Welcome to the Stay or Go podcast, where we're changing the dialogue around divorce so that no woman ever stays in her marriage out of fear. Get ready to dispel myths, learn life-changing tools, and build a solid foundation in yourself from which to make your decision. And now your host, me, Britta Joe. Alrighty. Here we are, my loves, at this momentous moment for the podcast. I am trying so hard to be like grounded going into this episode, but I am gonna be honest, I'm pretty jazzed up and like squealy excited. Um I'm like, man, I was just, I was just, I was this excited too last week when I got to interview um the amazing Vanessa Kulik Price. That was just an incredible um episode. And it has just rolled right into this one with the excitement of this being my hundredth episode of the podcast. And I've really been trying this week to like let this sink in some. Those that know me, my my close friends, Quinn definitely knows this about me. I tend to kind of just always just moving, you know, moving to the next thing. And so as I was sitting this week a little bit with, okay, this is this feels like a big number. This feels like a big number and trying to like let it land of 100 episodes created, um, you know, out in the ethers of my brain, and then ultimately pulled down and threw me out into the podcast and shared with all of you. So I wanted to kind of have some fun here at the beginning of this episode, really get to, oh my God, I love it. A butterfly just flew over my window. Like, yes, all the magic, all the magic today. Um, I wanted to get to celebrate a little bit. I was like, how can I celebrate this with all of my podcast listeners? And so, to kick us off, for those of you that are watching this episode, yes, that is actually, in fact, the jumper from the podcast's show image. Um I have a funny story about this, y'all. So I first off, I love this jumper so much. I cannot even tell you how much I love this jumper. And for those of you that knew me way back when I did my photo shoot for that incredible image and for a lot of the images that I use throughout my marketing, um that romper, I just crushed it on that photo shoot. And I liked that romper so much, y'all, that I went and found it again on Poshmark. If, for those of you that don't know, Poshmark is like an online retail uh thrift store, basically, where people can resell their clothes. And I found this romper, it had to have been a couple years ago on Poshmark in a size medium. The romper that I had the original size in, I think was like an extra small. Um, and I was like, you know what? I'm gonna get this in a bigger size just to be safe. And y'all, we have reached that moment thanks to my trainer and this gorgeous ass I've been working and growing on. We are now officially moved up into this size. So um, yeah, why let go of clothes when they don't fit you anymore? Just buy them in a size up. Highly, highly recommend. So that was one of the fun ways that I wanted to kick off this episode was by actually wearing the romper that um you all have maybe come to know and love from the podcast show image. Also, I was sitting and reflecting like what else has changed. Um, as you guys may have noticed, I am also no longer blonde. I have grown out my natural brunette hair color. And this year I did that uh partly because I felt like it, and also because I kind of felt the need to flip off the patriarchy and white supremacy by rejecting blonde Aryan standards of beauty this uh past year. Uh, those of you that have been with me in the podcast from the beginning know um something that I've really loved and been very proud of and leaning into is becoming more politically active over the last year. So that's a big change. I've even considered letting my armpit hair grow uninhibited as well. I was recently thinking about that too. I was like, wait, are these patriarchal standards of beauty and women? Do I want to stop this as well? Um, and I've even been considering this year, I may start buying more shirts that say things like big fan of human rights, um, or chinga la migra. Go look that one up if you don't know that one. Or radicalized by basic decency. Yeah, these are all shirts that I've been considering wearing here in my hometown, home state of Texas at the moment. So I gotta say, um really big fan personally myself of the changes that I've seen over these past two years through the podcast. Not only has the podcast been, I mean, obviously, for you know, you as my listener on the other end, it has been, you know, a different experience for you, right? Receiving it from me. But I always think it's beautiful to realize just as much as the podcast has been something that I started wanting to give, it has been something that has given back to me and that I have received from massively. For sure. Uh the podcast has helped me really, really develop my voice, uh, be able to speak more confidently. It's given me the opportunity to meet lots of amazing people. So just a lot of like pausing and looking back over where I've come from. And that takes me back to the very beginning of the episode for my OG listeners, um, or even those of you that have, you know, started it back at the very beginning. It was kind of neat to think back to how I recorded my very first episode of the podcast way back in the summer of 2022. And then I had a one and a half year break in between that first and second episode, which I talk about in those first two episodes. So if you haven't listened to the very beginning of the podcast, I highly recommend that just because um it's so much a huge part of just my story watching my family of origin implode over that period. Uh repressed memories come back. It was just a rough go of my personal growth during that time. A lot of CPTSD getting triggered. Didn't even know I had CPTSD at that time. Um, and then I ultimately came back and launched the podcast right at the end of 2023. So here we are now, two plus years on into the podcast and celebrating the 100th episode today. So yay, let's go. Um, along, you know, I was thinking this, I just had to say that with this momentous occasion, like of reaching this milestone of a hundred episodes, I do just have to facetiously kind of say, fuck life goals about being in a 50-year marriage and instead hell yes to milestones like this. That's all, that's all I'm gonna say about that. I'm just gonna say, having I never experienced a 50-year marriage, but having experienced a 10-year, I did make it 10 years, so you know, a 10-year anniversary, I feel much more excited about my hundredth episode in my podcast than I did about that. So for me personally, I want many more milestones like this in my life. I do actually have an episode written for you guys around something that I'm very excited to talk about. I actually have a couple stories that happened, actually, one this morning and then one this weekend that I'm excited to share with you all. But before we do that, I did also want to get to share because this is my hundredth episode. I took some time to uh get to share some stats with y'all and get to kind of geek out with y'all about that. Um so one of the things that's really cool in reaching this milestone is I went back and kind of researched, oh my god, another butterfly. This one was a monarch. Y'all, I okay, we're gonna do a little, you're gonna indulge me. ADHD rabbit hole on this one. I live in a monarch, my migratory corridor. And I always get so excited uh getting to see them come back in the spring. I also get to see them migrate out in the fall or down to Mexico in the fall, and then they come back up through here. So absolute total magic there as well, getting to see that. The other butterfly was a different one, those big yellow swallow tails. But this one was a monarch. So that feels very auspicious and special. So I was curious, right? I was like, what is the percentage of podcasts that actually end up putting out over a hundred episodes? And I went and looked at it. And the reality is most podcasts really rarely make it past 10 to 20 episodes. But to make it to a hundred, that is only about 10 to 20% of the entire podcasts out there. And I also happened to go look up my podcast on um, there's a site called Listen Score that can