When you're in the throws of divorce it can be hard to stay focused on anything useful. So often it seems like we have to put so much effort into figuring out who gets what, how we're going to pay the bills, and how much we'll miss the kids that we don't have any more time or energy to remember some basic key things that can definitely help ease the turmoil of divorce - even just a little bit.
So in today's episode I'm going to lay out 4 key things to remember when going through a divorce that I have identified from my own experience and from coaching my clients that are bound to help you, to bolster you, to support you as you go through your divorce. And these things don't cost you any money. They don't take major time or energy to remember. But by remembering these 4 things, it's possible that your divorce pain and heartache could become less unbearable which probably sounds pretty good right now.
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Grief and trauma are the two biggest struggles women deal with as they go through their divorce. It's highly likely that you are experiencing both and don't even realize what you're feeling. I'm here to tell you that it's okay for you to grieve your marriage (even if it was shitty) and it's normal to be experiencing some kind of trauma (which is essentially a disconnection from yourself - your mind, body and soul). I can help guide you through the grief in all of the forms it shows up so you can heal. I can also teach you how to ground yourself in healing so you can ease through the trauma. Schedule your free consult by clicking here.
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Full Episode Transcript:
If you're going through a divorce, you're in the right place because this is the podcast that can help. You are listening to episode number 148 and I am your host, Karin Nelson. Welcome to Becoming you Again, the podcast to help you with your mental and emotional well-being during and after divorce. This is where you learn to overcome the grief and trauma of your divorce. We're going to do that by reconnecting with yourself, creating lasting emotional resilience and living a truly independent life so that your life can be even better than when you were married. I'm your host, karen Nelson. Welcome back to the podcast. My friends, I'm so glad to be here with you today. I just got back from my morning walk. I found this year so far, especially, that I have really been coming at exercise from a very different point of view than I have in the past. I'll just share it with you briefly, very quickly, before we get into the topic of today, because I think that it's a cool way of thinking about exercise. Anyway, I have been thinking about exercise and movement more from a perspective of mental health. This is what I need today to honor my body, not really from a perspective of I'm doing this so that I can burn the calories so that I can continue to be the weight that I am, or so that I can lose the weight that I know I need to lose to get the approval of society. This really goes along with this whole idea that I talk about a lot on this podcast, actually about being in touch with your body and understanding what your body needs and letting your body kind of lead you. The more in touch we can be with our body, the more in touch we are with our intuition and with our true self. We can then show up as the person that we want to be, as the person that we're meant to be, rather than the person that kind of society tells us we should be. This is all to say. This year so far, I've kind of just been letting my body be the director of what it is that I need to do for my own health. That day or this day Today, I really felt I needed to go for a walk. It's cold outside. Thankfully it's not snowy, but it's cold. I just felt like that's what I needed. I did it and it felt very invigorating. It felt good. I just let myself walk and enjoy nature and be outside. It was great. I don't feel like I need that every day. I don't feel like my body needs that every day. The other day, I really felt like what my body needed was to release a lot of high energy, a little bit of rage, a little bit of anger. I did a kickboxing workout A few days before that. What I really needed was to just let my body move and feel rhythm. I did a dancing workout. That's the journey that I'm on right now. It doesn't have to be your journey, but I thought that I would share it with you. If you want to start thinking about movement and exercise in a different way than maybe you've been thinking about it before now, you can go ahead and adopt the way I've been trying to do it, kind of letting your body be the decider on what you might be needing in moments throughout your day. All right, enough about that. Let's jump into today's topic. Today, I want to talk about things that we need to remember when we are going through a divorce Because, first of all, I'm talking about this from my own perspective as someone who yes, I work with people who go through a divorce. My clients are all either going through a divorce or have been divorced. I understand what it feels like and I too have gone through a divorce but for me it has been like seven years now. I'm not in it like I was when I went through my divorce. But for those of you who are in it, who are in the throws, these are things that I want you to remember as you're going through your divorce. I think it might help lighten the load a little bit. At least, I hope that's what will happen with this episode for you. So I have four things that I'm gonna talk about. Take it or leave it, but I truly believe that if you will open up to accepting all four of these things, it may make things just a tiny bit easier. And when you're going through a divorce, a tiny bit easier than not any easier is maybe enough for that moment, for that day, right, all right. So the first thing that we need to remember when we're going through a divorce is that we're capable this can be a difficult thing for many women to believe about themselves, especially women who have been in a relationship that is long-term or not long-term just really, depending on number one, your attachment style that you have formed with your partner or partners over time, right. But also just because often when we are in a relationship it becomes very easy to forget how to be independent. Maybe you've combined your finances and those are very intertwined and you've got a mortgage and bills and cars and debt et cetera all of those things right. Or maybe one person has been the earner and the other person has been more of the homemaker, not bringing in as much income. Or maybe you've been relying on this other person to kind of validate you in many ways, kind of tell you that you're good enough, create happiness, be the completion of your relationship, the completion of yourself. And now that the relationship is over, you might be thinking like that validation