00:00 

Hey there and welcome to Intentional Living with Tanya Hale. This is episode number 221, "How to Handle Your Friend's Divorce." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. This is Tanya Hale and I'm your host for Intentional Living. 

00:22 

Well, hello there, my dear friends. Thank you for joining me here today. I am so glad to have you here in my closet as I record this podcast. Next big item on my to-do list is to get me some office furniture so I can set up shop. Alright, in the meantime I love what I've got to share for you today because it's come up several times and I know that I struggled with part of this. I struggled with it before I got divorced and then after I got divorced I struggled with it from the other side, and so I want to talk to you today about how to handle your friend's divorce. 

01:07 

Now divorce can be really tricky. When it's your own divorce, it's all sorts of emotional, emotionally complicated. You worry so much about your children and how they're going to work through the challenges and the changes. You stress about money and you wonder if you're going to have enough to cover even just the basics, the housing and the food and the utilities. Depending on your circumstance you may worry about whether your soon to be ex-spouse will fulfill their financial and/or their parental obligations. There is often a lot of worry about how people will judge you and what people will say. It took me a long time to get to the point that I was okay with being labeled as someone who was divorced, in part, honestly because of all the judgment that I had had over the years about other people who got divorced. And I anticipated that same kind of judgment coming toward me. I used to have a lot of judgment and a lot of thoughts about divorce. 

02:09 

I know that a few years before I got divorced, things were still, or before I realized that divorce was imminent, I had a friend who got divorced, and I remember thinking, "oh, come on. If I can make it work, they can make it work." Because my situation was pretty tough, and what I realized now, looking back, is, for one, I wasn't working. I wasn't making it work. We were surviving. We were doing the things, but we were not making it work. And second, I have no idea how much someone else is going through and how hard they've worked and what they've done. I have no idea. It's none of my business. I know that I used to wonder whose fault it was. Like, what's going on? Like, whose fault was it? Right? But I'll tell you what, now that I'm in the divorce camp, I see it from a very, very different perspective. And that only makes sense, right? One reason going through tough things like divorce is good for us is because it helps us to develop clarity and compassion and charity. 

03:25 

I've heard a lot of people say, and I probably said myself, no doubt, "so and so is getting divorced, and I'm not sure how to handle it." It feels like it can be really tricky to know how to navigate a friend's or a sister's or a parent's or a child's divorce. And if you've ever felt this way, I'm going to break things down for you here in this podcast and help you know how to handle it. Okay? Step one, you don't handle it. The divorce is not yours to handle, my friend. Okay, now, lest that seem really simple, and you're just wishing that I would keep talking because you want to listen to me more, let's chat a little bit more about this concept that "it's not yours to handle." To be honest, unless you have been intimately involved with one of the marriage partners, this divorce doesn't have anything to do with you. 

04:18 

Now, this is not to say that you don't love one or even both of the people a lot. And it's not to say that you don't want to be supportive. What I am saying is that it is not yours to fix. It's not yours to be responsible for. It's not yours to wonder about and stress about and feel anxiety about. It's also not yours to judge. You really have nothing to do with the divorce, so we can start by letting that go. Okay, that may seem like a weird kind of shift, but I want you to realize that first of all, let go. So let's start here. You have no control and no responsibility for the people going through the divorce. What you do have responsibility for is you and only you. And you get to decide how you and only you show up as a friend when someone you love gets divorced. It's intriguing to me that people have a much better sense about how to respond to someone when their spouse dies. They rally around, they all give hugs and let them know they're available if they need anything, they support them by taking meals by and taking care of household chores for a while. People call to check up on them to make sure they're managing the grief okay, they take them out to lunch, right? You get the idea and you've seen it happen and isn't that a brilliant part of our society, that we reach out to people who are hurting like that and who are struggling? When a spouse dies, people don't disappear generally. In fact, in many instances, people appear. We know how to do death, but we're still learning how to do divorce. Even as prevalent as divorce is in our society, we're still learning how to do it. 

