing to forgive because the guy is not apologizing! He can make it right. He can toss and turn at night, pick up the phone, or get in his car, drive over and do something. But as long as he holds this line… as far as I’m concerned, he’s a Ghost Ship. It’s not that complicate. The 12-steppers call it “making amends”.
“I’m sorry, man. What I did? I shouldn’t have done it.”
That goes a long way. And at that point, understanding and forgiveness becomes possible. And how is he supposed to understand? He has no idea idea what happened so there is nothing to understand!
“I was in a bad situation and I made it even worse when I hurt you….”
That’s a soul talkin’…
I definitely understand where everyone is coming from. I’ve had someone I care about leave me and never really give me the answers I so desperately needed. At the end of the day, the truth is that I never really needed them. Forgiveness isn’t about understanding or about making amends — waiting for those simply chain you to your pain. Forgiveness becomes possible when you’re willing to forgive. Forgiveness is the Amish families who forgave the man who just shot their schoolchildren. There was no understanding, no atonement, just forgiveness. That is REALLY the soul talking because it understands that we all have wronged and all have been wronged, and that is the true essense of love.
That’s fine, Marc, but it doesn’t give this guy a soul, does it? It’s the Amish who have the soul.
“Marc, there is nothing to forgive because the guy is not apologizing”
Hmmmm. Reminds me of a conversation I had with my sister a couple of months ago about someone very close to me. You see I injured this person with my big mouth so he injured me with his big hands. We parted company with him in cuffs.
It was sad, very sad all around. 13 years later I was afforded an opportunity to make amends for my behavior and I did. I apologized and asked for forgiveness. He said that he had already and that was the end of the conversation.
I told my sister the conversation and said that I felt a lot better by apologizing, but, what I found strange was that he never apologized for physically attacking me. I said, “Oh well, I forgive him anyway”, and she very astutely reminded me that that was not possible as he did not ASK for my forgiveness. I was blown away! She was right!
There is nothing to forgive because “empty vessel” did not ask for it.
Profound!
We’re all trying to live up to the goodness of our souls, Elsa. A lot of the time we fall short of that. We’ve all made the easy choice instead of the right choice or hurt someone else. We’ve all been hurt by another. We all have need to forgive and be forgiven. All the more reason we need to practice compassion and forgiveness for ourselves and others. You cannot judge another without judging yourself.
I respectfully disagree, Jamie. As long as you’re waiting for someone to “ask” for your forgiveness, you haven’t fully forgiven them. That’s the difference between atonement and forgiveness… the gap between karma and grace.
How fun your options Elsa! I have a sun-libra: and I really can’t to decide. Here are my reasons: Although I think every person deserves a word, before a goodbye. However sometimes You are surprised as Petrus the apostle with the third song of the rooster. That occured to me this december 31 asking a ex-lover “Who are you?” Faced to myself and my own cruelty, I can’t blame to anyone.
There are a song of Jose Feliciano that my ex and I enojeyed the same, that songs tells “To say goodby, my dear life, I just have to say good by”
Hm, well, I have libra and can’t decide between those options.
Most of the people that write to you, elsa, are pretty much lost on me. “Abandoned” really hit home, as I’ve been in a very similar situation before. I have nothing “nice” to say about people who can’t make one single phone call or write a letter or tell others SOMEHOW that they want to break up. When you find yourself at the end of a relationhip, it’s nice to actually know that fact instead of continuing to love and need someone who doesn’t love you even enough to say goodbye. The excuses of being in the closet or not having time or being scared or whatever it is people think up in defense is just selfishness. There is absolutely no excuse. If you want to end a love relationship you’re in, fucking say so.
NO! Never. This has happened to me and I can tell you it ranks among, probably is, the worst experience of my life. I felt dead. So if anyone is contemplating doing this, please re-think it.
The funny thing is, the people that do this usually come and seek the person they left out, whether it be months of years later. And they are the same, sad sack of a person. Pathetic, really. They are essentially big fat cowards.
I totally agree with you Elsa !!!!!!!!!
I lived a similar situation, a man walked away from me (we didnt live in the same country when this happened – we knew each other for 1 year and each one of us was working for 2 months in each other country so we could save some money to make a work reality come true for both of us in a third country), only with a simple mobile phone message saying that he couldnt travel with me no more.
It hurt like hell and i felt like shirt, someone that i trusted betrayed me (my moon is in scorpio, so it was a very deep pain).
Few months after i saw him in the street (in another country, not the country that we would go travel together to) with another woman and he pretended that he didnt see me. I was alone and it was nigth, i just walked away from them feeling like i was dying inside.
