Nodus Tollens is a point in life when a person realizes they have to let go of something that once brought them joy because it no longer serves who they are becoming.
This is difficult for most people because the things we have enjoyed are things we hold onto very tightly. Examples may include friendships, jobs, and even a home. Though each of these may seem like things we’d want to hold onto forever, there may be a time in life when they no longer fit with who we are becoming.
Friendships, especially old ones, are to be treasured. The history and shared experiences they hold, all the common ground and knowing they carry, are like no other exchanges with other people. However, sometimes life’s directions take each person in opposing directions, opinions, or simply geography that creates separation. Whatever the reason, one or both people realize the friendship no longer offers the same support or holds the same strength it once did.
Holding on, or trying to hold on, to what once was consumes more energy than releasing what is no longer there. Losing a friendship brings grief, but so might holding onto it with the hope of trying to continue to foster or recreate a lost connection.
Once, I had a client who had a married love interest. Their partner did not want to leave the security of the relationship. I cannot tell another person what to do. Relationships are complicated. What could be shared was helping my client see who they are, how they want to be, and what fits that image. It was not about negating the joy they experienced, but understanding what fits with who they know they are becoming.
Many have lost friendships. Some for known reasons, and the reasons of how they ended seemed to be in pace with time. Those were the easier ones to grieve and release. These relationships seemed to have reached a natural conclusion. These relationships end in more peaceful ways and seem to also carry with them a natural possibility to reopen a future door, should that come to be.
Harder, though, were the ones that seemed to simply end without cause or clue: a lack of returned calls or understanding of what happened. There is a sense of unfinishedness and incompleteness, simply a hollow ending. The incompleteness of the ending leaves a hole. It is not a natural conclusion for at least one of the parties.
Some lost friendships happen because someone has control over the loss without a natural ending. There is no peace and cannot be assured, only guesses. And most often, the guess is self-imposed and harsh. The suddenness is not natural.
At a time such as this, when one party is left with a hollow sense and considers the other person has ended a friendship as a coward, it is not nodus tollens. It does not support who each of the parties are becoming. Nodus tollens is leaving behind something that was joyful because it no longer serves who a person is becoming. When the action is done with cruelty or an absence of consideration and honest intent, nodus tollens does not apply.
Jobs are another time when nodus tollens is a natural conclusion, yet an often difficult step. So many times, I’ve heard people say how long they have worked at a job and the wonderful benefits they have from that employment. And in the same breath, how miserable and depleting that job is for them.
Jobs do offer us a certain type of security. However, when the security sacrifices personal happiness, growth, or inner calm, the job no longer serves the person but rather controls the person.
Though when a person has a satisfying job that they leave to take a position that more closely serves their higher believed purpose, they are aligning with their nodus tollens. Leaving or giving up a position that a person enjoys for a position that aligns with what is believed to be a higher calling is going in the direction of how one is becoming.
I have an example I can share. I know a woman who had a pastry chef position they adored, in a restaurant they dreamed of working for. They left their dream job for an unknown future because they knew their higher calling was to return home to help an elder parent.
Their personal nodus tollens was not an every-magically-happened Hallmark ending to the story. Though there was peace of mind and heart for the person who did what they believed they were called to do for their parent.
Homes are often another area that, after a time, becomes a call to leave a place of joy and move on to a new place, a new life, with new adventures and new becomings. Homes, dwellings, are places where we hold or create our becomings.
There are many ways we change who we are. In doing so, we do need to release old things, and sometimes even some things that brought us joy, so there is room and the ability for us to be and become who we are becoming.