06:17 

For many people, when they get divorced, people disappear. A lot of people ignore the fact that the divorce has happened and they don't mention it at all. At times, people you don't know very well will want to talk to you just so that they can get the scoop. They want to find out all the sort of details. "Who did what" and why you got divorced and all that stuff. Sometimes people you were in regular contact with stop contacting you at all. At church, some people will see you or at the store and intentionally turn and take another path to avoid talking to you. Very few people will ask you how you're doing and if there's anything you need. I know this not just from my own experience, but from talking to a lot of people who have gotten divorced. Sometimes people you used to go do things with as a couple stop inviting you because, well, now you're not a couple. And divorce can sometimes feel very isolating. You've just stepped away from being in a marriage where there was another person, even if it was dysfunctional. And now people are stepping away from you because now you're divorced. Now you're even more by yourself, right? Now this is the thing. I don't think people step away because you're divorced. It's not like you have a disease and people know that. What I believe is happening is that people are really uncomfortable with the divorce. And the easiest way to manage that discomfort is to step away so they don't have to feel the discomfort and they don't have to handle it. Which brings me back to the original question, how do you handle your friend's divorce? 

08:04 

So let's start here: recognize your own discomfort about the divorce and work to handle that. So this is the amazing thing about life. Everything becomes about us. Now, not in a narcissistic or a selfish way, but in a way that says, all I can control is me. So I'm going to work my hardest to show up as the best version of me. So just as a divorce can be an incredible opportunity for those getting divorced to see and understand things about themselves and to grow in a significant way, so can someone else's divorce give you an opportunity as well to learn and grow into a better version of you? One of the first things to understand is why you feel uncomfortable and start working through it. So discomfort is a feeling and our feelings are created by our thoughts. So if we want to figure out why we feel uncomfortable, we need to discover the thought behind it. So ask yourself, what is the thought creating the discomfort? So here are a few ideas of what your thoughts may be. "I don't know what to say." Okay, so let's look at this thought a little bit more closely. Very likely the thought behind this thought is, "I don't want to make them feel uncomfortable in some way," whether that's whether you're judging or whatever, right? We don't want to make them feel uncomfortable. I can promise you that you avoiding your friend feels way more uncomfortable than if you said something awkward. 

09:45 

Another thought that could be behind," I don't know what to say" is," I don't want to look stupid or unsympathetic or judge y." So instead, we avoid them and we don't say anything and then we come across as unsympathetic or judge-y. It's interesting, isn't it, that these thoughts turn the situation back on us, focusing on our discomfort. "I don't want to come across as unsympathetic or judge-y." This is very normal and it's a totally, totally human thing to do. So let's give ourselves some space for compassion and humanness. Okay, of course you may not know what to say. Here's how to work through that thought: decide what kind of person you want to be. Most people I know want to be loving and kind. They want to be compassionate and understanding. And most of us know how to do this. We just get a little bit freaked out sometimes, right? So ask yourself, "what would a loving person say? What would love look like? How can you show this person that you love them?" Love would sound something like, "hey friend, I love you and I'm sure this is difficult for you." "Friend I've been thinking so much about you, how are you?" "Friend, can I give you a break for an afternoon and watch your children?" "Friend, I go walking early in the mornings, would you like to join me?" Love would look like dropping by to give them a hug and let them know you're thinking of them. Love would look like diverting your path at church or at the store to get a chance to chat with them. Love would look like inviting them to still come to your night out. Love would look like reaching out to help with the often new and daunting list of chores that need to be done to keep the house up and running. We forget there sometimes used to be two people doing this and now one person is doing it all and sometimes that's overwhelming. Love would look like a text that makes them laugh. Love would look like it was showing up the same way it did before the divorce. 