kind of see like where you might be ranked against other podcasts. And it was very cool to see that my podcast is one of the top 1.5% most popular shows out of the 3.7 million plus that listen score um keeps track of. So that was also pretty like okay, wow, that is amazing. And so important for me to stop and kind of celebrate this with all of you. Cause sometimes we as women, I know you guys will totally relate to this, we are we are showing up and we are just amazing. We are crushing in so many ways. And yet we go through our lives rarely stopping to go, oh wow, look at that. Look at me and take ourselves in and really appreciate and take a moment to really celebrate ourselves. So that was pretty cool to see in the top 1.5%. And what was really ironic, too, about all of this, about looking at these statistics and kind of just, you know, taking this number in, letting this number digest in my system. One of the things that I thought about was how way back when I was considering divorce, when a podcast wasn't even in the ethers of possibility for me. I know way back then I was not ever, I didn't, that was not like a bucket list item. Oh, let's start a podcast one day. No, that was not. But uh there were some numbers that I was very concerned about. And those were the statistics around how women fare post-divorce. Um, I had gone to BYU and I actually graduated with a degree in home and family sciences. So in that degree, I had done quite a bit of, you know, reading up and learning about um, especially I mean, at BYU through a much more marriage positive, uh, family-centric focus, their statistics about how families do and that they do, I'm gonna put scenario quotes, like so much better if you stay married, and so much better if kids get raised with both parents. And so that was really the only framework that I had. And thank goodness, as those of you listening to the podcast know, I found the book for better or worse, divorce reconsidered. And that became a huge lifeline like shift moment for me because in her research, she, I think it's E. Mavis Heatherington. I'm pulling that one out of the top of my head. Um, in that research, she ends up showing statistics that showed, yes, it was a small percentage of women, but there were women that got divorced and actually went on to thrive and their children to thrive. And hearing that, I made that decision in that moment that I was gonna be one of those women. It was like, I don't, I don't care that the majority of the statistics say, you know, all these negative things. If there's at least this much of a statistic that says it can be good, I'm gonna choose to believe that's gonna be me. And it feels pretty neat to hear in this moment with the hundredth episode of the podcast, to be like, yeah, you know, I don't know if I I can't really statistically figure out where I'm at right now and how the divorce has been successful or not. But it's really neat to see that that what I have accomplished is being in a very small percentage of people when it comes to this work and art and part of my soul that I've been able to develop and create post-divorce. So that's something I wanted to share with y'all. I also wanted to take a little bit of time and do some shout-outs because I happened to check on my Apple podcasts. Um, I used to have like much, much better analytics uh through my previous podcast platform. Since switching over to Substack, they aren't as analytical in that way. But I still was able to find a few statistics. Um, and one of the ones I loved the most were the top five countries that I have the most listeners in. So some of you maybe take some guesses ahead of time. Obviously, I mean, I think it's apparent like the US is the top. That's where most of my listeners are from. But I loved hearing the next four. So shout out to all of my listeners in the United Kingdom, in Australia, in Canada, and South Africa. If that is you, uh, my listeners that are in those places, like, I'm sending you lots of love. Um, it's so cool. I've never been to Australia, I've never been to the UK, I've never been to Canada, I have never been to South Africa. But knowing you all are there and we have a connection makes me feel like I've traveled and maybe I will one day. Um also the top five cities that are the most uh that I get the most listens in are London, New York City, Los Angeles, Denver, and Chicago. So hi, all you beautiful babes in those cities. Just so fun to get to see. I love any opportunity I get to kind of connect with you guys more personally. And this is one of those moments where it was like, oh, I actually know like somebody in this country or somebody in this city is listening. So sending you all um love as well. I also took some time to look back over the podcast and to really just start noticing, you know, what are some of the topics that I have covered over the last hundred episodes? And oh my gosh, y'all, I have covered topics ranging from how guilt keeps you trapped in indecision to CPTSD, to affairs, how your emotions are the key to divorce clarity, embracing anger, trusting your timing, kids, and divorce, to releasing fear of making the wrong decision, reclaiming your desires and soul calls, covert narcissism, why leaving the good guy feels so hard, ADHD, and so many more. And not only have I covered an incredible range of topics, but I also got to reflect on many of the amazing guests that I've had on the podcast. And especially something I'm very proud of this year, that I've been able to start really using this platform as a way to amplify other women's stories of their journeys through considering divorce. As you guys have heard recently, women that I have coached or women that I'm meeting in my community, or even women that I'm meeting through this amazing new platform of Substack. That was something I did not uh ever really expect. I didn't, I honestly, y'all, I didn't think I would have a podcast that people would like want to come on. I never saw myself as being someone that was going to be like interviewing people. Um, but with the community um and wanting to bring guests in there, that really just flowed out into the podcast. So it's uh it's just really been special for me to start collaborating and meeting more people through that as well. And with this, you know, kind of theme of celebrating this hundredth episode, I actually wanted here to make a little request, a little 100 episodes gift from all of you all, as my listeners, that if you have never rated the podcast, either on Apple or Spotify, to please go and leave me a rating and a review. You guys know I love hearing from you. And every time you do, it helps the impact and the spread of the podcast go far and wide. And if you are, I actually have quite a few um amazing ratings on Apple. So I know many of you have done it before. And so if you're one of those, I would love for you instead to leave me a comment on one of my Substack posts, maybe one that's come out recently or one that's ahead. Every time I get to read something personal from one of you back as my listeners, it really helps me to continue with this work, knowing that it's making an impact and a difference for all of you. Um with that in mind, actually, I got to welcome a woman into the community last week. So I was doing community interviews. I was reviewing those. And it was really, really special to hear from her in the interview that she had actually been listening to the podcast from the very beginning. So, and I'm not saying like she's listened to all the episodes, but like two years ago, she found the podcast and started listening way back when I started it. So total OG. And I couldn't tell which of us was more excited about her joining the community. Um, because when I go through those interviews um for women joining the community, I always send back a personal audio from me. And I was just like, Oh, I'm so excited to meet you. I'm so touched uh to have gone on this journey for two years with you and to now get to meet you in person. Like that's just a very special, amazing experience for me, um, just as much I feel like sometimes for the women that I'm meeting on the other end. Um, and along with that, I actually also met a woman last week on a 90-minute Get