Posts Tagged ‘true power’
No More Robots!
When you got married, chances are it was a happy occasion and you had dreams of “Happily Ever After.” Leaving the idea of “Happily Ever After” and getting to the point in a marriage when divorce becomes a viable option is usually extremely painful and confusing. Actually making the decision to divorce is rarely easy.
Although the decision to divorce is strictly between you and your spouse, there are 3 different ways you can know when it’s time to make a dramatic change in your marriage.
- You’re feeling robotic and just going through the motions. If you find that your marriage is just kinda there – you each do the minimum to maintain the relationship – it’s time for something to change. You deserve to have your marriage be meaningful. Overall, your primary relationship should contribute positively to the quality of your life.
- You’re stuck in analysis paralysis. If you can’t make up your mind about whether or not something needs to change in your marriage, then you’re experiencing analysis paralysis. What I’ve discovered when I find myself in situations like this is that I’m lacking courage. If I have an inkling that something needs to change, it does! Debating with myself about whether or not I trust myself is a waste of time and has the potential to further damage the relationship. My time is better spent by figuring out what needs to change and then taking the action to make things better.
- You’re hiding yourself. We all wear masks of one form or another to get along. It’s part of our socialization. Think about it, how many times do you automatically respond “Fine.” when someone asks you how you’re doing? We may be having a miserable day, but we still respond “Fine.” The problem with purposely hiding yourself in your marriage is that besides denying who we are we’re also preventing ourselves from having the real benefits of being in an intimate relationship with our spouse. Relationships are meant to support us and prove a safe place for us to be us. If you feel like you can’t be you, it’s definitely time for something to change.
It’s natural for every relationship to grow and change over time. Each of the situations described above is just an indicator that a change is needed – not that you need to divorce. By recognizing that your marriage is in one of these situations, you might even be able to make the necessary changes to save your marriage and avoid divorce altogether. However, to accomplish this takes courage, the willingness to be vulnerable and a determination to eliminate robotic responses.
Your Friendly Coaching Assignment:
Which of these situations remind you most of your marriage? Every relationship needs to change at various times. Sometimes the change that needs to happen is one that you need to make, sometimes it’s something you need to discuss with the other person and ask them to make, and most of the time you both need to make adjustments.
What adjustments would make your marriage or your next relationship better? Getting clarity about what would improve the relationship in your opinion is vital. You might be able to do this on your own or you might need to discuss it with the other person. Once you have the needed clarity it will be much easier to improve your marriage and/or avoid the same situations in your next relationship.
I’m Dr. Karen Finn, a divorce and personal life coach helping people just like you who are dealing with the stress and pain of divorce. You can join my newsletter list for free weekly advice. And, if you’re ready, you can take the first step toward working with me as your personal coach by scheduling a private consultation.
(c) 2013 Karen Finn. All rights reserved under all copyright conventions.
Part 1: How To Decrease Stress When You’re Going Through Divorce
As anyone who’s been through divorce knows, it’s an incredibly stressful time. If the only stresses you had to worry about were due to divorce that would be one thing, but the real problem is that the rest of your life doesn’t stop just because you’re getting divorced. All of your usual day-to-day stressors (work, traffic, kids’ schedules, other family demands, and the news) somehow become even larger when you’re dealing with the big D.
In this first of three articles on minimizing stress when you’re dealing with divorce, we’ll be focusing on renewing your energy.
When’s the last time you thought about where your energy comes from? It wouldn’t surprise me if you’d never thought of it before. After all, it’s something that most of us take for granted. We assume we’ll have the energy to get through our day each and every day. We just accept that some days it’s easier to get through the day than others.
The thing is, when you’re going through divorce on top of everything else it can be more difficult than usual to get through your day. When I started consistently having trouble having enough energy to get through my day while I was going through my divorce 10 years ago, I got interested in how I could boost my energy and that led me to wondering where my energy came from.
What I learned was that our energy comes from our psychology and our physiology. Yup, it comes from a combination of how you think and how your body responds (which ultimately means how you treat your body). It’s just as simple and as hard as that.
