There’s a phrase that gets passed around like it’s wisdom.
“Not everything is meant to work.
Some things are meant to be left.” ▌
It shows up everywhere. Marriage. Jobs. Families. Life in general. It’s usually delivered with a reassuring nod, like someone just handed you the secret to endurance.
What they actually handed you was a shovel.
Because “make it work” rarely means fix something functional.
It usually means:
- Stay longer than you should
- Accept more than you should
- Tolerate things that, if you were advising someone else, you’d tell them to run from immediately
But for some reason, when it’s your life, the rules change.
The Prestige of Suffering
There’s a strange kind of social currency attached to sticking things out.
People admire endurance.
They admire sacrifice.
They admire the person who says, “It’s hard, but I’m making it work.”
What they don’t often admire is the person who says:
“This isn’t working, and I’m done.”
Because that sounds like failure.
Even when it’s not.
Especially when it’s not.
Broken Isn’t a Challenge Mode
Somewhere along the line, we started treating broken situations like they’re puzzles.
If you just try hard enough…
If you just communicate better…
If you just sacrifice a little more…
It’ll click.
Except sometimes it doesn’t click.
Sometimes the pieces don’t fit because they were never meant to.
And no amount of effort turns a bad system into a good one.
It just turns you into someone who’s exhausted from trying.
When “Work” Becomes the Only Option
Here’s where it gets uncomfortable.
If the only acceptable outcome is “make it work,” then people start redefining what “working” even means.
Staying becomes success.
Surviving becomes success.
Not leaving becomes success.
Even when everything inside is falling apart.
And if leaving isn’t an option—socially, emotionally, or mentally—then the brain starts looking for any way to resolve the pressure.
Not healthy ways.
Not good ways.
Just… ways.
The Lie We Don’t Say Out Loud
We don’t like to admit this part:
Sometimes, “make it work” is just a more polite way of saying,
“Don’t disrupt the system.”
Don’t make other people uncomfortable.
Don’t break expectations.
Don’t force anyone to reconsider what they told you to do.
Just… keep going.
Even if it’s killing you in ways that don’t show up on the outside.
Walking Away Isn’t Failure
Leaving something that doesn’t work isn’t failure.
It’s recognition.
It’s clarity.
It’s choosing a different outcome when the current one is unacceptable.
But we don’t frame it that way.
We frame it as quitting.
And then we wonder why people stay too long.
A Better Question
Instead of asking:
“How do I make this work?”
Maybe we should be asking:
“Is this worth making work at all?”
And if the answer is no—
That’s not the end of the story.
That’s the beginning of a better one. ▌