Unstuck and Empowered session, who told me that she had found the podcast more recently, but had listened to all of the episodes up until about February. So, probably a good 90 episodes uh that she ended up listening to. She talked about even like binge listening to them on a road trip, which I know some of my other listeners will be like, me too, me too, because you guys have told me about that, finding me on a road trip and just like listening nonstop. So I just want to also convey to all of you guys that have been listening and that share those bits with me. It is very meaningful to me to get to hear this and to get to meet and actually connect with those of you that reach out. It always, it always has a deep impact on me. So this podcast has always been about saying the things and sharing the ideas and viewpoints that I honestly just deeply wish that I had had way back when I was considering divorce. And I have really hopefully created it as a safe place to land during one of the most isolating and difficult processes that you can go through. And reaching a hundred episodes today, seeing those stats, um, hearing from so many of you, if So wonderful to like really land here and feel like, yes, that is what I set out to do, and that's what I'm doing. Um so thank you all for being a huge, huge part of this along with me. And I'm very, yeah, I'm very excited to see all that's going to come ahead. Now, before we transition into the actual episode that I have for you all, that was all just like fun party celebration. Let's both be stoked about how something that was just a glimmer in my eye three and a half years ago is now here. I do want to give you all a little bit of housekeeping. Um, because in my March 10th episode, I talked about three things women need to build self-trust. And in it, I referenced dream interpretation. And you'll remember I said, like, I don't want to be using ChatGPT, but I can't recommend a different one at the time, right? I didn't have that, but I do now. I have been actively testing out other AI. Um, it's really important to me. I am not aligned with ChatGPT, their support of ICE, the way they are interacting with our government and the military. Just not a fan. Um, so I'm really encouraging as many of us as can to join the boycott of that to help with that. Uh, we are going to be linking Claude. I started using Claude this last week and I found really beautiful, like I'm finding it just as much, it's got its own way of doing it, but I kind of even love it more. So we'll link in the show notes both Claude and then where previously the ChatGPT one I'd linked was specifically built for Jungian dream interpretation. Wasn't able to find Claude's specific ones built like that, but no fear. Instead, I worked with it over the last two weeks and I ended up creating up a little script that you can drop in with it before you end up giving it your dream that will help guide you back through the process. So my assistant Alex will be putting that in the show notes as well. Look for that there. Now, let's shift gears. I'm gonna take some deep breaths because where the first bit of this episode has been all this fun and excitement around the hundredth episode, the heart of what I wanted to talk about, what was coming through when I sat down to write this episode, has a bit more complexity to it for sure. Um, and it really came out of a couple of experiences, one this morning and then one this weekend. Also combined with the fact that I have started reading Victor Frankel's Man's Search for Meaning this past week. So if any of you have read that before, right? Um, I had not. This is the first time I've really heard of it before. I've heard quotes from it, but I've never actually read it. And there will be a lot more to come on that in the future. Um, I definitely have some deep, beautiful thoughts that I want to get into with all of you around what he's teaching in that book. But these stories uh that I'm gonna share with you from my weekend, combined with that book, it's really just been highlighting for me lately how much uh pain and suffering and cruelty there is out in the world. That is a tough thing for me as an empath to digest, to see. Um, and as it's been landing, I really uh realized with this episode that I want to kind of wade into some of that with all of you all. Because I have seen how with this much darkness in the world, uh the absolute importance of what each of you are doing in your own personal journeys because we become the change we want to see in the world. And I saw through these experiences this weekend the root of how I believe we actually do that. And that's what I want to talk with you guys about today. I'm like, oh my goodness, hundredth episode excitement to like, hmm, deep grounded. Let's let's go to the heart. So if you need to pause, take a couple deep breaths, maybe send down a grounding chord as we walk into this. I really want to walk with you guys through some of this darkness um to understand how we create um the light, basically. So, first story that I want to share is what happened this morning on my morning walk. So I live in an area in Texas that is um pretty rural. It has been. That's part of the reason we moved here back when I was married. Um moved here nine years ago, and I loved and picked it specifically because it was out and away on land, um, in an area that felt like it had a lot of beautiful natural resources. And yeah, I've loved living here for that reason, for how beautiful it is. Now, I think I mentioned it on the podcast a little bit that this year has brought, and I'm saying this year, not just 2026, like the last year. So the last 12 months, uh, has brought a lot of change to my neighborhood, so many developments, so much road construction. It just feels at times like I'm being assaulted from all sides, like just watching all of this land that I've loved in this space just get torn up. Um all and at the same time, you know, we've had water restrictions and struggled with resources out here. So it doesn't make a ton of sense to me how we're gonna just bring all of this in. Um, but I'm learning more and more. That's kind of how the bigger systems seem to work. I don't, I don't know. I think we're experiencing right now, uh especially in the US. I hope many of us are waking up to like, oh, okay, the people that are in charge maybe don't actually have our best interests or the planet's best interests or our children's best interests at heart. So it's been heavy to see that and to be not only seeing that in the bigger world, but really seeing it in a very physical way all around me in my neighborhood, in the places I drive past multiple times a day. So one of the ways that that's been felt, especially poignantly for me recently, is that uh the road I walk down, I have a pretty big farm-to-market road near me. And I love to go walking on it. In the years past, you really wouldn't get that many cars on it. It was a pretty unique little spot that was not a big, like thoroughfare. And um yeah, that made it a peaceful and wonderful place to go walking. And as I've been walking it more recently, I've been kind of shifting my exercise routine away. I'm actually not working with my personal trainer anymore. I've been trusting my body and I'm actually shifting into more of a body-led and guided in the handbook for human potential that I wrote, um, Chandra Zoss, I interviewed her a few months ago. There's a chapter with a woman who talks about her idea of minimum effective dose for exercise, and I love it. As soon as I read it, I was like, this is what I need to be doing. This is what I want right now. So part of her ideas are this walking, walking daily, which I've never done before, but I've been trying to. So I get out this morning, finally. I've I have not been walking and I've been like, okay, let's do it. Let's let's get out there. And I'm excited. I walk out my front door and I'm like, oh, smells gorgeous. Yes. And I get out on my road, and quite a, you know, I not that many in comparison, right, to other people's streets, but a lot for my road. And one of the things of the many times that I've walked on that road, that people do on that road is when they see you coming, because I'm usually