Luckily, the concept is pretty easy to understand. The more positive and calm your thoughts and the more healthy your body is the better you’ll be able to deal with stress. Unfortunately, the concept can be pretty difficult to implement if you’ve not paid much attention to your thoughts or your general health prior to divorce becoming a reality in your life. To help you out, I’ve got five quick tips that can give you a head start to renewing your energy even in the midst of divorce.
1. Start your day with a positive thought. Lots of people get out of bed dreading the day, but if you can start your day with a positive thought it will go a long way toward lessening the stress you have all day long.
Ten years ago, I was one of those people. I felt like I was on a treadmill of needing to meet one responsibility after another with a few catastrophes thrown in for variety. Learning to wake up with a positive thought (or two) really made a difference for me. It helped me get past the plague of depressive thoughts about being divorced and on to better things.
2. Schedule at least one break for yourself every day where you have ZERO responsibilities and ZERO interruptions. The break can even be as short as 5 minutes. The important thing is that you take it.
Ten years ago, I didn’t know what it was to have a real break. I spent almost every waking moment either working or worrying – neither of which was very helpful to renewing my energy. Learning to take a real break was hard for me, but by constantly trying out different things I realized that by allowing myself to have a time and space where I had zero responsibilities or interruptions that I felt tons better. I had more energy to go back to working (and worrying).
3. End your day with gratitude. Allowing yourself to appreciate the good that happened during the day goes a long way toward allowing you to have restorative sleep at night.
When I was going through my divorce, I used to have terrible nightmares. I’d dream about the worst case scenarios of all the things I had gone to sleep worrying about. As a result of the nightmares, I got very little sleep which just made life that much harder the next day. When I learned to change my thoughts at night from the worry to something more positive, the frequency of my nightmares decreased dramatically and I slept better. Of course when I got better sleep, I felt more energetic the next day.
4. Eat well and regularly. I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase “you are what you eat” before. There’s definitely some truth to that phrase, but when you’re going through divorce it’s even more powerfully truthful. Most people change the way they eat when they’re feeling stressed. They’ll over eat or eat “junk food” to soothe themselves or they’ll “forget” to eat in an attempt to gain some control. Either path leads to decreased energy. They’re either fueling their bodies with junk or not fueling their bodies at all.
I went the control route when I was dealing with the big D. I severely curtailed my eating and tried to live on next to nothing. I became anorexic and let me tell you that starving yourself is not the way to increase your energy! I felt exhausted and anxious most of the time. Luckily, I had a trainer who literally got in my face about being anorexic and got me to start eating healthfully again. It made a HUGE difference in my energy level and my mood. I actually started to feel happy again.
5. Get some exercise daily. When you’re going through divorce, it’s really easy to believe you don’t have time for exercise because there are just so many other things needing your attention. Exercise doesn’t have to mean a trip to the gym or the yoga studio, it can be as simple as taking a walk around the block, playing Frisbee with your kids and dog or even doing 5 jumping jacks. Exercise is anything that gets your body moving in a way you don’t usually do. The wonderful thing is that the novelty of the movement will energize you.
I was a glutton for punishment 10 years ago. I took everything to the extreme and would work out daily. What I learned from that was exercise doesn’t have to be work. It can be fun. The point of getting some exercise daily is just to move your body and change your thoughts. The wonderful thing I discovered about changing my thoughts was that I felt better and more energetic!
These 5 tips for renewing your energy are simple. Hopefully, they’re simple enough that you’re ready to try one or more of them out for yourself. I know you’ll start to notice improved energy levels and less stress once you implement at least one of these tips daily regardless of where you are in your divorce process.
Your Functional Divorce Assignment:
Eating well and regularly is a challenge my clients always face, so Your Functional Divorce Assignment will focus on this tip.
Take the following quiz to get an idea of how you might eat well and regularly.
Select one answer for each question.
