00:00 

Hey there, welcome to Intentional Living with Tanya Hale. This is episode number 291, "Divorce and Self-Worth." 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. 

00:19 

Hello there, my friends, welcome to the podcast. I am so glad to have you here with me today. Hey, before we get started, I just want to remind you I'm planning on doing a physical/emotional intimacy discussion group in March, so about the middle of February you're going to want to be listening up and even be on my mailing list if you are interested in that and want to find out all the deets. You can go to tanyahale.com. You can go to the "contact me," scroll down just a little bit and you can get on the list for my "weekend win," which is something that I send out to your email every week. Just a quick quick little message about life coaching stuff and I think they're really great, and I think they're good stuff. But as well, that's where I'm going to be putting out the bulk of the information and the links for how to how to sign up or find out the information that you want to about these groups. I'm playing with some different formats here that I haven't used before. I'm kind of thinking of a everybody scatters every work week and goes and learns Information in a place that feels amazing to you, and we bring it back to the group and we all share our amazing Information that we are learning about emotional and physical intimacy and how they work together. I know all of us have different ideas, different venues that speak to us, whether it be podcasts or books or whatever and there's so much great information out there. I would love to just have everybody bring stuff and share it. And I think it's going to be really great. So if you're interested in that kind of a discussion group where you can meet with other people who are also interested in the same stuff, you're going to want to get on my mailing list so that you can get that. 

02:08 

So today we are talking about divorce and self-worth. So first of all, if you are not divorced, there will still be some great stuff in here. I'm just going to be approaching this concept from a place of divorce. So I believe the most difficult decision I've ever made in my life was the one to get divorced. And without exception, personal exception, of people that I talk to, every person I can recall who has gotten divorced has felt the same. There were so many temporal situations to consider. How would the children fare with all of the changes? Would I have enough money after the divorce? Where would we all live? How do you engage with the former in-laws? How do you talk to them and do you get along with them? Do you not? Especially if they've been good friends and you've had a great relationship. There were also the societal ramifications to consider. Like what impact would the label of "divorce" have on me? How would my family respond? How would friends and people at church respond? Who would I hang out with? Who would I sit with at church? Who would I go to parties with? Which friends would distance themselves? 

03:16 

And then there are the emotional uncertainties that show up. How could I fail at something so important? Why couldn't I make this work? What is wrong with me? Am I lovable? Am I even capable of loving? I'm so broken. I don't know how to have a successful relationship. Who am I outside of being married? That's just heavy right there, right? Most of these questions and uncertainties come along, whether you were the person choosing to get divorced or whether you are the recipient of the divorce papers. 

03:51 

So either way causes you to question yourself at a core level that questions your worth and your value in a way that may not have been addressed before. There are so many questions and there is so much uncertainty when you get divorced and it can leave a person feeling pretty uncentered. And I believe many, if not all of the concepts, we're going to talk about today apply not just to divorce but anytime something big disrupts our regularly scheduled programming, or even if we have struggled to feel centered in our lives, even when big things aren't happening. So even if you're not getting divorced or are recently divorced, there will still be some concepts here that will resonate. I'm just going, as I mentioned before, just talking about them in the context of divorce. 

04:37 

So one of the biggest struggles I think many people encounter with divorce is a questioning of their self-worth. I think women in our generation were often taught that our worth in the world was attached to being married and having a family. Whereas men at church were often taught a more balanced view of having a career and then also being a husband and a father. As women, we were often taught that being a wife and mother was our highest calling, and if we chose to have a career, we were being selfish. And we should get a degree just in case our husbands died or something, but it's not really necessary. At least that's a huge part of the message that I received at church in the 70s and 80s, and societally as well, not just in church. So when our marriage and our family fall apart and we get divorced, our sense of self-worth can really take a hit because that's what we've been told is where our value lies. 

05:34 

So for me, I had to really get back to basics to reconnect with my value. I feel as though I always had a pretty good sense of my worth and I still felt a strong need to justify my decision and to prove to others that I was still a good person even though I was getting divorced. There was a lot of insecurity in other people accepting me and understanding me and giving me grace for now being a failure at the thing that should be the most important. Getting grounded again took me a bit of time and like I said, I feel like I started off with a pretty good self-worth footing. Many women struggle with self-worth much more than I did before the divorce, and getting their feet back on the ground can seem almost impossible at times. And when we add a lot of societal judgment for being divorced, it can sometimes feel as though just when we get a toe hold, we are shoved and pushed by someone's avoidance or insensitive comments. 

