Power, Agency, and the Courage to Let Clients Lead

The moment a divorcing client looks at us and says, “Just tell me what to do,” it can feel almost cruel not to step in with the answer. But that impulse is exactly where ethics, skill, and real transformation live. We sit down with Andrea Hips, LCSW and certified divorce coach, to talk about power, agency, and why “being the expert” can quietly become the fastest way to take power away from the person we’re trying to help.

We get specific about the difference between power and control, and why divorce makes people chase certainty like it’s oxygen. When a client clings to one outcome, we unpack what they’re really reaching for: safety, stability, and relief from overwhelm. From there we move into practical coaching tools for conflict-informed divorce coaching and alternative dispute resolution minded support, including how to slow down decisions under legal pressure, how to build distress tolerance, and how to help clients act wisely while uncertainty stays right beside them.

We also name the subtle ways coaches can unintentionally influence choices through tone, affirmations, and question framing. Andrea shares a simple North Star: there are many right answers, and hindsight isn’t something you can buy today. Protecting client agency is not a “nice to have” in divorce coaching, it’s the standard that builds capacity, reduces escalation, and helps clients leave coaching stronger than they arrived.

If you care about ethical divorce coaching, client autonomy, and decision making in high-conflict divorce, listen through and take notes. Subscribe, share this with a coach or friend going through divorce, and leave a review with the biggest shift you’re taking from the conversation.

Learn more about DCA® or  any of the classes or events mentioned in this episode at the links below:

Website: www.divorcecoachesacademy.com
Instagram: @divorcecoachesacademy
LinkedIn: divorce-coaches-academy
Email: DCA@divorcecoachesacademy.com

Transcript

Power Versus Control Defined

SPEAKER_01 0:39

Welcome back to Divorce Coaches Academy Podcast. I am Tracy. And here's something I've been sitting with lately. One of the most powerful things a divorce coach can do is resist the urge to be powerful. That sounds counterintuitive, right? But when a client walks in feeling like their whole life has been turned upside down, and they look at us and say, just tell me what to do. The temptation to step in and take charge is real. And I would argue that how we respond in that moment defines the kind of professional we are. So today we are going to go deep on power agency and why protecting our clients' ability to make their own decisions is not just good practice. It is the ethical backbone of conflict-informed divorce coaching. And today, I am thrilled to welcome Andrea Hips to the show to break all of this down with me. Andrea, for those of you that do not know her, is a licensed clinical social worker, a certified divorce coach, an author, and a speaker who helps people navigate love, family, and high-stakes transitions, my favorite words, with clarity and confidence. Through her coaching and teaching, she supports clients in creating healthier connections, handling those conversations that nobody wants to have, and moving forward, even in the trickiest situations. Andrea, welcome. I am so glad to have you here. Thank you. I'm glad to be here. All right. So Andrea is a frequent flyer in our case consultation and has been such an massive supporter and advocate for the field of divorce coaching. So this is really, really exciting. And Andrea just reminded me that she was actually on one of our first podcasts. So I am so happy and honored to have you back almost 200 episodes later. So before we dive in, right, I want to set the stage a little. This month at DCA, we've sort of been focused on this theme of power and divorce. And not power the way most people think of it, not who gets the house or who controls the narrative. We're sort of talking about something much deeper, right? How clients reclaim their own sense of personal agency during one of the most destabilizing experiences of their lives. And I absolutely think you're the perfect person to explore this with. So I want to just dive in. When we talk about power in divorce coaching, what does that mean to you? And how is that, if you will, different from control?

SPEAKER_00 3:17

Power is very internal and control is very external. So if I need to control things, it often means that I need to have all of my external circumstances lining up in a way that creates a sense of peace for me. That is an impossibility in divorce. You just simply don't get to control those things. Power, it puts it back in an internal spot where I can start to have choice and possibility and sort of maximize my nimbleness regardless of whether or not my circumstances are lighting up in a way that make me feel comfortable.