1. On average, every day I have ________ servings of caffeine (energy drinks, coffee, sodas, tea).
A. More than 5
B. 2 – 5
C. Less than 2
2. I eat some protein with every meal or snack.
A. Rarely
B. Sometimes
C. Usually
3. I eat _____ meals each day.
A. 0
B. 1
C. 2-3
4. I drink _______ glasses of water each day.
A. 0-2
B. 3-7
C. 8 or more
Ideally, C is the better answer for each of the questions. If you’ve answered A for any of these questions you might want to consider changing things so that you can answer B instead and I’ll bet that you just might feel a bit more energetic when you do.
And here are links to part 2 and part 3.
I’m Dr. Karen Finn, a divorce coach and advisor helping people just like you who are dealing with the stress and pain of divorce. You can join my newsletter list for free weekly advice. If you’re interested in taking the first step toward working with me, you can schedule an introductory private coaching session.
If you’re looking for more help on how to navigate the challenges of your life now, read more articles about Life After Divorce.
How To Calm Your FEARs
When I got divorced, FEAR was my constant companion. I was afraid of almost everything and I spent a lot of time imagining catastrophes that could happen to me. Some of the catastrophes I vividly pictured were being trapped in my home by a tornado (that was the happy version – the worst version was just being obliterated by a tornado), being poisoned by the food I had bought at the grocery store, being killed in a car accident, and even losing my job which would cause me to never work again and having to live on the street where I would die a painful death.
Luckily, none of my catastrophes have come to pass, but I wasted a HUGE amount of energy and time living with the fear of them. And yet, being afraid is a common part of going through divorce. There are so many changes happening all at once that can seem to threaten survival if your FEARs take hold of you like mine did.
Could I have worked my way through my divorce without wasting so much energy and time on being afraid? YES! But I didn’t know how then. I know how now and that’s what I want to share with you – exactly how to calm your FEARs.
You can look at the word fear as an acronym – FEAR – which stands for False Expectations Appearing Real. Each one of the catastrophic fears that I had were actually FEARs. They were just expectations that I made come terrifyingly alive for me even though they were not real events.
The first thing to remember about FEARs are that they are based on a loss of trust. When you have False Expectations Appearing Real you’ve lost trust in something.
When I was afraid of being obliterated by a tornado, I had lost my trust in being able to take the necessary precautions in a tornado warning. When I was afraid of being poisoned by the food I bought at the grocery store, I had lost my trust in the food production, safety and distribution organizations. When I was afraid of being killed in a car accident, I had lost my trust in my ability to drive defensively and my trust in the fact that most other drivers are going to follow the rules of the road. When I was afraid of losing my job, I had lost trust in my ability to perform at work even though I was still doing so. When I was afraid that I would never work again, I had lost my trust in myself. When I was afraid of living on the street, not only had I lost trust in myself, but I had lost trust in my friends and family too.
Now, losing trust is a normal part of going through divorce. It makes sense to have a questioning about trust with respect to relationships when you’re going through divorce. However, generalizing the loss of trust about relationships to other things is where FEARs start. So as easy as it can be to question your trust of other things in your life when you go through divorce, actually losing trust can lead to creating catastrophes where there are none. And this is exactly what I did when I went through my divorce.
The second thing to remember is that what you’re FEARing is probably not happening now. In fact, that’s the best way to start calming a FEAR. Just ask yourself if what you’re FEARing is true right now. Is it happening right now? Usually, it isn’t. Usually, your mind is just going down the path of creating a wildly vivid movie of your FEAR. But, the moment you’re able to push the pause button on the movie you’ve been creating by acknowledging that it’s not happening right now, you’ve just started calming your FEAR. Your FEARs will calm because you’ve changed your focus, if only for a moment, to the fact that it’s not happening right now.