walking towards the traffic, they always slide over to the other side of the road, right? To give you enough space. There are no sidewalks out where I live, so I have to walk on the road. And I've never had a problem with that. People usually slow down, they move aside. Um, I'm always very alert though, as well. Well, this morning though, as I come down one of the areas that I normally walk on, I was watching a car approach me and I was noticing that it was not moving out of the way like most of them do, and it was still coming pretty fast. And so I'm kind of getting off to this side of the edge of the road. There's also like big ditches on either side though. And, you know, watching this driver and kind of waving my arm to have them move over so that there's space enough for me and them to go around. And right as the car gets closest to me, um, and almost kind of like like definitely would have hit me, was not paying attention. And I actually saw the driver and I could see the male driver had a phone up on his uh dash, little phone holder, and he was definitely watching his phone. So by the time he realized I was there, um he startled and kind of swerved, and then instead of realizing his mistake, proceeds to yell obscenities at me about being in the road, to which my protective, I'm actually I've had some time to process this since, and I'm actually really proud of the way my body reacted because in the past, I might have um, you know, stepped back or like, oh my gosh, I, you know, this person seems really mad. I I kind of lost my shit, y'all. I just was like, dude, get, you know, move over. You are not the only one in this road. And as he's driving up, he stops like 30, probably, I don't know, how I'm not gonna know the yardage, 20 yards, 30 yards back from me, and continues to scream and yell at me, just so mad. And I didn't stop yelling either. I just turned and yelled my own stuff back because this is my road, this is my neighborhood, you're driving through it and you're not paying attention. Like, I'm not, I'm not gonna back down, dude. And then eventually just realized, like, oh, he's just gonna keep yelling and turned and covered my ears and just walked away. And thankfully, you know, I kept looking back to make sure he drove on. And y'all, right after it, I was like full-blown, high CBTSD, like adrenaline flashback for sure. Um, because I've almost been, you know, hit by this car. And then not only that, I don't think that would have distressed me. What it was was that individual believing I was at fault. And that was where the CBTSD flashback hit so hard. Because that's my childhood trauma of being, you know, um getting in trouble or being abused. And instead of somebody taking responsibility for their action, them blaming it on you. And as I kept so in that moment, I was like, oh my God, do I go home? Do I not? And I just had to like ground and I was like, it's okay. Let's check in with the facts. You're safe. We're gonna keep walking. We're gonna keep walking and we're just gonna process what just happened. Are we okay? You know? Um, and I noticed, right, like initially, that, oh my God, was I in the wrong? Should I have been doing something different? Which is so programmed into us, especially as women, right? Um, and as I could dig digest more of the adrenaline and realize, like, okay, and then start catching where my CPTSD, the inner critic, wanted to be like shaming me or blaming me, like you shouldn't be out walking on this road, or even though I've walked this road for eight years and never had something like that happen, you know, or you're you should have gotten out of the road, you should have jumped down in the ditch. I realized as I sat with it more and I could see back through what had happened. I was like, oh, there it is. That man, instead of sitting with his own mistake, right? Which was he was driving distracted. He was watching his phone instead of the road and almost hit someone, he couldn't accept that or see that in himself, and instead had to deflect in that moment of his own fear. I know it had to have scared him for sure, because he did not realize there was a person there. And in his fear, because he can't sit with fear, where was the only place he could go? Anger. And it was instantaneous. Like, didn't even pause to see if I was okay, didn't even pause to be like, oh my god, there's a human, I almost hit it. But just an instant anger. And that is never about me. That is about someone who cannot sit with their own emotions. And as I started to digest that, I started to realize like, oh, this is where so much of the trauma that is happening out in the world is coming from. Because when we cannot sit with our own pain and fear and sadness, when we cannot feel that in our bodies, the go-to place is to project it out onto others. When we can't take responsibility for our mistake, we have to hide that mistake from ourselves by making it about someone else. Now, you know, post all of this, I could easily make this guy out to be the villain and me the victim. And I'm not, I am gonna be totally real with you guys that I definitely had my moments right after it and on that road. And even when I got home with Joe, where I was like, ah, you know, just like this man's life must be awful. Like uh, I just yeah, I had my humanness for sure. But long term, okay, I could fall into thinking this guy is the villain and I am the victim. But if I'm being honest, y'all, when I look back on who I was nine years ago when I first started therapy, ooh, I was doing the same thing. I was unable to feel my sadness to acknowledge it. I wasn't able to work with my fear, and my go-to reaction was anger and projection out onto my children because I did not have the tools to deal with that within myself. And so, in this understanding, we realize it's not that he's a villain or a bad guy. It's just that he doesn't have the capacity to hold that fear, that shock within him, and not immediately spew it out on someone else. And that is so important for us to understand because I look at the world around us and I go, what is needed right now is growing this capacity, not only for those in our immediate vicinity, but for the greater world around us, right? I you're getting to see in the instance with him, this was somebody he he he doesn't know me, just a stranger. But also in my own life, I was doing it to my children, people that I thought, you know, that I thought I loved, and yet there I was treating them in ways that I wasn't proud of. And the tricky thing is that most of us don't understand this connection, right? Like I, through many, many years of coaching and watching my clients and watching my own psychology, have come to learn and realize, like, oh, often when we act this way, it's not actually about that other person as much as it is us struggling to understand something within ourselves or feel something within ourselves. And so we just have to project it out. And once we know that, then we know where to start doing the work. And it's so paradoxical, right? This is something that I feel like religion really did a very poor job uh explaining or really teaching. So I feel like in religion, it was a huge emphasis on be nice to everybody else, serve, serve, serve, serve, serve. At least for me, as a woman in Mormonism, that's what religion taught me. Like you will feel better if you abandon yourself and you just take care of everybody else. But that is not actually what I have seen play out. What I've seen is that actually as we give ourselves the attention and love and presence, that is actually when we become the most able to give more to others. So it's the paradox of as we resource ourselves and love ourselves, we actually have more to give. That's when our cup runs over. A part of me knew with the way that man treated me. I mean, just a just a just a pedestrian out going for a morning walk, dude. I was like, oh, sweetie, you are really hurting inside. Like that is a human that does not love himself, cannot sit with himself. Um, obviously, I don't know him personally, but this is one of the, you know, unintended beautiful gifts that I've gotten to enjoy from all of my work as a coach is being able to now see and understand, even in small