SPEAKER_01 3:52

Right. Right. So that distinction, right? I think so many people walking into the divorce process have only experienced sort of power in the sense of something that someone holds over someone or themselves, right? And it can have a really big adversarial connotation. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:11

And I think there's a the the impression of power is very different, right? We can all sit around one person and have a varying experience of whether or not that person has power over us. So it becomes a very personal journey to be able to detect your own threat of someone having power over you and to relocate it again inside of yourself.

SPEAKER_01 4:28

Yeah. And the other thing I often see power in is sort of this power over somewhat dominating the outcome, right? Trying to power through it, I like to say, right? And I think it's really about being grounded enough to participate in shaping the outcome without trying to power that outcome, right? And I think that's fundamentally a different orientation. How we model that for our clients, I think is significant in the way we reframe or help clients or bring awareness to that process.

SPEAKER_00 5:00

Absolutely. Yeah. And I do think that power often comes from the sense of I'm controlling the process. And so those two playing together power and control. The power really comes from can I participate in the process in a way that uses the maximum, maximum amount of my own agency in it while also not needing to control the other players as they walk their own process. Yes. Yes, exactly.

Why Certainty Feels Like Power

SPEAKER_01 5:23

I love that. So here's something I see constantly, and I'm curious whether this shows up in your work too. Why do clients often equate certainty or specific outcomes with power?

SPEAKER_00 5:35

I think in part because it feels safer to know what's going on. But the shift that as coaches, at least as a coach that I'm trying to make for people, is to understand that real power comes from the ability to act and move in uncertainty. I think people put together power and certainty as two concepts that live really close to each other. And they do. I mean, that it that does make it easier. But what we're learning how to do as divorce coaches is teach people how to have power while having a great deal of uncertainty right next to it.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

Yeah, it makes so much sense, right? And I think this is where sort of those conflict dynamics really come into play, right? Because when somebody is in the middle of divorce, that uncertainty is huge. It can be really, really overwhelming and that ground, that foundation is shifting underneath them, right? And that our brain, our stress response sort of response to that threat by trying to seek control, right, of something predictable, something that feels safe, right? So when clients say something like, you know, I need to know I'm getting the house, what they're often really saying is, is I think I need to feel like I have some footing here.

SPEAKER_00 6:45

Right, right. And I and and separating the outcomes from the feelings that we're attempting to get after really helps us have a lot more choices in what it is that we're selecting, right? So the great thing that Divorce Coaches Academy is so gifted at is really driving coaches to consider their clients' desired outcomes and to always be tying things back to that. And I think in the case of power, you're really trying to help people understand that your real power is your ability to move and consider options without the level of certainty that you're used to.

When Clients Say Tell Me What To Do

SPEAKER_01 7:18

Yeah. And I think along with that, right, we kind of talk about this concept of distress tolerance, right? That we can work towards that desired outcome and kind of sit with that discomfort, if you will, that there may be some uncertainty and not pushing to resolve it, right? Again, powering through, which then may not be aligned from a values perspective or for a general outcome process. So, all right, let's talk about what might be the most common request any divorce coach hears. I hear it. I'm sure you hear it. Just tell me what to do. Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me. So, Andrea, right? We we like to talk about a DCA sort of keeping our superhero caves in the closet. And and sure, we are in essence experts. Are we not? We're experts, right? I pretty much know exactly what my client should be doing, right? But how do we support clients in that moment without steering their decisions, right? When there's this help me, help me, we have we have information that they need, but not not taking that away from them.