The third thing is to help your thoughts change the channel from the FEAR movie as soon as you pause it. There are millions of other thoughts you can have instead of becoming engrossed in the movies of your FEARs. The easiest way to change the channel is to become engrossed in something else. For some people exercising works great. But if it’s the middle of the night when your FEAR movie-fest starts, it’s not too practical to start exercising. What I think works even better at any time of the day or night is to write down what your FEAR is and then write down as many things as you can think of to prevent that FEAR from becoming real. Another thing that can help any time of the day or night is to ask yourself what is happening now. What are the sounds you’re hearing, the things you can see, what are you touching, etc. Just by bringing yourself as fully into the reality of your surroundings as possible can help to quell the FEARs and change that channel.
Fears are a normal part of healing from divorce. The thing is that sometimes they can get out of hand and become FEARs (False Expectations Appearing Real). By having a plan in place that can help you change the channel when your FEARs start playing in your mind, you’ll be able to calm them quickly.
Your Functional Divorce Assignment:
What are you FEARing? People FEAR all kinds of things when they get divorced. Maybe you FEAR being alone for the rest of your life. Maybe you FEAR not being able to find a job when you return to the workforce. Maybe, you’re like me and you FEAR eating the food you bought at the grocery store. Whatever it is that you FEAR, acknowledge it. By acknowledging your FEARs, you’ll have more control over them instead of being ruled by them.
Now that you know what they are, prepare for you FEARs to show up. Understanding that your FEARs might show up again even after you’ve identified them will put you well on your way to calming them. They’ll become a movie you’ve seen a hundred times where you can recite every line of the dialog by heart. You’ll just need to remember to ask yourself, “Is what I FEAR happening now?” as soon as the FEAR movie starts to play again so you can pause it for just a moment.
When the movie is paused, pick one of the three options to change the channel. If your FEAR movie starts playing at a time when you can exercise, you might want to do that. If your FEAR movie starts to play at a time when it’s not possible to exercise, you can either write down your FEAR and as many things as you can think of to prevent it from coming true or you can start becoming firmly engrossed in your surroundings.
Whatever you choose to do to change the channel when your FEAR movie starts will be a HUGE boon to you calming your FEARs and being able to move on with your life after divorce.
I’m Dr. Karen Finn, a divorce coach and advisor helping people just like you who are dealing with the stress and pain of divorce. You can join my newsletter list for free weekly advice. And if you’re interested in taking the first step toward working with me, you can schedule an introductory private coaching session.
© 2013 Karen Finn. All rights reserved under all copyright conventions.
How A Small Shift Made A World Of Difference
As I was driving home from a networking event a couple of weeks ago, the low-gas light came on in my car. I was so tired from all the activities of the day that I decided to wait until the next morning to fill my car up.
The next morning, I headed over to the gas station at Walmart. As I got closer to the store, I debated with myself about whether I wanted to cut through the parking lot or wait through an extra light to get to the pumps. If I went through the parking lot, I ran the risk of needing to wait for people crossing the road and other cars jockeying for the best parking spot. If I waited for the light, I was stuck making 2 left-hand turns at lights. I really don’t like having to wait for the lights to make the turns, so I chose to cut through the parking lot.
As I neared the entrance to Walmart, there was this older guy pushing his cart down the middle of the road. My first thought was, “Figures! I knew something like this would happen.” Then I changed my mind and realized that in a few more years, that might be me struggling to maintain my dignity and do my own shopping even though it was hard for me to walk and wanting to minimize the walking I had to do even if it meant walking in the middle of the street to get to my car. That thought immediately changed how I was feeling. Instead of being frustrated and impatient, I relaxed and patiently waited for the man to get across the street.
After he moved out of the middle of the road, I continued on my way and filled my car up with gas. I had a few things I wanted to pick up at Walmart, so I drove back through the parking lot in search for my own spot.
As I was slowly making my way up and down the aisles, I thought I spotted the same older guy walking back up to the store. No, it couldn’t be, I reasoned. It must just be another old man that reminded me of the first. I found a great parking spot and walked into the store to buy a couple of things.