interactions like this, what might be going on much deeper underneath the surface. So that's the first story that I want to share with you. And I think it ties in to the second one that I also want to share with y'all. So this weekend, Joe and I had the opportunity to go down to Dallas. One of our friends was having her birthday, and she planned this amazing day of just all these different activities. It was a blast. We got to go thrift store shopping, we got to go out to dinner, and then we went to a comedy show. And the comedy show's over. We've all been hanging out on the patio. It's about 11:30 at night, way down in Deep Elm. If any of you have been to Deep Elm here in Dallas. And as we're getting ready to leave the comedy show, we're actually wanting to go to a different event that's happening that we need to drive to. I was the driver for the night. A gentleman wheels up to us in a wheelchair and he starts explaining to us that the bus he was supposed to catch did not actually stop for him. It just went past. And I could kind of feel, you know, Deep Elm's a very high, overstimulating like place. There's a lot of stuff going on. We actually weren't even all the way down in the bigger, busier part of Deep Elm. We were kind of up on the edge. But we'd already had like, you know, multiple Corvettes come and like pop wheelies in the street and rev their engines and motorcycles. Like it's a pretty fun, but also like wild and a little bit overwhelming vibe down there. So this man coming up to us, you know, your nervous system's already a little overstimulated. And I noticed as he starts talking to us that initially, you know, we were all kind of engaged and listening, but then I could feel this like kind of overwhelm or maybe distraction from my friends. And honestly, I get it. Like when somebody walks up to you or is explaining something and you're in the middle of other things or you've got plans, it's often your body's first reaction to either get defensive. You know, that's usually what we do when we're approached on the street. We get defensive, we kind of put up our Guard, in case they're going to ask us for something. Or, you know, I found my brain as he's explaining to me what he's going through, kind of thinking, like, okay, where is this going? What does he need from me? But thankfully, in that moment, some part of me stayed and stayed connected in to what this human was explaining, even though I wasn't sure where the story was going or what they were going to need. And he ends up sharing that because this bus has left, he now won't be able to catch another one till like an hour, maybe an hour and a half, like one in the morning. And so I'm, you know, thinking with him, like what might be his options. And he shares that he could get an Uber, but his wheelchair doesn't collapse. And so unfortunately, it wouldn't fit into the Uber. And ends up asking if one of us would maybe be willing to push him down to the hotel where it's located. And by the time that he explained that his wheelchair wouldn't fit in an Uber, I could feel it click for me. Like I knew I had, I have a forerunner. I knew that that would probably fit it. Um, and I just it was like there it was. And I turned to my friends and I said, Hey, y'all get an Uber, Joe and I, we're gonna take this guy down to his hotel. And took the time then, once I knew, I could feel my nervous system like chill, like, oh, okay, I know what's needed. I know what the interaction's gonna be here. I know I'm safe and actually I can help this person. And I dropped down in, kind of a little bit more my body, and I slowed him down and I said, What's your name? And I softened into the interaction. And then I reassured him, like, actually, I think we've got a solution. My friends are gonna take an Uber where we were going. We're gonna take you down to the hotel. And that moment, y'all, when you are resourced enough, when you are grounded enough in your body to be present for someone else's distress or their pain and actually be able to help them, that's a really special moment. I think moments like that are very um important. Along with what I was saying about like there's so much darkness and suffering in the world, these moments are very important for us in our lives. Um, I'm also thinking of Victor Frankel and in the book, you know, Man's Search for Meaning, he talks a lot about like how do we hold our integrity? How do we, what allows us to still remain human, even in some of the darkest, most horrible situations? So that's not even close to like what this experience was, but but I I felt in that moment that like instead of disconnecting, a part of me was grounded enough to lean in and actually help. And y'all, that experience was really, really special because we brought the car over. Joe and I helped get him up into the car, we put the wheelchair in the back, and we proceeded to drive like through the heart of Deep Elum at like 12 o'clock at night. So literally we were in traffic for, you know, it was only like a, I don't know, a short distance mile-wise, but 13-minute drive, 15-minute with traffic. Um, but as we're sitting in the car and I'm getting to talk to him, I get to start hearing about his life. And he's sharing how he lives out in Mansfield, which from Dallas is like an hour away, and that, you know, his parents had just brought him down to the city, down into Dallas, and dropped him off for the weekend because he really wanted to go to these comedy shows. And I was like, whoa, that is so brave and like bold of you. Um, and he said, Yeah, I really want to try to be more independent. I know that my parents are getting older and they're not going to be here forever. And he started to share with us just some of the difficulties, like him dropping out of the college he was going to because it was very ableist and there was really no support for him. And his, not, you know, not only did he have um being in the wheelchair, but he also had a little bit of like mental cognitive um impairment that, you know, growing up, I I have a brother who has Down syndrome. So thankfully I've been around individuals through Special Olympics, and it's always been something that I've loved interacting with people like that. So it didn't change things for me. Like he's just a human with this beautiful uh difference, which is probably why I've been able to like accept maybe a little bit more of my ADHD, that neurodivergent part of me. But just talking to him and hearing and just seeing how much he's a human, just like all of us, that just wants to live life, that just wants to have experiences, that wants to be able to go to a comedy show, that wants to be able to do things on his own. And the reality is he's not able to do that without people showing up for him, you know, like that night, right? I realized as we drove up that road and I finally uh comprehended how far away his hotel was, and that the route to get to that hotel would have been literally four blocks of deep Elm midnight crowds on the sidewalks, just packed. There is no room for someone like him. I realized how important it is for all of us to open to this responsibility, not only to ourselves and to the people we love, but to like that bigger piece of other people in the world that may need us to, you know, thinking back to this morning, to just slow our car the fuck down and move a couple feet to the left so that they can go for a walk, or in this man's instance, to stop, actually hear what's happened to us, and then offer us a ride. And so as we're getting closer to his hotel, he also ends up sharing with me how the previous day he'd been, you know, moving around through Dallas. And as he'd been going, he had un inadvertently rolled through dog poop. And because he has to use his hands with his wheels, that dog poop then got up on his hands. And he shared how in that moment he was looking around for anyone that might be able to help him or perhaps push him somewhere so that he could go and clean his hands. And instead of people stopping, people ignoring him, and even one man like flipping him off. And I thought, why? You know, why do we as humans treat each other this way? And once again, it goes back to what I was saying earlier of this, like when we