I wanted so
I just want say another thing.
I was hurt because he abandoned me but i was DEEPLY hurt because i didnt understand why he did that.
He was coward and just disconnected his mobile phone – i couldnt reach him in any way i could. He didnt gave me any explanation.
For me, forgiveness and apologies don’t necessarily go hand on hand. I have forgiven people for shit they have done to me and haven’t apologized for simply because I find it easy to.
I am an apologizer. It does go a long way, that’s for dang sure.
This guy doesn’t sound souless to me. He sounds like a person who has made some shitty decisions. From a philosophical stand point, it seems like if he did the right thing, everyone would go: “Okay! Now he has a soul.”
And I totally agree with you, Marc. Coming out is fucking seriously hard business and I think the guy has taken leave of his senses.
And it’s only January 10th! Like, maybe the guy has something to say and will say it soon.
Great topic here.. Personally I feel he can forgive the dude whether or not he asked for it. Forgiveness is for yourself, not the other person.
Empty vessel? Maybe.. doesnt really matter. This guy needs to forgive and move on.
So far we’re all talking about functional relationships here.
What about someone who has been in a dysfunctional relationship a long time, “sobers up,” and leaves the still-dysfunctional partner without notice? What about a battered woman, whose life may be in danger if she announces her intention to leave? I think, in both of these cases, a person can leave without warning and still be “whole and connected.”
I left my violent ex “without warning” as you describe above, SaDiablo. Although if he’d ever thought of me instead of himself he’d have seen the “warnings” in the discussions I tried to initiate (where his aggression would end it pretty fast) and my misery and loss of interest in friends and activities (this didn’t concern him of course, but rather suited him as I was less and less involved with the outside world).
So I left “without warning” and I only wish I’d done it sooner!!
It could be that the man has a soul but lacks maturity. They both are in their early 20s. Explaining feelings is difficult, impossible if you aren’t in touch with yourself. And few people are at 22. I know I wasn’t. It sounds like loverboy’s parents are rigid folk who didn’t allow a lot of room for him to be himself growing up.
I say this not to excuse his behavior, it was very hurtful. But to call this man soulless sounds to me a tad harsh. Maybe he is, maybe he isn’t. I do think it’s fair to say he’s emotionally very wounded though.
“I told my sister the conversation and said that I felt a lot better by apologizing, but, what I found strange was that he never apologized for physically attacking me.”
That’s not strange at all, Jamie. I was in a similar situation a year ago. I said something mean, someone else said something meaner that pushed me over the edge and I tried to kill myself. I apologized. He never did. Why? Bc that would mean that he’d have to take responsibility for having done wrong and he wasn’t willing to do that. By not apologizing, he could still live with the fiction that I was the only in the wrong. See how that works?
I thought the same thing that SaDiablo did when I read the question. I couldn’t answer it globally on that account bc I’ve been in abusive relationships where my partner has insisted on getting “an answer”. To him “an answer” was only admissible if it meant that I would stay with him regardless of his behavior toward me. Or “an answer” was a way for him to manipulate me to come back. And, at first, I felt horrible for leaving without giving my abusive partners “closure” until I realized that this was part of their abuse and manipulation. When I understood that, I became whole, not the other way around. I am not saying that this was the case with the letter in question. That sounds like it was more a matter of immaturity and family pressure but the way that the question was worded certainly did not afford much nuance.
I agree with Marc and Molly that calling an immature person “an empty soulless vessel” is harsh. As to the forgiveness issue, well, I think that’s a bit more complicated.
I keep thinking about the whole “forgiveness” thing and it gets my goat. It really does. Bc someone does something bad to you and people automatically pipe up: Forgive! Be the bigger person! Etc.
And while holding grudges is definitely unhealthy and unseemly, etc., automatic forgiveness seems wrong to me somehow. I think the implied message the victim gets is: “Forget your pain, stat! What the other person did was not so bad/is understandable/put yourself in his shoes, etc.” I do believe in being compassionate. I do. But I don’t know if this automatic injunction to forgive right away is really serving anyone. I think it gets people to discount some of their pain instead of processing it, feeling it, owning it and then letting it go. I don’t think it serves the wrongdoer either. What does it teach someone if he’s constantly doing people wrong and people let him off the hook? That he can do whatever he wants! That it’s okay to be weak bc others will be stronger and more compassionate! That he doesn’t have to face the pain that he caused someone! How is that serving that person? It’s just going to keep the wrongdoer in a rut; he’s not going to grow as a person. Is that spiritual? I don’t think so.
