Follow Your Gut
When faced with a divorce, most people just want to be told where to go, what to do, how to make the pain stop. Can’t say I blame them...however...
If only it were that easy.
But divorce, like yourself, is not cookie cutter, one-size fits all. You’ll really want to find a way to show up for yourself and make decisions that are aligned with your desired outcomes.
Why is that so important?
You’ll get lots of opinions from friends, family and co-workers (even professionals) about WHAT you should do, HOW you should do it and WHEN you should do it. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you should do or listen to any of it if it doesn’t feel ‘right’ to you.
You’re the one who will be left to live with the ramifications of these choices — and it’s hard to even imagine all of the possible outcomes when you are just beginning the process. There are a lot of variables and there’s a lot at stake.
Besides, everyone else gets to go back to their lives when the divorce dust settles — leaving you with their opinions and the aftermath.
I don’t share this because I want you to be scared or more overwhelmed than you may be feeling already. I want you to find a way to feel empowered despite feeling disempowered.
I also want you to know that you can make sustainable change so that you never find yourself in this position again — and so that you can move through life adversity in a whole new way.
It’s powerful to simply be able to state where you are and how you feel — better yet, what you need.
I’m scared. I’m overwhelmed. I feel alone and confused. I feel enraged. I need help.
It’s OK to feel all of that and still want out of your marriage. You have your reasons. This didn’t happen overnight. But you know what? No one wants to be alone in a crisis.
A mama who doesn’t lean in risks wasting time, money and suffering a lot of unnecessary heartache. Quick fixes don’t work here.
I was recently talking to one of the mamas in our program who said, “I had to become the person I thought my mediator was supposed to be.”
BOOM!
Initially she was optimistic that this path would be kinder, gentler and less costly...until she began to feel like the mediator wasn’t doing her job by guiding the process or keeping her and her ex on track.
Now this isn’t intended to bash mediation...it’s a GREAT option, but not one that can work for all.
There are 2 takeaways from this that I want you to remember:
1.) Follow your gut (for example, initially mediation was definitely a worthwhile option for this mama)
and...
2.) Follow your gut (when it felt like it was veering off course, she pivoted)
Your intuition will serve you on all sides of the equation.
I kid you not. As we say in our coaching program, you need to be the CEO of your divorce (and life). It doesn’t mean you have all the answers, it means you trust yourself.
When we deny what we are seeing, feeling, picking up — even when we aren’t an expert in a particular field — we risk compounding all the issues and creating more chaos and clean-up for ourselves.
In this particular case, this mama saved time, money and heartache by changing course. She ditched the mediator and retained a lawyer who took control of this runaway train.
Reconnecting to your intuition isn’t fluff, it’s strategy. As my famous friend Sonia Choquette, aka, the Queen of Intuition says in her book, 21-Days to Jump Start Your Intuition, “Being disconnected from our intuition is like trying to find our way through a dense, fierce jungle at night without a flashlight and with no protection.”
One of the most common reasons that mothers wind up in divorce, and then struggle through it, is that somewhere along the way they’ve become disconnected from their intuition: your God-given inner compass. It’s your gut — it’s the butterflies in your belly when you’re in love, the goosebumps when you’re excited, the pit in your stomach when you’re anxious. It’s where your true answers are found.
So why do we ignore it?
Because we don’t trust ourselves…and we practice that until we forget how. But there’s a direct path back to self-agency.
I don’t expect you to know HOW to divorce or navigate the process, but I want to guide you back to figuring out HOW to reconnect to your intuition so that you can make the moves you need to make during this pivotal time. And more importantly trust yourself, feel supported and good about the choices you are making.
It’s possible, mama. I promise. I see it in motion each and every day.
You suffered in your marriage, you don’t have to suffer in your divorce.
Are you ready for a flashlight, a roadmap and a travel companion? You’ve got this. Your intuition is doing a happy dance as we speak and I’m right here waiting to walk beside you.
Where have you been ignoring your gut (and want to change that)? Please leave a comment below and let’s continue the conversation…