As I was walking out of the store I noticed an old guy sitting on one of those motorized carts with his head in his hands. I almost got all the way out the doors before I realized that it was the same guy I kept seeing! I walked up to him and asked, “Didn’t I see you walk out of the store earlier?” He told me yes and that he was having a hard time finding his car. I asked him what kind of car he was driving and he told me a dark blue Kia. So I started out of the store on a mission to find his car for him.
I got just outside and I realized that I would never spot his car and that I should ask him if he was comfortable with me driving him around the parking lot looking for his car. He about jumped out of the motorized cart he was so happy to have me help him like that. We gathered up his bags and started out to my car.
I could tell he was really pushing himself to walk quickly, but I kept a slow pace and just chatted with him about where I had parked and hoping to give him the idea that I had plenty of time and I was parked close enough that he wouldn’t have to walk too far.
And then, just as we reached the parking aisle, he looked over to the right and said, “Is that my car?” Sure enough, he found his car right away – before we had even reached mine.
As I was helping him get his bags into his car, he admitted that he wasn’t supposed to be out walking without his walker and that he was so thankful to be back to his car.
Now it was a little thing for me to notice that an old man was walking down the middle of the street in a parking lot. It was another little thing for me to notice an old man walking back into Walmart. And it was yet another little thing for me to notice a tired old man sitting in a motorized shopping cart. But it was a big thing to that man.
Little things are like that. Individually, they’re itty-bitty things, but added together, they can make a world of difference. I’m not just talking about how little things can add up for helping someone else, but even for us. In fact, this idea of itty-bitty things added together is a major philosophy behind the work I do. For anyone going through divorce, making little changes in perception and then taking action can create a world of difference.
Your Functional Divorce Assignment:
What little things have you chosen not to notice that might make a big difference in your life? Just like my noticing the old man walking back and forth through the Walmart parking lot, what might you need to notice about you or your kids as you’re transitioning from married to single?
Now that you’ve noticed something you might have overlooked before what do you need to do to make a difference? The thing you choose to do might be something small, but sometimes something small is all it takes to make a world of difference.
I’m Dr. Karen Finn, a divorce coach and advisor helping people just like you who are dealing with the stress and pain of divorce. You can join my newsletter list for free weekly advice. If you’re interested in taking the first step toward working with me, you can schedule an introductory private coaching session.
© 2013 Karen Finn. All rights reserved under all copyright conventions.
Step 1 For Finding Me-Time In Your Busy Day: Set Timer For 5 Minutes
Isn’t it easy to get caught up in everything that’s going on and demanding our attention? There’s work, our family and friends, our community activities, our health, chores, TV and the internet. PLUS the divorce! It’s all clamoring for attention RIGHT NOW! Wouldn’t it be great to be able to stop the world for a moment and regroup?
Well, stopping the world for just a moment is EXACTLY what I believe you should get in the habit of doing every day. Sounds like a dream, right? OK, so no one can truly stop the world, but you can certainly stop participating in everything for just a few minutes every day. My recommendation is that you take at least 5 minutes every day for “me time”.
The benefits of regular me-time are amazing! They include a reduction in stress, the ability to think more clearly, seeing the “big picture”, and increased energy.
Here’s what you’ll need to be able to stop the world and get your own “me time”: a timer, a comfortable place to sit, and an agreement with everyone else that you are not to be disturbed for 5 minutes.
Step 1: set timer for 5 minutes. Yes, seriously! Set the timer so you can relax knowing you won’t lose track of time.
Step 2: Get comfortable where you’re sitting and close your eyes. Grab a pillow. Curl your legs up underneath you. Pull a blanket over you so you feel cozy. Do whatever you need to do to feel comfortable.
Step 3: Take a deep breath in, hold it for a second and then s-l-o-w-l-y exhale. Notice that while you are exhaling, your shoulders loosen up a bit. Keeping your eyes closed; continue your deep breathing until the timer sounds.
Step 4: Slowly open your eyes, when the timer sounds. Wiggle your fingers and toes. Let yourself re-orient to your surroundings and enjoy how relaxed you’re feeling. Now, go ahead and turn off the timer and let the world start up again.
