The Difference Between Leaving and Running

9/24/2026

Once when I was visiting LA, I had an untimely conversation with my lovely waiter—hugo in hand of course. As I was giving him the latest details about my (at the time) situationship, I stopped as I grew guilty from stealing his presence away from other tables. Mid-apology for my absentmindedness, he simply said,

“I’m not kept. I’ll leave if I want.”

The gasp that left my mouth was so audible, diners 3 tables over likely heard. Someone’s therapy has been paying off. And I say that with admiration.

After this experience, and as I’ve gotten older, I’ve noticed the development a seemingly advantageous mindset.

Being the botler.

If a relationship gets bad enough, I can leave.

If a job becomes unbearable, I can quit.

If a city starts to suffocate me, I can move.

If I don't like who I am becoming, I can start over.

There is something incredibly powerful about knowing you are not trapped. A very comforting feeling in knowing that nothing has to be permanent.

I think this is one of the better things I have learned in my twenties. I don't have to stay somewhere simply because I once chose it. I don't have to spend the rest of my life honoring decisions made by a version of myself who no longer exists. There is no prize for suffering through something simply because you once said yes to it.

And yet, lately, I have started wondering if there is a darker side to this particular kind of self confidence.

Because if I always know I can leave, how do I know when I should stay?

There is a difference between knowing you have an exit and constantly standing beside it.

I have met people who seem to possess this same ability. They are remarkably self sufficient. They don't need anyone to save them. They can pick themselves up, start over, move across the country, find another job, date someone new. They are adaptable and independent and seemingly unafraid of change.

I admire these people. I am these people.

But sometimes I wonder if there is a fine line between I know I can leave and I know I will leave.

Because the first is self trust. The second can become avoidance.

And perhaps that is where the bolter gets into trouble.

When leaving stops being the emergency exit and starts becoming the plan.

I think there is a version of self confidence that says: I trust myself enough to leave when something is no longer right for me.

But there is another version that says: I trust myself to survive leaving, so I never have to find out what happens if I stay.

And those sound remarkably similar until you are sitting in the uncomfortable middle.

Because staying is not always a sign of weakness. Sometimes staying is the harder thing.

Staying long enough to have difficult conversations. Staying through the awkward season of a friendship. Staying in the city while you figure out why you don't like it instead of immediately deciding you need a new one. Staying at the job long enough to become good at something instead of assuming the next opportunity will feel better. Staying with a person long enough to discover that intimacy is not always supposed to feel easy.

There is a discomfort that comes from realizing that not everything that frustrates you is a sign that you need to leave.

Sometimes you are bored.

Sometimes you are scared.

Sometimes you are changing.

And sometimes, yes, it really is wrong for you.

I don't think there is a universal equation for knowing which is which. And this is where I’m afraid I get stuck.

Because I don't want to romanticize staying. I don't want to turn endurance into a virtue simply because it is difficult. There are relationships that should end. Jobs that should be left. Cities that should be escaped.

We should not confuse commitment with self abandonment.

But I also don't want to become so committed to my own freedom that I become incapable of being committed to anything else.

There is something seductive about being the person who can always start over.

Starting over is clean.

You get to choose the apartment. The neighborhood. The wardrobe. The people. The version of yourself you introduce to everyone.

Nobody knows what you were like before.

Nobody knows what you failed at.

Nobody knows the things you tolerated.

You get to rewrite the story.

And maybe this is why I have always loved the idea of a new city, a new job, a new life. There is an almost intoxicating relief in knowing you can become someone else somewhere else.

But what if sometimes the fantasy of elsewhere is simply a more glamorous form of avoidance?

What if I need to become comfortable being bad at something before I become good at it?

When thinking about this concept, I truly don't know.

And I think that is the most honest answer.

Because I have spent a lot of time learning how to trust myself. Learning that I can make decisions. Learning that I can recover. This is something I will never lose.

But perhaps the next stage of self trust is learning that I can stay, too.

That I can let something disappoint me without deciding it has failed me.

That I can be dependent on someone without becoming dependent upon them.

That I can change my mind without needing to change my entire life.

Maybe real freedom is not having the ability to leave everything.

Maybe it is knowing you could leave, and choosing not to.

Being trapped versus being rooted.

I think I have spent a lot of my life wanting to be unkept. Free from permanence. I want to be the woman who knows she can leave.

But I am beginning to wonder if I also want to become the woman who doesn't always need to.

Maybe the goal isn't to stop being the bolter.

Maybe it's simply to stop bolting before you've given yourself the chance to find out what staying could have become.