06:30 

Here's the important part of what we need to remember, though: what other people think and feel and do can impact us, ultimately, we are the ones responsible for our own self-worth. That is why it's called self-worth. It can only come from us, from ourselves. So whether your self-worth has taken a huge hit and is faltering, or you've always struggled to have self worth, one of the first things we need to do to get some good footing is seeing and accepting our value. One of the biggest players I regularly see around struggling self-worth is the idea that around being "good enough." We just never seem to hit that mark, do we? There's always something more that we can do to prove to God, to ourselves, and to others that we are valuable. And being a moving target, we never quite hit it. These constant reminders that we are always falling short, very easily noticeable in the physical realm. We are bombarded with information about how our body should look, how much we should weigh, how we should dress, better ways to do our makeup, exercises to help us have that flat stomach and sculpted shoulders, fix that super dated and drab hair. There is also so much information about how we messed up our kids and how we should have known better than to pop them on the bottom when they were being naughty, or how we should have never put them in timeout because that sent the message that we didn't love them if they weren't good. How every time we lost our cool we emotionally injured them and how all of their problems they have today are because of us. How they would all still be going to church if we had been more righteous in having prayers and going to church and doing family scripture study. Even though so much of what we did, that's now considered wrong, was what we were told was okay and even good parenting at the time. Right? There's just so much judgment over this. Continually we're being told that we should be the grandma who is always available, and yet we should also be the woman who is adding to the family finances now that the kids are grown by having an amazing career and doing great things there. 

08:44 

Okay, I could go on and on. And I know that we visited this before, but there is always a message that we are not good enough until we are perfect. And it's subtle and it's never said that plainly, but but it's there and I know you see it as well and you feel it as well that we're not good enough unless we're perfect. And unfortunately we have a tendency to press that message onto all of the people in our lives, our spouses and children most notably as well. So we start expecting, and even sometimes demanding, this perfectionist behavior. So how do we plant our feet on the solid ground of self-worth? 

09:28 

I think one of the first things we can do is to accept that our worth is not something we earn. There is no checklist of things that we can do that, when it's all checked off, we have worth. Our worth as humans is God-given. It is part of us whether we have done anything to earn it or not. Our worth exists just because God created us and gave us worth. So let's say I have a 

three-carat, pink diamond. Wouldn't that be beautiful, right? What would the diamond be worth if I put it in a ring setting? What would that diamond be, the exact same diamond, be worth if I put it in a necklace setting? What if I put it in a bag in the back of my sock drawer? Or what if I lost it out in the forest and it got buried in dirt and debris? What's the answer? It would always be worth the same. The value does not change based on circumstance and the diamond doesn't earn its value. 

It just is. And we are the same as well. Our value doesn't change whether we are married or divorced. The problem often is  that we just don't recognize it. It's like finding that diamond in a box of costume jewelry and thinking it's just a piece of glass. So we neglect it. We might throw it away or let the grandkids play with it. But just because we don't recognize it for what it is doesn't mean the value is less. So the question becomes, how do we really step into recognizing and accepting our value? 

11:05 

At some level, we just have to choose. We have to decide to believe. And this can be a struggle because our pattern thinking very often includes thoughts of worthlessness. "I'm so ridiculous. I'm so stupid. No wonder no one loves me. Oh, I'm such a bad mom. My hair is so ugly. I just can't get my life together. Why can't I get motivated to clean my house? I'll never be as good at cooking as her. Oh, I'm so bad at technology. I'm such a cry baby. I should put more time and effort into my calling. I'm such a loser. What is my problem? I don't have any self-control. I'm so fat and ugly, nothing looks good on me. You wouldn't want to get divorced if I was more lovable." Ugh, right? Does any of that sound familiar? If you've struggled with seeing your value, some form of those kinds of comments is going to resonate with you. So how do we change it? We just decide to. We choose to change it. 

12:14 

When those pattern thoughts come into your head, you get to first learn to be aware that they are showing up. Very likely they're coming into your thoughts, into your head, and you aren't even noticing them. It's like that ugly vase in the corner of your kitchen that has been there forever, but you don't even see it because it's been there for so long. We have to start cleaning out the corners of our brain and finding all of these detrimental thoughts, these hurtful thoughts. So learn to start paying attention to your thoughts. Hear what your brain is saying, and when you hear something unkind, say something. Just as you would call out one of your children for saying something unkind to another one of them, say something. Even saying, "that's not actually true" is helpful. You don't even need to counter it with the opposite positive thought. 