12:00 

Here's another idea about what might be creating your discomfort. You may think you have to choose sides. But guess what? You do not have to choose a side at all. If you've been good friends with both people in the divorce, continue to be friends with both people. You don't have to choose sides. I promise that you can love both people at the same time. It's like when two of your kids are having a huge fight. You still love them both. It's not like you choose sides with your kids and think, well, I love you and I don't love you. We love them both. Okay, in many instances, probably every instance, both people are pretty scraped up and hurting. And they may both tell you how they're hurting. Venting and getting the info out there is one way for people to process what's happening to them and figuring out how they want to move forward. They may need to just vent and talk. You can let them vent and be compassionate and even empathetic and still realize that this is not your situation to handle. You don't have to have answers or even offer solutions. You don't have to have the skills of a life coach or a counselor. You don't even have to believe their story in order to be compassionate. You just have to know that they believe their story. Love would listen. Love would create space. Love would know that they are hurting and very possibly aren't seeing everything with clarity yet. But love will give them the space to work through it, to talk through it, to start to figure it out and love will not judge them for their pain and their struggle and for where they are. Your job in this is not to manage what they are thinking and doing. Your job is to manage your mind around what is going on in your head. 

14:04 

What thoughts could you be thinking? Here's some just off the top of my head. "They're so delusional if they think this divorce will fix them." "They could have tried harder." "They should just get over this already." "They don't understand how hard it will be to be divorced." "They're not solving a problem with this divorce." "I wonder who's to blame? Her husband is just so nice. I can't figure it out." "Well, you can't work full time and be so successful as a woman and not have divorce be on the table. Making more money than your husband will always be a problem." 

14:45 

Okay, get your thoughts out of your head and onto paper and then question them. So sit down, write down all your thoughts...just take five ten minutes write down all your thoughts about the divorce and do not edit them. Put them down. We cannot see them until they're out on the table and if we're pretending we're better than we are by not writing down the one thought that sounds really bad...guess what? You're not going to be able to fix it Okay, we have to put all, the good, the bad, the ugly, out on the table. So get them all in paper and then we're going to start questioning them and we're going to question them hard. Are they really true? Do you really know that they should have tried harder or should be over the pain by now? We really know very very very little about what experiences and thoughts and beliefs play into a person's life decisions. We can ask a million questions and still not even scratch the surface. 

15:52 

So how do you handle your friends divorce? You recognize and name your own discomfort. You identify the thoughts that are creating the discomfort. You poke holes in those thoughts. Start to see where those thoughts are false and faulty. You accept that your only work here is to show up as the best version of yourself, to show up in love and ask yourself "What would love do and then you do it?" So just FYI, love will not judge, blame, or criticize. Love will accept, acknowledge, listen, support, validate, share, hold hands, give a hug, show up, speak kindly, not speak at all, text, invite, laugh with, cry with. When someone you love is getting divorced, it's a great opportunity for you to learn how to stay in your own lane. Let them handle their own divorce, while you are handling showing up as the best version of you...the version who is loving and kind and compassionate and understanding. 

17:29 

This, my friends, is the best gig in the world. Growing up into middle age, love it so much. I love understanding these kinds of concepts at a deeper level that just were not available to me when I was younger, just because I didn't have the experience and the insight and the understanding. So thank you so so much for joining me here today. I hope this was helpful and if you know someone whose friends are getting divorced, send this to them if they're struggling, feeling uncomfortable with it. And if you know someone who is getting divorced, I will tell you I have been doing a lot, a lot of coaching people who are considering divorce, who are really trying to figure out "is this the right choice for me" and I will tell you, I am loving this coaching right now and I am so good at coaching people and helping them step into their best selves before they make that decision to get divorced, which is the only way that we can really make a strong powerful decision that we can have our own backs on. So if you know someone who is contemplating divorce and struggling, I'm a great life coach option for them to work with to help them clean up so much stuff so that they can see clearly and make a better decision. I'm really loving the coaching that I'm doing in this arena right now. 

19:03 

And just last: loving the content? Share it with a friend, please. You can either share it in person, you can send the link to a friend, you can get on and leave me a review which helps other people to find my podcasts. Let's just keep sharing and helping people be better versions of themselves. I'm so passionate about this work because I know how much coaching has impacted my life for the better. I'm in such a good place right now, and best place in my life, and it's attributed to coaching and the work that coaching has offered me and how coaching has helped me step into a better relationship with God, with Christ, with myself, and with other people. Brilliant work, my friends. I love it so much and I want to help you, so I'm so glad that you're here. Please continue to keep coming and I will talk to you next week. Bye! 

20:06 

Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation, be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win" Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week. Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya!