Ah! It’s been a mess.

I asked J____ for forgiveness to the greatest degree I felt I could, in good conscience.

He accepted my apology and proffered forgiveness.

I made no mention of the conclusion of our relationship. He had stated firmly on Monday that “this was it.”

He made no mention of continuing our relationship, either.

So a couple of hours after I asked forgiveness and he granted it, I wrote him about a refund.

“Interesting follow up email to your email asking for forgiveness,” he replied.

I responded:

Please know that I wrote my refund letter with the idea in mind that your need to terminate our relationship is unrelated to the letter for which I asked–and you graciously granted–forgiveness. (Thank you once more for offering your forgiveness.) I did not–and would not–expect your grant of forgiveness to alter your decision to terminate our working relationship.

Certain behaviors produce certain results, no matter how much one party is willing to forgive another. Based on what you said on Monday, I figured this–my behavior over the past several months, culminating in my email to you last week–is such a case. I sincerely wish it were not so, but that was my assumption when I wrote my email about refunds.

We agreed to discuss the potential future of our relationship by phone rather than email . . . which we did yesterday morning.

At the end of it, we agreed that he would reconsider whether he might be willing, as it were, to “take us back.”

Meanwhile, however, he asked us not to discuss with any other advisors any of the details of the plan he created . . . until he returns next Monday from a trip out-of-town.

“I appreciated our call today,” he wrote, late yesterday afternoon. “We are praying about this and I’ll get back with you on Monday.”

And something just “snapped” in my mind.

Well, maybe “snapped” is the wrong word. But something quickly developed in my mind and in conversation with Sarita. I decided there was something “just” not going to work in any relationship with J____ going forward.

Something about his super-spirituality. Something about his inability ever to see himself in the wrong. It’s “all [my/John's] fault.” . . . I don’t want to have to deal with that kind of burden. Especially not if–as happened Monday morning–I am liable to be verbally beaten on the way he beat me.

So I wrote him an hour and a half ago:

J____ and C____:

After further consideration, and in hopes of reducing the burden you might feel about wrestling in mind or in prayer, Sarita and I wanted to inform you: we have decided to go along with your original decision and terminate our relationship with your firm.

Thank you.

And he wrote back half an hour later:

I am in the plane getting ready to head to ________.

This is just another surprise.

I’ll be back in touch with you on Monday to discuss the details of our mutually agreed upon termination.

Yep. “Just another surprise.” Our fault, y’know.

Somehow I am, suddenly, really looking forward to this relationship being over!

(No Ratings Yet)

 Loading ...

 |  Email This Post  |  Print This Post  |  Subscribe to It!
This entry was posted on Thursday, April 24th, 2008 at 8:06 am and is filed under estate planning, legacy planning. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.