SPEAKER_00 8:32

Yeah, I I always start with a ton of empathy because there is uh it makes a lot of sense that if you have a rash and you go to a doctor, the doctor will tell you what to do with the rash. And so if you're coming to a divorce coach and you have a divorce, you expect them to tell you what to do. And so any, and you're looking at me as an expert in it, I'm presenting in a way that feels hopefully very trustworthy. And so you can just say, please fix it for me. So I have a lot of empathy for just wanting someone to take over and start to make those decisions for you. But I start with a reminder that borrowing my impression of their lives and their situation, borrowing my impression is actually a reduction in power in the long term from for them. They have to create trust and interpret their own impressions alongside me. And I'm happy to participate in that, but in a short-term way, right? In a short-term way, I can sort of frame their situation with them, but they can only borrow my impression for so long. Otherwise, I'm shut shortcutting their growth. I'm shortcutting their growth by handing out answers. What I want to do is sort of help them understand that even with the tremendous amount of overwhelm that they're experiencing, they can still make those decisions. And sometimes I'll relate it to parenting, right? So kids sometimes borrow their parents on their way to creating their own character values, right? It's an okay thing to do. I do it for you, I do it with you, I watch you do it, right? But as a coach, we're wanting to sort of very quickly get out of that I'm doing it for you and start with I'm doing it with you, and then I'm watching you do it.

SPEAKER_01 10:02

Yeah. For you versus with you. As a person who trains new coaches, I really think that this is one of the hardest concepts to develop, right? Absolutely. And I want to have empathy for us as coaches, right? In addition to having empathy for our clients, us in this work, right? I have empathy for you because I get it. You came to do this work, right? And when somebody is sitting across from you in total distress and they're asking you to lead, everything wants to step in there, right? And take the weight off their shoulders, relieve them from this. But that's not what we do as dispute resolution uh professionals. That's really directing. And I think borrowing that creates that opportunity that I'm going to support you. Because I also have seen, no offense, some professionals out there, but I have seen individuals be like, oh, well, no, talk to your attorney. Oh, no, you need to go talk to somebody else. And then they almost like take away, go to the other end of that continuum, right? Where they're like, Well, I can't actually help you with anything. No, we we actually supporting the clients and helping them, both in skill development and education processes, we're just not doing it for them. Right.

SPEAKER_00 11:18

And I I think some of that job is we're we're, in a sense, we're sort of filtering their lived experience in a way that we can help feed it back to them, that it gives them a framework for understanding themselves, right? So if I've met with you a few times and I understand I'm naturally made anxious by this, and this is the thing that causes me to feel most powerful, I can summarize that for people and put them in a decision-making place more quickly than they might have been able to do on their own, because I'm able to sort of distill their essence, their character, their values, their outcomes back to them and set the structure for them.

Hidden Ways Coaches Steer Choices

SPEAKER_01 11:51

Right. And I like to think of it as sort of pulling some of the webs away because also our clients are ingrained in some of these limiting beliefs or or processes that aren't really being helpful to them in that situation. So, so sort of staying on this thread still, right? And this one might be a little uncomfortable, but I think it's certainly worth going there because why not? Right? What do you see as some subtle ways that divorce coaches can unintentionally influence a client's choices, even with really good intentions?

SPEAKER_00 12:24

Yeah. Well, I I think we have to understand from the outset that just positionally, as divorce coaches, we're already in a position to be perceived as having the answers. And so we have to share the stage with some intention in order to level it.

SPEAKER_01 12:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

Right. On one hand. Well, on the other hand, being the trained professional that was hired, right? Because we're not just your buddy that's here to sort of listen and uh-huh you on the way to your to your answers. So I think a lot of things influence that message, in part simply how you listen from your gasps, from your affirmations, from your word to and for me, the work has been to really reassure my clients that there are a lot of right answers. I think people going through divorce get the sense that there's one way. And the one way is a mystery, and they're missing it, and their attorney is hiding it, and they can't figure it out, and they're maybe in the former partner is is disturbing it. But in fact, there are a lot of right answers. And here's what we can't buy. Hindsight. In six months, you may have made a different decision about what you would have wanted done today. That's only because you have six months more of information lived experience. So we're doing the best we can with what we have, and there are many right answers for us to choose from.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