I do believe that the victim has to let any grudges go but “automatic forgiveness”? I say no, not necessarily. Nor can I tell someone when it’s a good time to forgive bc the wrong wasn’t done to me. It’s like a wound, for some people it might take a couple of days for that wound to heal and for others it might take a week. I can’t scream at the wound: Heal already! It’s time! It will happen in its own good time and everybody has to honor the process (unless it’s taking too long, in which case it’s time to take out the big antibiotics, etc.) And I think that psychic healing is the same way, you know? As human beings, we don’t have very clear notions about how people heal psychologically.
Marly I am so glad you got out of there! ::good vibes::
I’m reminded of a strange incident I witnessed years ago. I was in an elevator with 2 women, and one had a heart attack. I went into first aid mode, the 2nd woman froze. Like, the elevator sailed up and down the bay for minutes while she watched me try and help this other woman. It wasn’t until I started giving the 2nd woman instructions (pull the alarm, take us back to the lobby, prop open the doors, get security who will call an ambulance, etc etc) that she started to move. She was like a goddamn statue!
She thought I was so together. She was waiting for my cues! Funny how that works. Anyway, retelling the story, most of my friends thought the 2nd woman was a numbskull. I knew she was a ‘freezer.’ She literally stopped functioning at the sight of the crash.
And people do this in relationships, too. It seems to me this man froze at the sight of the ‘crash’ and and the first sign of some true adversity and I hope for all concerned he learns some coping skills because his life will be very painful until he does.
Oh My Goodness! No it is not harsh at all to call someone souless. It would be the same as calling me faithless if I cheated, or blonde, or skinny (which I am)….it is a state of being or condition at present. It does not imply one “is” for all eternity. Conditions change and, for some, growth occurs enabling them to move on to another state of being.
It is what it is. You have to earn that status I think.
I do agree about the forgiving being more for ourselves than for the other person because it helps one to move on. That being said I also totally agree with Marly. A person who does not ask for forgiveness (or apologize) feels justified in their behavior, and, feels no remorse. I keep my distance from such people because, frankly, they scare me.
I suppose we could all go ’round and ’round about this subject….and we are.LOL!
It’s been a debate I’ve enjoyed.
Thanks, Kashmiri. Yeah, it took me a long while to get out of there. It’s hard for me to move. I can totally see what you’re saying about some people being “freezers”–good on you that you noticed and helped her be useful.
Jamie: I guess it depends on how you think of soul. Soulless to me is someone who is beyond recall. I don’t think of soulless as a temporary condition at all. Quite the opposite. Unless you mean “soulless” the way jazz musicians do. I know, I’m very anal when it comes to words but I think it’s important to be exact.
“Forgiveness isn’t about understanding or about making amends – waiting for those simply chain you to your pain. Forgiveness becomes possible when you’re willing to forgive. Forgiveness is the Amish families who forgave the man who just shot their schoolchildren. There was no understanding, no atonement, just forgiveness. That is REALLY the soul talking because it understands that we all have wronged and all have been wronged, and that is the true essense of love.”
I’m with Marc on this.
This person needs to deal with the pain on their own. If the other person owns up to what they did, fine, but healing the pain belongs with the person who wrote in about it. It’s not easy, it will take time, and it would be nice to know why… but still it’s up to the author to heal the pain.
My Mother had a long, lingering, illness and before she died she refused to talk to me. She turned her head to the wall and stopped speaking. For nine days I sat by her side, I talked to her, and she said nothing. It hurt like hell but I made the choice to forgive her. What the guy who wrote in has been through isn’t the same, but it is similar – someone’s turned his back on him and is refusing to communicate. There’s not a damn thing to be done. Live in pain or learn to forgive the actions which cause it.
“It could be that the man has a soul but lacks maturity. They both are in their early 20s.”
I think Molly is right – we all have a soul but not everyone knows how to live with it.
You know, when my stepfather used to abuse my sister and me, we’d be traumatized, yes? He’d corner us against the wall so that we had nowhere to go. He’d put his face really close to ours, poke us in the chest with his index finger and rant. He’d call us lazy bitches, asshole queens, cockteases, sick in the head, etc. (This all started when we were 7 and 9.) If we tried to defend ourselves or explain, he’d just hiss that we were liars. When he’d said enough, he’d leave in a huff. Then my mother would come around to us, smooth our hair, and in the softest sweetest voice, she’d EXPLAIN where he was coming from and urge us to forgive. We wanted to be good girls. My sister wanted to be good even after he’d fling her against the wall (she got the brunt of the physical abuse and she was really skinny and small, btw, so she was a pretty light projectile. Oh, yes, she could really fly far and hit that wall HARD.)
