If you are in doubt about how to end something – end it quickly.
But how often do we do the opposite?
Good-grief I have known people that took two years to break up with someone they knew was never going to work out.
Maybe you took five years to finally leave that job you hated.
I mean, there is a reason that decisiveness is one of the seven decisions you need to daily make.
The worst way to end anything—a war, a conflict, a relationship—is slowly and painfully. The costs of such an ending run deep: loss of self-confidence, unconscious avoidance of conflict the next time around, the bitterness and animosity left breeding—it is all an absurd waste of time. Before entering any action, you must calculate in precise terms your exit strategy. How exactly will the engagement end, and where it will leave you? If the answers to those questions seem vague and full of speculation, if success seems all too alluring and failure somewhat dangerous, you are more than likely taking a gamble. Your emotions are leading you into a situation that could end up a quagmire.
-Robert Greene, The 33 Strategies Of War
