walk away

present singular third person walks away · participle present walking away · participle past walked away · past walked away

1. idiomaticTo withdraw from a problematic situation.

   Company lawyers told him to walk away from the deal.

   2 more examples

   Green adds: "Luckily, nobody did walk away. Railtrack stayed with it, so did the government, so did the Strategic Rail Authority.

   2022 September 21, Chris Green tells Nick Brodrick, “It's absolutely my favourite train”, in RAIL, number 966, page 35

   When John Lithgow was announced as Dumbledore, he revealed that a friend had sent him a link to an article entitled: “An open letter to John Lithgow: Please walk away from Harry Potter.”

   2025 June 11, Stuart Heritage, “‘Please walk away from Harry Potter’: why the stars of HBO’s new TV show are in for decades of social media hell”, in The Guardian, →ISSN, archived from the original on 21 Jul 2025

2. colloquialeuphemisticintransitiveOf an object, to go missing or be stolen.
3. To free oneself from a debt such as a mortgage by abandoning the collateral to the lender. To make a strategic default.
4. idiomaticTo survive a challenging or dangerous situation without harm.

   The football team walked away with a 1-0 victory.

5. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see walk, away.

   I took one last look at the house and walked away.

   1 more example

   Shepard: Mordin, walk away. Mordin: Can't do that, Shepard. Shepard: I don't have a choice here. Walk away, or I will fire.

   2012, BioWare, Mass Effect 3 (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Tuchanka