I grew up. I thought I had forgiven. I thought I had forgotten and moved on. My sister didn’t. She refused to talk to him for years. I said I wasn’t going to hold it against him. I couldn’t understand why my sister wouldn’t be the bigger person and just let it go. “That all happened so long ago!” And I didn’t think I was in pain. But that was not true forgiveness bc I wasn’t aware of the pain he caused. I didn’t think I had a right to feel pain, you see, because if I was good, truly good, I would not acknowledge that someone hurt me (that would make him feel bad and that’s wrong, right?) I would just forgive, whether someone deserved it or not. Why make such a big deal out of it?
It didn’t help me heal. I just turned my back on the pain but it was still there and whitewashing it cause me nothing but trouble. Now, I’m not expecting my stepfather (or my mother bc she was an accomplice in her own gentle way) to ask for forgiveness. When he calls, I talk to him. I talk to my mother. I can laugh with her. I care for her, I worry, I don’t want anything to happen to her. But until I face the pain of what really happened to my sister and me, forgiveness is not truly possible. Trust me, I would much rather just close the door behind all those bad memories and begin anew. But I know from experience that I have to acknowledge the huge loss and wounds that he caused bc I matter as a human being. It’s not just his soul that matters, mine does too. And if he asks me if he did me wrong, I can’t lie. I have to say yes. I don’t have to be abusive about it but I have to respect him enough as a person to tell him the truth.
I know that he himself came from an abusive background but he didn’t deal with the pain and he reenacted it. Oh, he believes he’s forgiven his father. And I believe that’s why the cycle continued. If he had stood up and said, What you did was wrong, maybe my stepfather would’ve been able to acknowledge that his father caused him pain and that he himself was in danger of causing others pain as well.
So these are my thoughts on forgiveness. I don’t say not to forgive. But I think it’s a process that’s a lot deeper and more complicated than all that. It takes a lot of work. And admitting that someone caused you pain IS a form of love.
I have Libra, but I decided on No.
Marly,
What you wrote touched my heart.
Forgiveness is the most rewarding and sometimes difficult process that a soul can achieve. I believe in Karmic astrology and i believe that each one, before we are born, choose the parents we are going to have and the experiences that we are going to live in childhood in order for our soul to grow.
Sometimes these experiences can be very very hard, but all of them are a learning experience
We’re not getting the story of the other half (aka “empty vessel”). I really don’t like to judge witouth earing the other guy’s side of the story.
In fact, I don’t like to judge (and many times I do just by focusing on the person’s actions) – but it still feels wrong, you know.
How many times have I walked in that guy’s shoes? And even if I would have a similar human story (which I don’t) I still don’t have that person’s soul living in me. You know?
Sometimes, imo, it feels that we’re jumping to conclusions even if the facts speek louder than words.
In this situation I don’t wanna judge.
I didn’t feel like any of the options were correct for me. I actually feel sorry for both of the them. I can truly feel for Abandoned and wish him much love. The “empty vessel” to me has betrayed and abandoned himself as well by choosing fear over love. I know he is young, but he should not have told Abandoned that he would call and then not. Forgivness is up to Abandoned when and if he feels like it. I wouldn’t confront the empty vessel though. If someone wants to go…you just have to let them go.
I’ve been thru this. So i know how it feels. It feels like you’re dead.
Its taken me a long time to recover so I can wholly relate to this article.
Grace is important. Whether you’re in a relationship, or are ending it.
It’s impossible to talk in absolutes. I was dumped high and dry once and have never understood why he couldn’t at least talk to me.
I left my ex-husband, with our son in tow, without a word. I don’t doubt for a second that the situation would have ended violently if I had tried to be upfront. He had threatened us with a butcher’s knife 36 hours before I was able to get us out.
stacey, you’re right. When someone is hitting you, that’s a deal-breaker.
When someone does something like this, it makes it so much harder for the other person to find closure… if not impossible. If you really want a ‘clean’ break and truly want to ‘move’ on, then there needs to be some kind of communication, otherwise that other person is going to be ‘connected’ and you’ll never really be free.
Hi Elsa,
I agree with you here.
I have done this to a man I was in a relationship with for about a year. The last few months of the relationship I felt powerless, and addicted to this man, in equal measure. Constant drama, constant break-ups and make-ups and the only way I could survive at that time was to walk away, change my mobile number, avoid email and anything to do with him. He did try to contact me in numerous ways for weeks after but I felt it was because he was more mad at me for walking away, than because of sadness at the loss of the relationship itself. It is still unfinished business all these years later however, and I wish at that time, that I had the strengh of spirit to look him in the eye and say this is over. I do admit that it was a cowardly way of doing things, we did have a great relationship for the first six months, and no-one deserved being cut off like that. I would never do it again, when your strength returns you feel compassion, but it’s too late then.
