58: I Choose Me: Divorce Rings, Rituals & Rebirth

It’s not about retail therapy—it’s about reclaiming your identity. In this deeply empowering episode, Quinn explores the growing trend of divorce rings and other symbolic rituals women are using to mark their rebirth after divorce.

We talk about:

💍 What a divorce ring is (and isn’t)
 🔥 How Beyoncé, Serena Williams, and Adele used symbols to step into power
 🌀 Quinn’s personal ritual under the moon and how to find your anchor in chaos
🖋 Why name changes, tattoos, playlists, and even art preferences matter
🧠 How symbols help your brain heal and move forward after deep transformation
🌕 Why ritual isn’t optional—it’s ancient, necessary, and available to you right now

“Symbols help our nervous system make sense of chaos. They say: this chapter is different. You are different now.”

Whether you’re buying a thrift store ring, lighting a candle, or blasting Meghan Trainor on your school run—this episode is a love letter to your becoming.

MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• The Alter Ego Effect by Todd Herman
• Adele’s Saturn tattoo
• Elizabeth Gilbert’s sacred altars
• Reese Witherspoon’s daily rituals
• Women Who Run With the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés
• Song: “I Love Me” by Meghan Trainor ft. LunchMoney Lewis & Sasha Sloan

PostDivorceGlowUp.com

Email: quinn@postdivorceglowup.com

Transcript

0:49

Welcome back to the podcast, my friends. It is a good day to be divorced. It is such a good day to be divorced. Yes, it brings me so much joy. As you know, I hope it brings a lot of joy to you as well. Now, the fact that divorce brings us a lot of joy does not mean that it doesn't bring us a lot of other gifts as well. And some of those can be challenging. So those of you who are struggling and challenged at this point in your journey. I am so sorry and I am here for you and hopefully you can harvest a little bit of joy in what we talk about today. So gather in, I wanna dive into the bold, the symbolic, the beautifully rebellious, the rise of the divorce ring and the empowerment rituals that women are using to mark their rebirth, their literal rebirth after divorce. I love this trend. have you heard about this trend of women buying rings or repurposing? Oh, the rings, but putting something on their ring finger as a way to. Create a commitment to themselves. Now, before you roll your eyes and think, no, this is just another reason to go shopping. I am so sick of the consumerism. Or maybe you're one of those girlies who are like, yeah, any reason to go shopping? I'm there. I'm with you Quinn, but stay with me. We're not talking about retail therapy. We're talking about finding symbols. To help you reclaim your identity, discovering who you are, what speaks to you through meaningful symbols that are all about our transformation. I don't think it's possible to go through divorce without some sort of transformation. The transformation from when we met and married our spouse. To the time that we choose out or they choose out somebody's choosing out of the marriage. There is such a profound transformation that we go through. Some of us stays the same, but so much of us changes, Hopefully for the better, but not always, but let's get honest about all of it. When we come out the other end of this divorce, as I said that it, it sounded better in my head. So when we come to the other side about that instead of the other end, when we come to the other side of a divorce. It's time to take a breath, but also to make some really conscious decisions about what is going to draw us forward. So let's start with the symbol of a divorce ring. Some women are using black diamonds instead of the clear diamonds or phoenix designs to bands that go on the right hand to say, this woman belongs to no one but herself. But the cool thing about this trend is that typically, traditionally women have been claimed. By the ring finger. You know, a man puts a, a band on the, that finger and, and it's not necessarily gendered. Men wear wedding bands as well, but that reclaiming that symbol that. I get to have a ring on whatever finger I want to because I decide to. women are choosing to do this for a variety of reasons, because absence of a wedding ring, especially if you've worn a wedding ring for many years or decades. It can feel really weird. You could feel invisible or naked, like something is missing we've been conditioned to see that. A woman with a ring. That's proof of her value of her being chosen. So when you take it off, there's often this silence, this echoing chasm in yourself of who am I now? And a divorce ring says I choose me. I choose myself, and these rings are typically anything but subtle. As I was scouring the internet and different forms, looking at different pieces of jewelry, what I think struck me the most is that these are statement pieces in a different way than an engagement ring is. Think custom designed sapphires to symbolize. Wisdom or a birthstone or a bloodstone or a moonstone or something that is meaningful to you personally. Some women repurpose stones from old engagement rings, perhaps bold, geometric shapes. I mean, it's not just jewelry, it's a declaration. I recently started getting into rings. I have found several that I really love. I did not have a traditional, wedding ring for a lot of years. Early on in, well, you know, within the first decade of our marriage, my husband, he had lost his wedding ring within just a few months of us getting married, and then he later pawned. My ring to settle some of his debts, and so I haven't had a wedding ring for a very long time, but when I went exploring rings, I found that I was drawn to certain symbols, certain stones that were meaningful to me. And I do actually