are uncomfortable in our own bodies, you know, the people not looking at him, people not stopping, that's that whole we don't feel grounded and safe in our own body. And so it's difficult to like be open to other people interacting with us. Or maybe we've had, you know, distressing experiences with other people and so we're guarded and we're shut down around that. But in doing that, we miss out on these opportunities to relieve some of the suffering that is in the world around us, right? In very small ways. It would have been a very small thing for somebody to in that moment be like, hey, do you need some help? Oh, I'm so sorry that happened to you. Yeah, that sucks when people don't pick up their dog poop. That is the worst. Here, let me grab your wheelchair and let's walk over to uh 7-Eleven. Let's get you cleaned up, right? For that moment to be possible, you have to be connected to your own humanity first. I I really think that's a big part of this episode that I want because I feel like what I was trained in in childhood and through religion was like humanity to others first, humanity to others, others, others. And yes, I think there's like a scale here, right? That's not necessarily the worst thing, but it wasn't sustainable for me. Humanity to others at the uh expense of myself, not taking the time, like always taking care of others and not taking the time to actually sit with myself, to be with my feelings, to understand myself, was not sustainable in the long term. Because lo and behold, where it landed me nine years ago was my cup completely empty and then losing my shit on everybody else because I had an empty cup and also no capacity or resourcing to be with all the painful feelings inside myself. I see myself now nine years on in this instance, and I'm like, what's the difference? Self-resourcing, being with myself, being grounded in being able to see my own suffering. You know, giving him a ride that night took maybe 30 minutes out of our evening. We still got to go to our event afterwards. Our friend made it, our friends made it just fine. So, what when we look at these two examples, right? What allowed me to respond to this man like this versus how that man responded to me this morning, almost hitting me on the road. And in that instance, right, let's lay, let's even notice that even in that instance, I wasn't even physically asking him for help. All that man had to do was turn his steering wheel a couple inches, just a couple inches to the left. I think the difference between us is the self-resourcing and self-love. And I'm not, when I say self-love, I want to be clear that I'm not talking like the weird performatory pseudo-ideas we have of what self-love is. You know, I think a lot of people see individuals that are actually narcissistic and think that they love themselves. No, that's performatory self-love. You know, what I'm talking about is the kind of self-love that involves meeting yourself in the most vulnerable deep places of yourself where there is fear and there is pain and you are not in control and there is CPTSD and inner critic work. And in those moments, not abandoning yourself so that when you do make mistakes, like that man did this morning, you can own them. You can stop and make sure maybe that the person is okay instead of projecting your undigested fear out into somebody as anger. And if you all think, right, if you're like, oh, I don't know how this applies to me, or like, you know, maybe you have not had an interaction with a stranger like this recently, y'all, if you are considering divorce, I know that you will absolutely be able to take what I am talking about here and use this same concept, this framework to understand patterns and types of behavior that may be in your partner in your marriage as well. Are we seeing it now? Because when someone is emotionally immature, that's what I'm talking about. This is ultimately at the heart of it, emotional immaturity. They need to project and deflect rather than own up and accept responsibility when they make mistakes. And in some instances, you know, maybe it's not even that a mistake is being made. Okay. So, right, we're applying this potentially to your marriage. Maybe it's not even that your partner has made a mistake. But if your partner is not aware of how they are feeling and their needs and what's going on inside of them, if they are not connected to that, they can unconsciously end up projecting and acting that out on the people around them. So sometimes it, you know, maybe, maybe that man wasn't shocked about, you know, it let's go with a different scenario. Maybe that man this morning wasn't afraid that he'd almost hit me. Maybe it's more that he's got shit going on at home or at work that he's not dealing or processing. And so I just end up being the bystander that gets the shrapnel from him boiling up inside and not being able to move any of that through. That may be what a lot of you are experiencing in your marriages, right? With partners that although this gentleman just provided a small glimpse of it this morning, may be behaving in the same ways, and you may be unconsciously taking it on, thinking it's a you thing, when really it's a much deeper lack of capacity and emotional maturity. And I think another big part of this that I want to tie in is that, you know, it's it's one thing to have like the story of helping somebody in a wheelchair, you know, get to their hotel down in Dallas, like a one-off story. I heard a lot of those in Mormonism. There were a lot of stories shared at our twice-a-year general conference about stories like this that now looking back, I can see those people were doing that, but there wasn't like an underlying grounded presence, truly, that actually like carried not only just to random moments where you get asked to help somebody, a stranger, but actually into like, how do I treat my kids? How do I treat the people I work with? How do I treat myself? That's really what I've I think I felt the most proud of in recognizing and digesting all of this was that where previously it was a lot of like I did stuff and helped other people so that I could feel good about myself. Now it's moved into a space of I do those things because it feels like the right way to show up for the world in alleviating suffering that I now understand at a much, much deeper level because I have gone and met my own suffering. I hope that makes sense because there are these nuances, right? There are so many people out there that are like giving service and giving, giving, giving, but you know, at moments have these other alter egos that just come out and crucify people like that guy this morning. And it's like, what is what is that? It's all of this that I'm discussing. It's this underlying depth of meeting yourself. And that's why one of the things I think coming back to the heart of me saying, like, it's about self-love, we have to ultimately invest not only our time in like feeling good, that we're capable of giving love, giving love, giving love, giving love to our spouse, giving love to our kids, giving love to our community members or the school people or you know, people at church, but being able to land in that we are also worthy of giving love and receiving it for ourselves, giving it to ourselves and receiving it from ourselves. And I believe, you know, a big part of why that has changed for me, why I'm able to respond differently from how I did nine years ago, right? Because I've told you the way that man responded to me this morning reminds me a lot of how I used to respond to my kids. Just, you know, cannot deal with my stuff. So I've got to yell at somebody else. A big part of what's helped in that is that I have been actively reshaping and building a supportive life environment of a place where I feel safe to be me. And I'm genuinely loved and supported as me. And I think that's really key too, because a lot of us hold ourselves to these high standards of like, I'm gonna love myself and I'm gonna love everybody else and show up in the world. And yet we're keeping ourselves perhaps in a marriage, in a dynamic where we are actively being cut down or actively having our partner's shit thrown on us because they don't have the emotional capacity