Switching Off
June 26, 2025
The OFF switch is the most powerful component of any device. This is true because when something starts going wrong, bringing it to a halt can be the only remaining way to save whatever is left.
Want proof? The pilot landing an airplane halfway through a flight as a precaution because the weather ahead looks bad is hitting a kind of off switch. As someone said, planes don’t fly in the air; they fly in the weather, and weather bad enough can knock you right out of the sky.
The passengers might not like the pilot’s decision. They had a destination in mind and want to get there, no matter what. Well, a pilot must remain free to decide when the weather is unflyable, and a precautionary landing at least keeps everybody live to complain about it.
It is true because machinery has limitations. True also of Life, I would say. The discretion to say No may be the only true attribute of Liberty.
One has to mean it sincerely. Merely saying No will not do. It has to be operationalized. Land the plane. Park it. Walk away. Stop.
Maybe I got lucky growing up in a family that moved house — city, state for cryin’ out loud — every two years on average. This was before smartphones. Mail was slow. Long distance phone calls cost more than a child had the means to pay. Moving vans transfer your stuff but not your friendships; those, you end. Make new friends in new places.
Do that enough times and it becomes second nature. When the time comes to stop doing something, just stop. I quit smoking that way. Woke up one morning determined to stop. Got out of bed, went all through the house finding every hidden cigarette, threw them all away, and that was that. No lingering craves.
Recently I quit a leadership role I accepted four years ago in a group that invested in some property together. I had to stop, for reasons that need no elaboration here. The other leaders are friends of mine. I expect they will be unhappy with me. Not their fault that it became time for me to go. If I tried to explain, they would not understand.
It was necessary for me to step away, to save something important to me about who I think I am. Unfortunately, it probably cost me those friendships. They will vanish like all those friends who sank below the horizon in the rear view windows of my parents' cars on Moving Days. I cannot help them to deal with my going, because I am gone.
Only by knowing that one can say No, can one truly be free to say Yes. Genuine commitment is a continuously active choice. While I was in that role with the investment group, I gave it my best effort. When the time came to stop, I stopped. There is all the difference in the world between choosing not to say No, in contrast to discovering that one is no longer in a position to say it.
Where I am going, what is next in my life, I do not know (yet). Only that when I get there the door will open and I will look for something to say Yes to.