13:13 

So here's an interesting thing. I saw a study a few weeks ago talking about whether it was more important to have more positive thoughts or less negative thoughts. And through this study, they found that the answer was that it's more important to have less negative thoughts. So if you have a thought that you're stupid for not being able to figure something out right away, once you notice it, just call it out. Say something like, "that's not actually true." Just start noticing all of these hurtful, mean thoughts coming up. And then if you want, you could also add on, "you know, that's not true. I'll figure it out eventually," or "I'm smart enough to figure it out. It just might take a little bit more time." Notice the grace in these kinds of comments. But even just the awareness of the demeaning thoughts in your head and calling them out will help so much. If you wouldn't allow the statement from one of your children to another, it will be helpful to not allow it in your head to yourself either. Those things are unkind. They are hurtful and they are not true. And we do not need to be saying them to ourselves. We need to learn to be our own greatest cheerleader, not our biggest bully. 

14:35 

Alright. So here's another way we can start to recognize our value. Allow yourself to be a human. When did we start thinking that we are supposed to be super human, that we're supposed to do it all? Why is that even a thing? God sent us here to Earth knowing we were going to make a lot of mistakes. In fact, wanting us to make a lot of mistakes because that is how we learn and grow. He even sent a Savior to the world because He knew we would make mistakes and that we would need redemption from them. We were not sent here to be perfect, but rather we were sent here to be imperfect. He sent us into homes where our parents were imperfect, where we were living with siblings who are imperfect, going to school and work with imperfect people, with homes and cars and other things in our lives that are imperfect and that break down in a world that is in constant entropy, constantly moving toward disorder. Look at the world around us. It's amazingness comes from its entropy. The trees that lose leaves in the fall and then grow new ones in the spring. The plants that die and decompose and become fertilizer for new plants. The water that falls from the sky and gives life to the plants below. The volcanoes that erupt and create rich soil for plants to grow. The plants that produce seeds and then in their death, they release those seeds to create new plants. Isn't that amazing? This is the amazingness, the entropy of the world. The earth that God created lives in a state of breaking down and renewing itself. Why would we be any different? We weren't created to be perfect. 

16:20 

We were created to break down, to be in disorder, to fail and then to rise and create new life. Not a perfect life. The more we can embrace that God's plan for us is mistakes and growth, failure and then forward. The more that we can love God, the life we are living, the more that we can love ourselves and see value in our imperfect journey, whatever the path is that we  are taking. Embracing our humanity, really learning to deeply love our humanity, is an amazing way to see that we are enough, that our worth is great regardless of what we have checked or not checked off of our list this week, regardless of whether or not someone else chooses to love and accept us, regardless of whether we are married in a great healthy marriage or divorced. Okay, we have to love our humanity, which all of this then leads us to another way to step into our self-worth, really understanding that what others think or believe about us doesn't mean anything about us at all, and hence it means nothing about our value as a person. Other people do not determine our value, God already did that. 

17:39 

So often in life and especially before, during, and after divorce, we hear a lot of messaging about our value. Some of that's in our heads and some of that's from other people. Often our previous spouse may have told us, or may even currently be telling us, that we are unlovable, that we don't deserve to be loved, that we are worthless. We may see that they are choosing other people instead of us. They may push us aside for someone that seems a little bit more shiny and exciting, or at least 20 years younger, right? Okay, and that can feel overwhelming and hurtful and disheartening. And this is the time that it is so important to remember that what other people do or say doesn't have anything to do with us and everything to do with them. 

18:29 

Okay, so let me elaborate on that. When someone gets angry with you, yes, you might have put some behavior out there. But whether the person gets angry with that behavior has everything to do with how they think about the behavior and how they interpret the behavior. When someone tells you that you are unlovable, it isn't that you are not lovable. It's that they are unable or unwilling to love you for their own reasons. They may have a lot of judgment about how you are doing things, beliefs about what you should be doing differently, thoughts regarding your characteristics and imperfections. And they get to have every thought and belief and judgment that they want to have. It's just really important for us to realize that none of that has anything to do with us. Those things are theirs to own, not ours. 

19:22 

So this is not to say that we don't put actions in their circumstance line and sometimes we put really crappy actions in other people's circumstance line, but they still get to choose their thoughts and they may choose not to love us and that is their choice. But if you have had teenagers, you know that you can choose to love someone who behaves really badly. Okay, now we have our own work to do if we're putting really crappy actions in their circumstance line. We've got our own stuff to clean up. But if someone else tells us mean, horrible things about ourselves, including that we are unlovable, that has nothing to do with us. That has to do with their capacity to love. 