is gone and with it goes my worth and my value. Or maybe it's just been so freaking long that you have been in this relationship 20, 30, 40 years that you literally do not remember very clearly a time when you were out of this relationship, and that is fucking scary. Or maybe it's something else altogether. But whatever the reason is behind the why you have forgotten your capability as a person, your capability to live or to reason or to make decisions or to work or to cope or to manage or to feel, the fact still remains, and has always been there, that you are capable. You are more capable than you give yourself credit for in creating a life that is happy and creating a life where you feel fulfilled, and creating a life that you love, and creating a life where you thrive, and creating a life that looks the way you've always wanted it to look. I promise you you are capable of doing that. You may not believe it right now, or you may have lost touch with that idea, but that does not diminish that it is a fact that you can create and that you can accept. You may not see it now, you might not know how to do it in this moment, but the one thing to remember right now, if you are going through a divorce and you've kind of lost your belief in your capability as a human, the one thing to remember is that it is possible, that you are capable and at any point that you want, you can own that knowledge and take steps to move forward toward it. All right. The second thing that we need to remember as we go through a divorce is that you're worthy, 100% worthy. Nothing you do or don't do will diminish your worth. It stays constant, it is never changing, it is inherent. It is with you always. Your breakup, your divorce. It doesn't make you less valuable. It doesn't make you less lovable. It doesn't make you less desirable. It doesn't make you less of a mom. It doesn't make you less of a woman. It doesn't mean that you are not enough in some way. It doesn't mean that your family is broken. It doesn't mean that you are broken and you need to be fixed, or that the relationship that you had while you were married made you whole and now that it's over, you'll never be whole again. Like all of that is a story that you have been fed over time to have you believing that you as a woman are not complete without the addition of being chosen by a partner and or being the mother to children. But the thing is none of that is true, because either every single human, male or female or otherwise, every single father or mother or otherwise, is 100% worthy and complete, just as they are from the moment they are born until they pass on from this life, or none of us are. And so the belief that you are inherently worthy of being human, living a life progressing if you choose, choosing your life and having autonomy and having agency, being in this world. Loving and being loved. Those are all things that you can believe. You are worthy, you are lovable, you have value, and the divorce does not and will not ever diminish that or ever define that for you. The third thing to remember when we go through a divorce is that things will get better. You may not know how right now, you may not see how that could even be possible, but the thing is is that life is a lot of things, but one thing it is not is that it is changeless. Life is full of movement, ebbs and flows, change, evolution, progression, highs, lows and in-betweens your life that you have right now that feels hard and heavy and terrible and there's so much uncertainty it will not stay the way it is right now. Right, it will not stay the same. Your life will change and it will get better, if that's what you want. You may not understand how you may not be able to see beyond where you're at right now. That's okay. The key is to believe that it's possible, that one day it will be better, and then just keep that belief kind of somewhere in the back of your mind as something to hold on to, as something to protect and treasure as the days pass and at some point you will know this is a step in the right direction, to a better life, to a better future. All right, and then the fourth thing that we need to remember when going through a divorce is that it's going to be hard, like not for everybody, but I think most of my audience, most of the people who are listening to this podcast, understand and have experienced that divorce is hard. Maybe it's already been hard up to this point, maybe your hard is yet to come, maybe you feel like the hard is never ending. But whatever it is, it's most likely going to be hard and difficult and challenging and that's okay. The key with this one is to remind yourself that hard is okay. It's okay for there to be hard things in your life. Nothing has gone wrong when we experience something hard, something difficult, something challenging. Hard is part of the human experience. Without hard, we wouldn't know what easy is. Without hard, we most likely do not have the opportunity to grow, to expand, to understand some of our deepest, truest parts. Now listen to me here. This is really important about this number four. Okay, knowing that it's hard and knowing that that's okay for it to be hard does not mean that you have to like the hard. It does not mean that you have to now just look forward to it or think that like okay, I know it's hard and that's okay and so I should just enjoy it. No, that is not what letting it be okay means. All it means is that you are accepting of the fact that it's hard and you're not trying to talk yourself out of that fact. Let it be hard and then trust yourself that you can handle the hard, because remember number one, you're capable. And as Glen and Doyle always says and it's actually the title of her podcast, if you haven't listened to it, go listen to it. But we can do hard things. All right, my friends, remember these things as you go through your divorce. They may help you through some of the more tough times, and that help could be there exactly when you need it. I love you. My friends, you've got this. I'm here for you. I will talk to you next week. Hi, friend, I'm so glad you're here and thanks for listening. I wanted to let you know that if you're wanting more, a way to make deeper, more lasting change, then working one-on-one with me as your coach may be exactly what you need Together. We'll take everything you're learning in the podcast and implement it in your life, with weekly coaching, real life practice and practical guidance. To learn more about how to work with me one-on-one, go to KarinNelsonCoaching dot com. That's wwwKARINNELSONCoaching dot com. Thanks for listening. If this podcast agreed with you in any way, please take a minute to follow and give me a rating. Wherever you listen to podcasts and for more details about how I can help you live an even better life than when you were married, make sure and check out the full show notes by clicking the link in the description.