Your Friendly Coaching Assignment:
Schedule 5 minutes of me-time in the next 24 hours. I find that most people are so used to doing what they believe has to be done for everyone else, that it can be hard to find even 5 minutes to take care of themselves. That’s why this step is so important. Decide when you have 5 minutes that you can dedicate to taking care of you and schedule it into your day.
Keep your appointment with yourself. In order for you to get the benefits of your me-time, you’ve actually got to do it. So, once you get the time scheduled, take the 5 minutes to recharge. I bet you’ll be happy you did!
Do it! The more consistently you give yourself the gift of me-time the easier you’ll find it is to handle all the twists and turns and demands for attention that pop up in your life.
If you’d like more do-able ideas for creating more me-time in your life, give me a call at 817-993-0561 so we can schedule a Complimentary Consultation and together we’ll figure out a way for you to have more me-time.
I’m Dr. Karen Finn, a divorce and personal life coach helping people just like you who are dealing with the stress and pain of divorce. You can join my newsletter list for free weekly advice or schedule a private consultation with me.
Flexibility: It’s About More Than Just Muscles
Life changes a lot when you separate and divorce. Things that used to be a regular part of life just aren’t anymore. And when things change in unexpected ways, we can get scared, frustrated and angry.
When clients begin working with me, they’re usually experiencing some combination of fear, frustration and anger. One of the first things we do is dive into what’s behind or at the root of these emotions. What we usually discover on our deep dive are limits that have been disregarded in some way. The limits could be behaviors, expectations, thoughts, beliefs or even habits.
The identification of your personal limits is a critical part of restructuring your life during and after divorce.
Some people are quite adept at identifying their limits – what they can and can’t do, what they think and why they think it, what they expect and why they expect it and what their habits of thought, belief, response and action are.
Others aren’t as aware of their limits. They aren’t quite sure of what their limits are or even if they want to know because they do and think what others tell them to.
And then there are people everywhere in between these two extremes.
Regardless of your starting point, I think knowing and understanding your limits is one of the key pieces to successfully navigating divorce. Your limits can help you understand what’s truly important to you as you negotiate your settlement. And knowing your limits will even allow you to ask for help and support when you need it.
Your limits will be tested, pushed, prodded, and beat against before, during, and after your separation and divorce. Who’s doing all this “exploring”? EVERYONE. Or at least it will probably feel that way. However, the chief “explorers” are usually your soon-to-be-ex and you. I’ll bet you already get how your soon-to-be-ex figures in here, but did you expect to also be one the chief “explorers”? The thing is that by virtue of going through the divorce process you’re asking yourself to completely redefine what your life is like. And anytime you or anyone else changes it’s a matter of testing and exploring previous limits.
I know all the testing, pushing, prodding, and beating against limits is at a minimum uncomfortable and at worst excruciating. However, the payoff is either an adjustment or a reaffirming of your limits along with, ideally, improved ways of communicating them to yourself and others. With your new limits you’re most often better off than you were with your old limits. Kinda like that old adage – what doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.
Great, right? There’s going to be some struggle and then things will be better. UGH! There’s nothing there about how to make the transition from married to divorce easier! And here’s where I’m going to tell you that the way to make things easier is to be flexible and loving while you’re exploring your limits so you can adjust and evaluate them by choice instead of by force.
By allowing yourself to be flexible as you explore your limits you’ll be much more able to understand and choose what to do with your limits and your life as you move forward through your divorce process. The flexibility will also allow you to negotiate from a more confident spot because you’ll be able to more easily see the options available to you. Developing the ability to be flexible will help you now as you’re navigating your divorce, but throughout your life.
Your Functional Divorce Assignment:
Know your limits. As you’re proceeding through your separation and divorce process take note of your limits. You’ll probably become aware of them most easily when you’re experiencing a strong emotion.
Explore your limits. Once you’ve identified a limit, ask yourself questions like “How did I develop this limit?”, “What’s the benefit of this limit?”, and “What might adjusting this limit be like?” Take note of what you discover about yourself.