to digest it themselves. That's not the world I live in anymore. That's not my environment. And so my baseline for what I live in every day is not that. My baseline is I am loved, I am safe. There is more than enough here for every, for everyone. So when others lash out at me, like this morning, like, yes, my CPTSD definitely got activated and my protective, like, back the fuck up, dude. Do not come after me. I'm not gonna just quietly move away. I get to take up space too. I can now, though, because my baseline at home is so safe, I can see more quickly how that interaction wasn't about me. I can, you know, I can interact or experience some of that pain and suffering that's out in the world, other people's pain and suffering that's being projected out onto me, but I don't take it inside me anymore and make it mean something about me. Because ultimately, that man was just someone who was distracted by his phone, almost hit me. And instead of being conscious of his own fear in that moment, he needed to project it onto me as being my fault. Um, or, you know, he had a fight this morning or he's hating work and he just needs a punching bag. But I no longer believe that I deserve to be the punching bag, nor do I then carry that the way he treated me forward into my life the rest of the day with all of those ruminations of like, maybe I shouldn't have gone on the road, maybe I should have stepped off, maybe I should have this, which so many of us as women do, right? And it was really all of this really started digesting and coming through as I was journaling this morning. So after I got home, I knew it was like, I may understand intellectually what happened, but that doesn't mean my nervous system isn't still like, ah, tiger, I need to be alert. Um, so I took some time to write and journal. And as I journaled, I realized like there was some really deep grief and sadness coming up for me after these two events this morning and then this weekend, at acknowledging and seeing the cruelty and the neglect and the abuse that we as humans enact on each other. Um and it was really as I was sitting with that as well, that kind of like it was a beautiful moment too, of seeing this as the hundredth episode, that I had this powerful realization come through of how even with all of the pain and abuse that I have experienced in my life, and you know, ultimately, I hate comparing the idea of like comparing suffering to other people's suffering. I think I've heard it described once as like suffering is like a gas. It goes in, or pain, abuse, it goes into the room and it fills whatever size of the room it's in. So you can't really compare other people's suffering to each other. So I say that, you know, with the caveat, right, of my my suffering is my own. And for me, it definitely filled the entire room of my life. I've been realizing that more and more. But how immensely deeply proud I am that even with all of that, I have chosen to not spew that out onto others, but instead to meet it, to go towards it. And through being in contact with, in presence with those parts of me, I have allowed that pain to deepen and soften me, to make me more compassionate. Not less. I have in so many ways taken the darkness that has been a huge part of my journey, my childhood, and in many ways transmuted it into a capacity for presence or curiosity and the ability to resource both myself and others. And with this hundredth episode, I feel like this is such a beautiful heart to land this idea that that is absolutely available to each and every one of you as well. It is. And I've watched it with many of my clients, with women in my community who have been through horrific things, who have been through maybe even things that they didn't realize were horrific. That's a huge piece of denying our pain, not understanding how under-resourced we were or how neglected, even if it was quote, putting this in air quotes, just emotionally, right? As a child. And I really am, I'm so happy that this topic came through with this hundredth episode because I want this to land as probably one of the most important things that I will say on this podcast, because more than anything in the world right now, I believe we need more and more people that can take the darkness of their lives and transmute it to instead of going through hard things and becoming hardened, because that's a thing, y'all. Not everybody goes through hard shit and comes out the other side more empathic. That's that's not a given. It's absolutely something you have to move towards. But that is so vital and necessary that when one of us does that, it ripples and cascades out into the collective. And kind of magically, along with all of this, you know, this morning before I went out on my walk, I pulled my tarot spread for the day. And I looked over the cards and I just was like, mm, yummy. And then I came back after what had happened with that man and I looked at them again. And the first card that I had pulled for my theme for the day just landed differently for me, especially after I had started digesting this episode and thinking of this framework of how we transmute the darkness and we can really make a difference in the world by developing this capacity in ourselves. And so I wanted to share this card with you all. For those of you watching the video, you'll be able to see it. I'll also hopefully, I think Alex can, yeah, she'll link it in the Substack show notes. But the card that I had pulled was the Seven of Inspiration. Now, those of you that know Tarot, you're like, wait a no, no, no, there is no inspiration. But I am using a deck from Chrissanne called The Muse Tarot. Highly, highly recommend it. It is stunning, gorgeous. I just got it this year. Um, I was looking for a new tarot deck. I wanted to do something different. I'd used Chrissanne's The Light Seers for a long time, but this was the one I decided on, and it has blown me away. I really love so many of her images and interpretations for the cards. So she instead of the wands uses the word inspiration. And the card looks like this. It's called the Seven of Inspiration. And it is this incredible. I'll describe it for those of you that are listening. It is this gorgeous image of this woman. She's sitting on the ground with her legs kind of crossed up in front of her, and she has her arms out to either side, and she is holding open what looks like this portal. And all around her is blackness. You know, when I when I look at this card, I think of the void. Um, and she is with her arms holding open this portal, and the portal leads to this sunset, the ocean, and there's this beautiful star that seems to be being called down out of the heavens towards her. And although this card, you know, the Seven of Wands typically has a kind of, it's not one of the cards that I pull in traditional tarot decks and feel this way about, because it's um normally a, you know, the meaning is a little bit more um rough and tumble. That's the way I kind of think of it, or like we've got, you know, things we're pushing against or fighting against. Um, but I love this image in this deck because I think it just shows the power of one person to transmute that darkness, to hold that darkness open and create something else. And I especially love the star in this image because the post that I put just this last week in Substack called You Are the Meaning Maker. That's what I envision this star being. You know, we are the ones with the incredible faculty of our consciousness, working deep with our bodies, our emotions, and the unconscious as well. We get to create these other realities. We get to call down that star out of the sky and open up and pull back the blackness and have a different reality be available to us. Now, as you can see from the card, and especially it being the seven of wands, this is not an easy path. Okay. It can be tough. Um, in fact, I'll read that one of the things I wanted to do, I wanted to read from that card just so you guys can get a feel for this card. So it says, after feeling the sunlight of goals met and success tasted, the seven of inspiration finds herself with clouded perception and a heavy heart. Those around her have attacked her winds, her path, her position. Some simply