Yeah, I love that. I love that you said that because I think it's a professional blind spot often that doesn't get sort of talked about enough. And I think it's really significant. You talked a lot about listening, right? And and how we frame questions and supporting clients in that discovery process. We, in essence, are creating opportunities for our clients, right, to look at some of those limiting beliefs, to create reality testing and looking at barriers and potential impacts. So we actually are trying to almost create that future-focused process that they may not have. Yes, if they were six months down the road, they have that information. We're actually trying to create their awareness of the possibility of that information from a different place. And I think that's really important. I also think something that we kind of alluded to that I think is essential here is adhering to professional standards for coaches to stay within their scope of practice would be an unfamiliar day for me to go on to LinkedIn and see somebody kind of saying something that a divorce coach crossed over a line of legal advice or financial information. So I think also being able to stay within our scope, understanding our direction, our ability to support clients, that we don't need to be in the advice-giving lane. Our lane is so, so important in recognizing helping clients expand their own awareness to be able to make decisions autonomously.

SPEAKER_00 15:13

And I like the word, I like the verb brokering. I'm really brokering them to information. I'm not giving them answers as much as I am. These are things you may not be aware that are possibilities for you. And I'm brokering you to those possibilities. I'm not necessarily indicating which one's going to be the right one for you. Yes.

Slowing Down To Regain Power

SPEAKER_01 15:30

Yes. All right. So let's shift into something practical because I love practical for all of our listeners. What is what is slowing down actually look like when clients are feeling pressured to decide quickly? And there are a lot of time constraints and recognition of divorce that clients may not have control over. Uh, as we talk about control, right? We often talk about our legal system, our court processes. Sometimes there are things that decisions will have to be made, but what is slowing down sort of look like when clients are feeling pressured?

SPEAKER_00 16:02

I love to remind clients that delays are where the real power is in divorce. Whoever delays the most has the most power. So what they often think is I need to hurry up and catch up because all of the people in power have are doing something to me, when in fact the delay itself, not sort of as a as a power tactic or something that's sort of used to wound or or or make more difficult the process, it's just an awareness that you can slow down. And if you slow down, the whole process does actually slow down with you. There isn't a big thing that's happening outside of you that you don't have influence over. So that that's a big part of it. And then again, being able to sit in uncertainty long enough to discern is an art. And it's a particularly hard art when you're going through divorce and you have a ton of anxiety about your process. But I like for people to know that slowing down gives you the chance to uh steady what feels like a process that is out of your hands and put it back in your hands. This process is very easily mentally co-opted by attorneys, the court, the legal uh missives that you're getting in your email, your partner's threats, your children's anxiety, all of those things again make us feel like we need to get control. We don't need control. We need to have power. We need to have the power that says I can direct my process at the speed that gives me the most comfort with the information that I need to make the best decisions for me and my family going forward.

SPEAKER_01 17:25

Yeah, I think that is gold, right? Pressure to move fast is everywhere in divorce. Yes. And you mentioned it, right? Attorneys have deadlines, co-parents have logistics, right? Emotions are running high. There are all these factors. This is perfect storm, right? Which it feels like I have to make a decision right now. And if I don't, something bad's gonna happen. And being part, I think part of our role as divorce coaches is really to allow, we just said that, right? To sit with some of that uncertainty, to be able to get information, to be able to ensure that it is informed, an intentional response rather than a reaction. And and that's where we play a lot in terms of this conflict engagement, right? Because as decisions are rushed into without that process of really thinking it through, more than likely conflict is gonna escalate rather than the issue being resolved.

SPEAKER_00 18:23

So and I think you're you're operating in a system that has very little empathy for the emotional experience of your process, right? So there are there are there are attorneys and situations that are disregarding of dates because they're just doing a job. They don't realize that there's an emotional context to you making decisions at the speed that they're asking you to make them at. And I think you can start to feel small or at times stupid for not being able to access your own opinions a little bit quicker and always remind people this is just going to work for everybody else. But for you, it's your life. And you need to remind yourself and other people of that sometimes so that they're not sort of carried away in the the function of getting this divorce done when it has such an impact on you.