Adjust your limits. Exploring limits almost always gives you new ideas of how to be, act, and think. Take advantage of your discoveries and adjust your limits in ways that make you feel wonderful!
As always, I’m here if you need some help in increasing your flexibility. You can reach my by email at karen@functionaldivorce.com and by phone at 817-993-0561.
I’m Dr. Karen Finn, a divorce coach and advisor helping people just like you who are dealing with the stress and pain of divorce. You can join my newsletter list for free weekly advice. And if you’re interested in taking the first step toward working with me, you can schedule an introductory private coaching session.
© 2012 Karen Finn. All rights reserved under all copyright conventions.
Finding Your True Power
I love the Beatles. OK, it’s more accurate to say I love the Beatles album 1. I consider it “happy music” and often put it on when I’ve got a long drive ahead of me or when I just need a pick-me-up. One of the songs on the album is Help!
If you’re not familiar with the lyrics of the song, you can find them on Metro Lyric’s website. For me, the idea behind the song is that we learn how to be independent when we’re young and as we grow and mature we yearn and search for interdependence.
When we’re born we’re completely dependent on others and essentially helpless. All we can do is cry and scream when we want help. Then, when we turn about 2 we begin to discover our own power and the magic word “NO!”. That’s when our natural desire is to begin to find out who we are independent of our parents. Most of us tend to begin intently striving for our independence during our teen years. Some of us wait until we get to college to become independent and some, like me, don’t realize our full independence until much later. Regardless of when you establish your independence, it’s an important milestone and the ability to exclaim “I did it!” is one of the headiest moments anyone can experience.
And yet, after we’ve achieved independence and it’s glories, there’s often the desire for connection with others. I’m not talking about a temporary connection, but a deep meaningful connection that helps us to know that we’re not alone in our life. This is the search for interdependence and where we recognize our true power – our ability to be part of something so much larger than us that nurtures and supports us and everyone else in ways beyond what we could ever do on our own.
The key to this power, our true power, is the ability to be vulnerable and ask for help when we need it. This is different that asking for help simply because you want something that you’re unwilling to do for yourself. This is about asking for help because you’ve been working toward and straining for something and you realize you’re just not able to do it all on your own, you need the help of someone to take the next step, to ease some of the burden, to be connected with all that you can be and all that is. This is the type of asking that true interdependence demands. I believe this is true maturity. I also believe this interdependence creates a joy and meaning in life that is beyond compare.
My thought is that we all live lives that are combination of dependent and interdependent thoughts, habits, beliefs and actions. I think of the path between dependent, independent and interdependent being a continuum. Probably the easiest way to visualize it is as a line with dependent at the far left, independent someplace in the middle and interdependent is at the far right.
I’ve yet to meet someone who is living completely interdependent life. Of course, there are lots of people I’ve not met yet.
Your Friendly Coaching Assignment:
Where are you on the continuum of living a dependent, an independent and an interdependent life? What I find is that the answer depends on which part of my life I’m thinking about. You may find the same is true for your too. If that’s the case, answer the question for each part of your life. I’m sure your answer(s) will be interesting.
Are there parts of your life that you’d like to move more toward independent or interdependent? This can be a tough question to answer for a lot of people because we aren’t really sure if such a change is possible or we might be plain afraid of the consequences of such a change.
If you answered “no” to the last question, good for you! Chances are great that you’re comfortable with your life exactly as it is now. That’s a wonderful thing!
If you answered “yes” to the last question, get ready for an adventure! Figuring out how to realize more of your own power is the greatest adventure anyone can take. You’ll discover so much about yourself that you’ll be in awe of whom you truly are and who those around you are. That’s been true for me anyway. I also know that it’s not always the easiest adventure to undertake and yet every time I move from dependence to independence and then to interdependence I am ALWAYS happy I have.
Happy adventuring!
I’m Dr. Karen Finn, a divorce and personal life coach. I help people just like you who are dealing with the stress and pain of divorce. You can join my newsletter list for free weekly advice.