Man, that whole mess with Tony a couple years back just about broke me. We’d started that small shop together, pouring every single penny we had into it. Things were good for a minute, then the disagreements started piling up. It wasn’t just business stuff either; it got real personal, real fast. One minute we were planning expansion, the next we were screaming across the table about who stole whose idea and who was putting in less time. It ended with me buying him out, but really, it felt like I lost everything, even if I technically ‘won’ the company.
The Bitter Taste of Victory
For months, I was walking around feeling like a champ and a loser all at once. I had the shop, yeah, but the cost was that friendship, over twenty years down the drain. Every time I thought about him, my stomach would just clench up. I spent so much time replaying the arguments, thinking up new, devastating things I should have said. I was chewing on that bitterness like an old piece of leather. I was technically the one standing when the dust settled, but it was just me and a pile of rubble. I was totally living the wrong side of that Five of Swords picture, standing there with the swords, but totally alone and miserable.
The paperwork was signed, the bank accounts were split, but the emotional ledger was still running a massive deficit. I even had this weird habit of driving past his new apartment block just to see if his light was on, which, looking back, was completely nuts. It was like I needed proof he was suffering too, which is just dark, man. That kind of mental obsession takes up space where genuinely productive stuff could be happening. I’d be trying to budget or talk to a supplier, and suddenly I’d be back in that last screaming match, losing focus entirely. I kept telling myself I was focused on the business, but really, I was just focused on being right and nursing that wounded pride. That’s the practical record right there: Grudges are heavy. Real heavy, and they make you do stupid, unproductive things.
I tried to distract myself. Threw myself into the shop. Worked harder than ever. But every little hiccup, every client issue, every late night felt heavier because I didn’t have my old buddy to bounce ideas off. It wasn’t about the business partnership anymore; it was about the constant emotional drain of holding a grudge that big. I was spending more energy maintaining the fight—the internal fight—than I was running the company.
The Forced Truce
The turning point wasn’t some sudden epiphany. It was a funeral. Tony’s uncle, who was like a second dad to both of us growing up. There was no way around it. We were both going to be there, stuck in the same room with all the old faces, the people who knew exactly how ugly our split had been. I was dreading it for weeks, trying to figure out the logistics to avoid him—different entry times, sitting in different sections—the whole nine yards of ridiculous avoidance planning. I felt like a spy on a mission instead of a mourner.
The day came, and I saw him across the room. He looked older, maybe tired. I looked away immediately. But later, standing outside grabbing some air, he just walked up. No drama. No yelling. He just stood next to me. The silence was deafening, worse than any shouting match we’d ever had.
He didn’t apologize for the fight. I didn’t apologize either. We just started talking about the uncle, about old memories, stupid stuff from high school. No talk of the business. Zero mention of the argument. It was just two guys remembering someone they both cared about, temporarily dropping all that baggage. The crazy thing is, in that moment, I realized I hadn’t seen him laugh in years, and I almost forgot what it sounded like. It hit me that both of us had probably been miserable messes carrying this thing around. Seeing him there, vulnerable and sad, stripped away the ‘villain’ narrative I’d been running in my head for months. It made him just Tony again. And that felt like a crack in the wall I’d built.
I walked away from that cemetery feeling completely different. Not happy, not healed, but just… lighter. That’s the reversed card doing its work, forcing you to look at the situation and recognize that the cost of maintaining the war is now greater than the cost of just letting it go. I went home and actually slept through the night for the first time in ages. The internal guard duty had paused.
Starting the Slow Climb Back
That accidental fifteen minutes outside the church was the start of the reversal. That card isn’t about everything magically going back to perfect. It’s about dropping the sword you’re still clinging to. The next day, I didn’t feel that gut clench when I thought about him. It was lighter. That’s the real practice of reconciliation—it starts small, usually with something completely unrelated to the core problem.
The actual practical steps looked like this:
- The Low-Stakes Communication: A week later, I sent a text. Just an emoji. Nothing heavy. He sent one back. It was totally pointless, but it broke the remaining ice. I waited three days before I did it, agonizing over it like it was a major business deal. Then I just hit send and walked away from my phone. I didn’t care what he thought; I just wanted to record that I tried to stop the staring contest.
- The Neutral Zone Meeting: A few weeks later, I suggested coffee. Not at the old shop. Not at his new place. Just some random diner across town. We agreed, no business talk. We stuck to it. It was awkward as hell, maybe the most forced hour of my life. We talked about sports, some TV shows, his sister’s kids. It was surface-level garbage, but the entire point was just to sit in proximity without the need to attack or defend. We were practicing being civil strangers who used to matter.
- Accepting the New Map: This was the hardest part. I had to stop wanting the old friendship back. That old map was burned. The new one was just about being cordial, maybe being able to help each other out professionally down the road without the hate. I had to let go of the idea of total “forgiveness” and just settle for “peace.” Forgiveness sounds too clean, too religious. Peace is just a quiet agreement not to keep swinging. I archived our old chat thread instead of deleting it—a physical record of moving it to the past, not erasing it entirely.
- Setting the Boundary for the Future: I actively chose to stop gossiping about him. When mutual friends brought him up, I cut the conversation short. I said, “It’s done, man. Water under the bridge.” That act of verbally closing the door on the conflict, even to outsiders, locked in the reconciliation for me. I stopped feeding the fight.
I realized the Reversed Five of Swords isn’t about some massive, hug-it-out movie moment. It’s about the quiet, often-clumsy work of cleaning up the psychological battlefield you created. It’s giving yourself permission to stop fighting, even if the other person hasn’t fully surrendered either. My practice was simply choosing to stop wasting energy on the conflict. It wasn’t about him giving in; it was about me letting go of the internal war. The reconciliation wasn’t with Tony, really. It was with myself. And that feeling? That heavy weight finally dropping? That was totally worth the awkward coffee. Now, when I see his name pop up on social media, I don’t feel anger. I just feel nothing much at all. And let me tell you, nothing is the best feeling after all that pain.