SPEAKER_01 19:09

Absolutely. So slowing down is not passive, it is actually one of the most active intentional things we can support our clients with to create that space, if you will. And in that space lives some additional clarity. And and to me, durability. I we like to talk about durability in these situations. Does that feel consistent?

SPEAKER_00 19:34

But I I think when you're having to do that, we're being asked, or as coaches, we're asking our clients to become project managers in a system that they are often the least informed person in, right? If I get hired as a project manager and money, that's great enough. I typically am hired because I have a familiarity with all of the different networks that I'm trying to weave together to create a product. You're the project manager, you don't know anything about the law, you don't know anything about spousal support, you don't know anything about co-parenting, you don't know anything, and yet you're the hub. It just feels really uncomfortable for people. But we have to keep equipping them to stand in that role with more confidence, with more power and get comfortable in a really weird role.

Building Trust In An Internal Voice

SPEAKER_01 20:16

Yeah, yeah. I love that. They are. If you've never done this before, you're learning and you're learning fast, and you feel really over. Yeah. Yeah. So how do you help clients shift from constantly looking outward for direction to trusting, trusting their own internal voice, right? As we're saying this, they're they're already set up, they're somewhat ill-equipped for a lot of this. Support clients and in trusting their voice, their internal, internal messaging system.

SPEAKER_00 20:47

Yeah, as coaches, I feel like we have this really beautiful and rare front row seat to the breaking and remaking of our clients. And no one else has that role. Nobody else gets to sit in the front seat of the theater watching them do this on stage. There are people who are in the back in the dark with their popcorn, you know, watching, but we're the people who are really up front. And so I always want in all of my sessions to give a tremendous amount of applause for what I'm noticing. Because uh, you know, you remember the book The Gap in the Game, where it talks about our brains only notice the gap from where we are to where we need to be. We have very little familiarity with celebrating how much we've gained along the way. And I like for people when I'm building those kinds of things to be able to trust in their internal direction. Do you remember that when I met you, this was the situation, and now you can do this? You couldn't do X and now you do Y. I'm amazed, right? I I have to be the person who feeds back and says, Act one, you really nailed it. We can keep building on this. So it's almost being this um uh participant observer to say, you are actually growing, even though the situation hasn't resolved itself and maybe the characters have gotten a little more wild. You are doing well. And I feel like that's what helps to create a narrative that says, I and therefore I'll keep doing it.

SPEAKER_01 22:03

Yeah. And I really want to uh differentiate that from being a cheerleader. Absolutely. That's not what this absolutely, right? This is acknowledging and reflecting for them, so then then it becomes an ingrained process, right? Where cheering from the outside may be motivating, but not necessarily internally aligning, if you will, developing those skills of saying, okay, yes, this is what I did. We're gonna build upon that. That's where we're gonna go. And I I agree, I think this is where the real transformation happens, right? Because most clients don't come in because of all of The reasons we just talked about are not trusting themselves. Well, they and they've been in these systems, whether it's their marriage, family dynamic, or legal process itself. And that's kind of been dictating almost what they should think.

SPEAKER_00 22:54

Yeah, there's a there's a learning framework that talks about everybody starts when they're learning a new thing in unconscious incompetence. I don't know how bad I am at it. And coaching usually wakes us up to, right, when we learn our conflict styles. Now I have conscious incompetence. I'm really aware that I'm not doing it very well. And then as we move through the the quadrants, we move into conscious competence. I have to work really hard at doing it well. And then we end in unconscious competence, which is just I do it naturally well. And I think as a coach, I'm always showing people you didn't know to now you know, and it's really hard. And oh my gosh, you just moved into you're doing it and you're aware that you're doing it. That kind of momentum, I feel like, is important for people to see too, because they have many of them quite a steep hill to walk when it comes to transforming how they interact with someone who's difficult, asserting themselves in an environment that they know nothing about, making plans for a future that totally frightens them. You're doing a lot of moving through that quadrant. And I feel like that's a helpful framework for people to teach.

