It has to be one of the hardest words to say. An authentic goodbye doesn't mean see you later, it might mean see you never. An authentic goodbye bids farewell to something loved, something that will be missed, something that will stay only in one's heart. Nobody likes saying goodbye.
Yet it seems we do it all the time. In our culture, we bid farewell to old things, old people, old places. We constantly look to a future and try to ignore the things we have left behind. Trying to figure out how to say goodbye and really mean it, it's just too hard.
So how do you say goodbye?
I am leaving a place where I have lived for almost 10 months. And I'm probably not coming back. I'm not leaving my freshman year of college or going on a three week trip to some other country. I'm leaving New Zealand, and it feels like a pretty permanent goodbye. I know that I might never again see the gorgeous rolling hills of Waikato, or the impossibly blue rivers of the West Coast, or the remarkable mountains in Queenstown. I know that I might never sit down to coffee and laughs with the incredible friends I've made here. And yet, I have to simply bid everything goodbye and walk away.
How can one word possibly convey everything I feel towards this beautiful place? There is only one way: to mean it.
Because I see it this way: people hate saying goodbye, so they use a cop out. They talk about themselves, and then never even bother to think about what they left behind. They give up on gorgeous, impossible, remarkable things, and they don't even say a proper goodbye.
Understand this, I'm no professional at saying goodbyes. In fact, I'm pretty terrible at it. I forget, or I put it off so long that it would just be weird, or I make the goodbye all about me. But for once, I don't want to give a terrible farewell. So here goes...my attempt to figure out the art of saying goodbye.
I've been thinking this for about a week now. I've been attempting to work out the right words that convey how much I will miss NZ with its people and food and scenery. I thought about which pictures would work best, and how to divide it up amongst everything I need to say so that nobody loses interest. And I couldn't do it. Sure I'd get emotional, and sometimes come up with some great phrase, but the goodbye never seemed real...until I finally realized what I was getting wrong. Goodbyes aren't for the departed, they're for the ones we leave behind. Simply put, it's not for me, it's for them.
So how do you say goodbye?
Step one, don't say it to make yourself feel important. That's not to say you aren't, just that it's not the right reason to be saying goodbye.
Step two, figure out what they've done for you. Don't remember how much you changed their lives, make them see how much they've changed yours.
Step three, close your mouth and act. The power of action is incredible...so pay for a coffee. Buy a little gift. Don't blab on and on, just show them how much they mean to you.
Step four, keep your promises. Stay in touch if you said you would. Remember them. Pray for them, if you like. But don't break your promise after you've said goodbye.
Step five, remember them.
Maybe that's all I need to realize. My goodbye shouldn't be about me at all. I needed to take myself out of the equation, stop my words, and simply show people how I felt. Of course, that's what so difficult about it, right? Opening up and selflessly giving the people you leave behind what they need. But I think that's what we miss when we say goodbye nowadays.
We say goodbye to so many things, and we always make it about us. We selfishly forget others, talk on and on, and don't actually mean a single bit of it. We neglect the fact that it isn't painful only for us.
So I challenge you today. The next goodbye you make, don't make it about you: make it about them. Shut up and show them what they meant to you. Goodbyes are hard, but they are also crucial. They give us hope and peace in times of hurt. They mean that even if I don't see you, I will still remember you. I will still care about you. I will still think of you.
So goodbye to a beautiful country filled with incredible people. My farewell doesn't simply mean "I acknowledge that we are parting." It means that I acknowledge every incredible thing that you have done for me, and I will always remember.
Goodbye.