Thanks,
DeeC
I was in a relationship for 4 years, 3 of them living together and we have a 2 year old daughter. At the beginning of October he up and left with no warning, nothing. He moved back in with his mother and left me to deal completely alone. One week later he was already out trying to date.
It’s a horrible horrible thing to do someone you shared so much of your life with. I can’t decide yet if it’s the cowards way out or just plain ‘ole cruel. I can tell you tho, being on the receiving end of this is a nightmare that I wouldn’t wish upon my worst enemy.
Having the last 4 years of your life completely negated pretty much, and left with no answers whatsoever, well, thankfully I believe in karma! Talk about dark night of the soul, its been a dark month for me!
(Hows that for a Venus retrograde story!)
I have done this and had it done to me, but only very early on in a relationship when there’s no formal commitment yet. If there’s a formal commitment, this is crazy and cruel. My venus is in virgo.
(((ethereal soul))) thats bloody horrible…
Geez, this thread is old, but boy am I glad it got recycled. It addresses the deep-seated nagging guilt I’ve had with leaving an old childhood friend in a similar fashion. Someone who was more like a sister actually. I love the simple apology, Elsa. I’ve never been able to find the words.
{{etherealsoul}} I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy.
I think you need to say something, yes, but I don’t know that you owe an explanation beyond, “I don’t want to be with you any more.” Because, really, that’s the entire explanation right there. As a friend of mine said, after spending hours and hours on the phone with an ex trying to “explain” her dumping of him, “Isn’t it enough that I just don’t want to be with you anymore? Don’t you think you should be with someone who does?”
This happened to me, but my e and I were together for NINE years, living together.
Decided it may be best to take a break for two weeks — NEVER HEARD FROM HIM.
He literally dropped my things off at my friend’s house (when she wasn’t there) like 6 months later.
Never heard a peep from him since, and it;s been 4 years.
Once the initial shock and mourning passed, thinking back, it was one of the BEST thing to happen to me, though.
I am so happy right now 🙂
NOnono! I would never do this to someone I love! It would leave a huge scar on them, wondering what happened and probably they would think that its only their fault. Its not fair!!!
Venus Scorp.
Unfortunately, If anything, I stay in something too long until I’ve exhausted all possibilities that it cannot work. I have had this done to me, but after about 3-4 months, not 2 years, that’s cruel.
(venus sag)
No! & that’s all there is to it.
I did this to someone once. My first husband. He left for a convention one weekend, and when he came home I was gone. Was the relationship abusive, NO, where there problems, OH YEAH. I was so cut off from my own emotions that I couldn’t bring them to the surface. I truly thought that he would be better off without me, and instead of it letting it get to a hideous angry stage, I just left. 31 years latter, I picked up the phone and said, I am sorry, I owe you an apology and I will answer any questions have. I also understand if you hang up the phone right now, and I also understand if you can not forgive me.
I thought a clean cut would be the best, but my assholeness ate at me for all those years, and with the help of my therapist she gave me the strength to account for and to face up to my actions all those years ago that where still affecting me thus far.
Guilty as charged and not proud of it either. Won’t make that mistake twice.
The “figure it out for yourself” silent dump is how I’ve been dumped almost every single time. I considered myself lucky that my fiance of two years dumped me via e-mail because at least he fucking TOLD ME. I had to figure out one dumping by calling the guy from my work number (he answered his phone), hanging up, and then immediately calling him from my usual number (guess what he didn’t do).
Yeah, I think I’d agree with “has no soul” or “is a total asshole” for people who pull that shit after you’ve been with someone for a long time. Clearly I’m such a horrible person that I deserve that kind of treatment, I guess? Gee, thanks.
I was dumped in this way. We had a stellium in Pisces/12th House for our composite chart. I was expected to just ‘get it’ which I think I did. But I didn’t WANT TO “just get it.” I wanted a chance to work out the problems in what was the most important relationship I had.
I remember when a guy I’ve mentioned here at times, said to me “I could just disappear, you know” when I had a problem with something he’d said. I told him if he could disappear that easily on me, then he should do so. He came back a few weeks later, joking around, explaining what he’d really meant by what had upset me… I should have not responded to him, when he contacted me, because his just saying that, in an effort to control me, was a huge red flag. I’m angry at myself for ever trusting him farther than I could throw him – I’ve spent my life trying to avoid men like that.
I voted “No” but an exception would be in a domestic abuse situation.