SPEAKER_01 23:59

Yes. Right? Which we're we're talking about power and control, which we sort of started with this, right? So so what signals tell you that a client is genuinely moving towards that real autonomy in their decision making?

SPEAKER_00 24:12

What are you seeing? I see that they are able to interrupt their own patterns and they know the antidote to them. So I'll have people say sometimes, sometimes I think, gosh, if I was talking to Andrea, what would she say to me right now? It's not so much that I want them to remember what I would say to them, but that they're interrupting what they would say to themselves. Notice that I'm in a pattern and I want to shift it. And if I do, and I have a jingle that I sing to all my clients, which is in order to get new places, we have to do new things. And I want that jingle to be a part of that interruption too, which is I have to do the new thing, which is what again, what is it that I have to do? That's when I notice that they're starting to get real autonomy, is they're pushing back and have an awareness that the pattern that they're about to repeat is not the one that they actually want to do. And they know the antidote to it as well.

Why Protecting Agency Is Ethical

SPEAKER_01 25:00

Yes, something right that is happening to me versus something that I'm doing. Often we see clients in this space of and I have no control because it's happening to me and shifting on. I love that, especially in in relationship to identity. Okay, so last question, right? And it's an important one from an ethical and professional standpoint. Why is protecting client agency so central to divorce coaching, the work that we do in divorce coaching?

SPEAKER_00 25:29

I really love this question because I think we, as divorce coaches, one of our primary roles is as capacity builders. And when we give out answers, we are diminishing the possibility of our clients developing more and more capacity to handle their own lives. And I love being in that role where I take to, you know, start with someone who's who's this size, and over time and coaching, they expand to be this person who can handle so much uncertainty and so much confusion and still think for themselves and create solutions for themselves at work.

Where To Find Andrea And DCA

SPEAKER_01 26:05

Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's the kind of thread that runs through everything we've talked about today, right? Because if we're serious, if we are serious as a profession about being conflict informed, you know, this is my new language, I'm trending it. So anybody else want to get in there? Conflict informed. We've spent a lot of time talking about trauma-informed. I am now all about conflict informed. So if we're going to show up as conflict-informed professionals and we're serious about being part of this alternative dispute resolution space and not just the support and encouragement lane. Again, we talked a bit about that, then protecting our clients' agency is a non-negotiable. It's not a nice to have. It's got to be the standard, right? Because when we protect clients' right to choose, which there is often so much in this space, so much noise of people choosing for them, right? We protect the integrity of the entire process. We talk about this, right? That self-actualization. We can reduce conditions for escalation. And we model the very thing that our clients need to practice. That's respect for another person's autonomy as well. Yeah, which is even harder. Andrea, it has been such a valuable conversation. I want to thank you for bringing your insight and your experience and your honesty to these questions. So, for our listeners, where can people learn more about you? Because I know you have your Monday moments, but people might not know that. So, how can they find you?

SPEAKER_00 27:38

On Instagram and the internet as Andrea Hoop's divorce coach. And again, so grateful for all the work that DCA does to make sure that we are delivering the best kind of support to people with the most kind of need.

SPEAKER_01 27:51

Thank you. Thank you so much. And to everyone listening at this conversation, got you thinking about what kind of divorce coach you want to be. Do you want to be conflict informed or the kind of training you're looking for? I'd love for you to explore our offerings and what we're building on Divorce Coaches Academy. We train divorce coaches to do this work at a professional level, grounded in conflict theory, aligned with an ADR framework and committed to the standards that make this feel credible. So I want to thank you all so much for joining us, Andrea. Until next time, you're definitely coming back. Thank you again. This is lovely. Thanks.