20:06 

Okay, another way that we can strengthen our self-worth in the divorce process is to step into responsibility. This means that we stop blaming the other person for all the things and we start looking at how we have been culpable in the dysfunction. This isn't saying that the other person hasn't been at fault. Both people have fault in almost every divorce. It is saying that when we choose to be self-reflective and see our own damaging contributions that our self-worth increases. Now, you may be wondering, how does self-worth increase when I see my own dysfunction and hurtful patterns of behavior? Isn't that a place for me to beat myself up and to think that I'm a horrible person? We can go there with our thoughts, but we're not going to, right? We're going to embrace our humanity, okay? But what this does when we take responsibility, it moves us out of being the victim. When we can only see our previous spouses' mistakes and problems, we tend to make them the villain of our story. "Oh, poor us, we have fallen prey to their insidious behavior," right? And when there is a villain, there is always a victim. And who is the victim? We are. And victims are notorious for being powerless, for being unable to change their situation, for needing someone else to change or do something in order for their circumstances to get better. And when we are in this disempowered situation, we will struggle with self-worth with seeing our value because we view ourselves as weak, as unable to change things, as having to depend on someone else to change our situation. 

21:55 

One of the strongest things you can do is get rid of the villain in your story. Many of us run around telling everyone about how victimized we have been by our previous spouse. When someone asks us how we're doing with the divorce, we robustly go into the latest story about how horrible our ex has been and how it's impacting our children. And aren't they just the worst? Hey, see how you've just made them the main character in your story? When they are the main character, they have all of the power. And your empowerment comes from getting rid of the villain in your story. Because without a villain, guess what? There's also no victim. When we can no longer see ourselves as the victim, a place where we are up to our eyeballs in problems, then we can start looking for the solutions, which then makes us the hero of our own story. When we look for solutions, we start moving forward. 

23:00 

So when someone asks you how you're doing, tell them how you are doing, not how your previous spouse is doing. Tell them about your exciting plans, about how you're figuring things out, about something you've learned lately that has you feeling amazing, about something you're doing that is moving you forward. Take your previous spouse out of the main character position and put yourself there. If you do need to mention something about your ex, they should be a minor, minor character in your story. Like the drive-by shot of someone stocking shelves in the grocery store, while you walk by. Learning to take responsibility and own your own hurtful behaviors will help you know how to grow and move forward and that will positively impact your self-worth. 

23:52 

Alright, okay, this is not an all-inclusive list, but these are some of the biggest things that come to my mind when we're talking about regaining a sense of value after such a big upheaval in our lives like divorce. So many dysfunctional behaviors are cleaned up when we really accept our worth, when we really see our value and live accordingly. It's a place of learning to love and respect us for being us, letting go of the checklist we have believed give us worth. And this deeper sense of self worth is an incredible blessing of growing up into middle age. 

24:32 

I love growing up into middle age, don't you? It is like the best time of my life. Figuring these things out, cleaning them out and being able to implement them into a relationship, is creating the most incredible relationship of my life. My husband and I are always just like floored and we always look at each other and say, "who gets this? Who gets this kind of a relationship?" And we go, well, "we do. Cause we've done a boatload of work or as my kids would say, a 'buttload' of work." So we can do this, you can do this. Step into these things, do not let your self-worth be irreparably damaged by somebody else. Step in, take control, take responsibility for who you are, for how you're showing up, for what you have done in the past and let's learn things and let's move forward. 

25:34 

Okay, that's gonna do it for this week. Just one more reminder, if you think that coaching might be a really great option for you, if you feel like you're ready to step into some coaching, I would love an opportunity to talk to you about how coaching works and also to give you an experience of what coaching can do for you. And so with that, I have just increased the time of my free consults from 30 minutes to 90 minutes. That gives us a lot of time to do some serious coaching to help you see 

things so that you can have this experience with coaching and go, "wow, that was amazing. I know now why I would want some coaching." Okay, it's good stuff. It's powerful stuff. And I want you to experience it. So you can go to tanyahale.com. You can go up the top. There's a tab that says "free consultation." Click on there. You have access to my calendar that is open for two weeks at a time. And you can sign up, and let's do some coaching and let's talk about how coaching can improve your life at a faster rate than you ever thought possible. Okay, have an amazing, amazing week, my friends. And I will see you next time. Bye. 

26:53 

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.