don't understand her unique glow and disagree with her, so they try to push her down. Some covet her accomplishments or dislike them. Some have mindsets about success that confuse their own fragile feelings about what they don't have with how they feel about her. We noticing some themes here. She wavers, feeling it all, taking it in, and as she does, her fire begins to dim. It sputters as she allows the external jabber to enter her core. Then she remembers that rising up can sometimes mean others will not agree. She breathes in. She settles once more. She fills her heart with joy. Do not be dimmed. You deserve this success. It's time to defend your spark and reach out in love, pushing all external darkness away. Y'all, I felt a little like a you know, a tiny bit of this this morning, right? With this guy, just the feeling of like literally somebody attacking my path, my position on a road. But y'all may be feeling this on like a pretty existential, deep level right now, right? Feeling the being attacked for your position, others not understanding your mindset, what your belief is, the way you're seeing the world, especially, you know, when you're considering divorce and trying to figure out what you want to do in your marriage. Or even for my listeners that have already made that decision, you know, that doesn't go away in creating the life after and charting the path into the unknown of your soul calls. This is this is the work. It's even when the darkness comes in, it's coming back to that center and remembering do not be dimmed. You deserve this success. And boy, when you do this for yourself, not only does it change your life, but it opens the way for others around you. Looking over this card towards the end of writing this episode, I realized that this podcast not only is my life this, but I am deeply proud and honored to realize that I believe this podcast has also been this in the world. You know, in getting to connect with all of you, to hear your stories back, I have seen just how much this podcast has become a way to illuminate a portal through the darkness, a place where even when it feels like there is no route, there is a way forward and through into a life even better than you can imagine. So with that side, I just want to thank all of you for these 100 episodes together for your graciousness and beauty in being a part of my journey. Um I think a lot of how much, you know, the majority of this podcast was created before I ever found out I had ADHD and without uh medication. And to have had so much support and love back from all of you. Um to have had so many of you, you know, that that is the beauty too of understanding. And I want to bring this in here that yes, there is a lot of pain and suffering in the world. And there are people who are cruel and do not have the capacity to manage their own feelings and will project them. But also, wow, is there so much light and love and many people doing this work? I've seen that through your comments in the podcast. I've definitely had people come to me and find me in the comments that are, you know, nitpicking or finding something about me that they feel like they need to let me know. Um and then I've had, but you know, those have been far, far, far outweighed by the majority of you that have just been like, yeah, I see you. Thank you. Thank you for letting yourself be seen. Thank you for letting your thoughts be shared. And thank you for taking the time to give this out into the world and impact my life accordingly. Um, so I want to leave you guys with that here at the end is yes, we don't run from the darkness and we don't pretend that it's not there. That's, I think, a big piece that I've been learning this year of the importance of like really seeing what is in the world and letting seeing that deepen my practice of loving myself well, loving those around me well, being with myself in the dark, painful parts so that I can love those around me well. And in the moment when a stranger needs my help, also be grounded enough to provide that. So thank you again, all of you, all of my wonderful listeners for these hundred episodes already in the books. And here is with much joy and excitement to the next 100 ahead. Now that's what I've got for you episode-wise. I do have to give you a little heads-up reminder that next week is a fifth Tuesday. So there will not actually be an episode dropping. Every fifth Tuesday, I get to rest, take a little break. They come every three months. I actually won't be resting much because I'll be creating everything for the next two months in the community. And with that in mind, if you are like, uh, but I'm gonna miss you, know that that doesn't mean we can't hang out because the community is the place for that. For those of you that have been listening to the podcast and you're like, I want more, or maybe you're reading stuff on Substack, the community is the place to come hang out with me outside of this, to actually get to be around not only me live on our calls, but a bunch of other kick-ass amazing women in the community. And it's a place where we get to be talking about things like this and so much more, plus just really getting to hang out and have a great time. Um, there was a woman who is in my community who took the time. I'm so grateful. Uh, we had a recent conversation where she shared with me how much she appreciates that in my community, there are these calls every Friday that are just for sharing. We call them weather of the week. And they're an opportunity for any women that can get on to be able to both talk about their weather that it happened this week and witness other women. And she mentioned that in other groups she'd been in, you know, the calls were just all kind of teaching and not as informal, and how much it's meant to her to have this space where we get to yes, learn about important concepts. I just did a huge workshop a couple of days ago, this last weekend, all about this incredible framework that I'm now teaching in the community called Core, that I was just like over the top, excited about. We've been really building towards it this whole year. I think it's going to be really life-changing for the women in my community. So, yes, we have amazing frameworks, but on top of that, there are calls where we really just get to drop in, have fun, be spicy, talk about the things that maybe you have nobody else to talk about. And I'm especially excited that this next month in April, we will be adding. I'm gonna try out a new call that's gonna be purely like fun, getting to know each other, because I'm noticing how much right now we just need places to feel seen, to kind of let our hair down with other authentic women that are figuring out this crazy thing called life as well. So know that your spot is there and waiting for you if you've been feeling the itch for more. And for those of you that are looking for maybe more specific support, really wanting to get my eye on where you're at in the process with considering divorce. I've got that 90-minute get unstuck and empowered session for those of you that are wanting like a DIY roadmap to help you get unstuck and moving forward. And my deep dive one-on-one coaching container for women that are crushing it, maybe at work and professionally, like you feel like a badass there. And at the same time, though, you dread coming home. You know who you are, my babes. If that is you, definitely go take a look at my deep dive coaching container. Um, I've had some amazing women recently um move through that. I have one in particular that I'm just like blown away with who not only got divorced, but is like moving straight into starting a business and really launching the next part of her life. And that's what I want for my women that are ready for that. They're like, not only do I want to like figure out what decision I want to make, but from there, I want to really have the tools to move into living a very big, very soul-led life. So if that's you, go check it out. That's all I've got for you guys today. Till April, my loves, sending you big hugs, big kisses, lots of celebration for the hundredth episode today.
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SPEAKER_00Next time we'll be on 101. Bye, babes.