like wearing it on my ring finger, especially This abalone ring that I have that is so meaningful to me because of my love of the ocean, because of the swirling nature of, of the colors that are involved. as you go exploring, you may have in your mind what you think would be meaningful. But I'd encourage you to be open to having the ring find you rather than you find the ring. a lot of the people that I work with, because sometimes I do work with bracelets and jewelry when I am helping someone create an alter ego. Because often we come out of a divorce thinking certain things about ourselves and acting in certain patterns that are not helpful, and we really want to uplevel or transform in significant ways. And sometimes for some people, it's helpful to create an alter ego. As in give her a new name, give her a whole different personality, and give her a symbol that she can use when she becomes this alter ego. For some of my women, it's when I go on a date, I always put on this perfume, or I always put on this ring, or this necklace, or this bracelet, or I go through this ritual. Something that sets you apart like this trigger. what I found that with these clients, that they're more interested in something that is unique or handmade or custom, something found at a flea market or within Tucson we have what are called antique malls, where It's kind of like an indoor flea market, but not quite, and there are beautiful pieces that are one of a kind. Also looking at estate sales is a great place. I have found some beautiful pieces at thrift stores. Just start exploring if this, if this calls to you, if you're like, yeah, that sounds like something that I would love, a piece of jewelry, a ring, it, it doesn't have to be a ring. just something that speaks to you. So let's take a little bit of a step beyond jewelry because there are lots of different things that can create symbols to help you embody this new era. My BFF, she got a tattoo and this was. Important to her on several levels. First of all, within Mormonism at the time, they were pretty strict about tattoos, as in you're not supposed to get them. I know that they have relaxed the rule, the issue for now, but at the time when she left Mormonism and she left her marriage, she decided to get a tattoo and it was a very specific tattoo because of a very specific book that helped her grow and become more of who she is and the book. Is women who run with the wolves. So she has this beautiful wolf tattoo on her forearm, and that was the symbol and is still a symbol that is so important to her. A lot of women are drawn to images like Phoenix's, you know, the, the Phoenix that no matter how many times it bursts into flames and goes to ash, it rises again or butterflies. The idea of. Being the caterpillar, going into the cocoon, turning into mush and emerging as something completely new stars or phrases like, still I rise, or something that. Is a good reminder for you. A lot of women choose to do it in other languages or in symbols that other people aren't able to understand. If they just look at it, they would have to know you in order to ask, what does that mean? What does that mean to you? But tattoos is a beautiful way if that's something you're open to. Another symbol Beyond Rings is a name change. I have a girlfriend who changed her name completely, not her birth name, not her maiden name, not her married name, but a completely new name, and it's so beautiful. I made that same choice that I chose my own chosen name. Just a couple weeks ago, I went to get my mammogram and the woman that was doing it. She had this beautiful name and I complimented her on her name, how much I liked it, and she complimented me on mine and I said, yes, it's a chosen name. And she said, yes, mine is a chosen name. And it, it's so amazing meeting women out in the wild where we are choosing on purpose what we want. Now not everyone wants to change their name. It's kind of a pain in the ass, but. It can be something that if it's something that you are choosing for yourself, can feel like a fresh identity. There are also ceremonies that we can incorporate into our lives that can be very symbolic, whether it's burning letters or old things from the relationship that we no longer want to have in our space. For me, one of the rituals that I really love is being underneath a full moon. I have a beautiful park by my house, so to go out and watch the moon rise and to just, I mean, I don't know what it is. I don't know if it's menopause, but, or my witch nest just rising to the surface. Just ancestrally. I don't know what it is, but I have fallen in love with the moon. So me having a ritual of sitting under the full moon and contemplating my life and who I am becoming has become an important part of my life. There are women who live close to mountains who love to go and hike, and that's part of An ongoing ritual for them or women who like to walk on the beach and walk into the water while saying certain phrases or write something in the sand and allow the waves to come and wipe it away. All of these can be taken into your toolbox as a ceremony that can symbolize something for you. You get to decide what things mean. You get to decide if your divorce was a tragedy or a comedy, or a little bit of both. There are also objects that can mean something to you, that you like to keep around you. Maybe a crystal or a journal or something that another woman in your life has given to you who went through something difficult and came out the other side. It can be really anything. It's you that. Imbues this object with power. In the book, the Alter Ego Effect, So if you're interested in learning more about creating an alter ego, it's a fantastic resource. But he talks about how athletes, performers, CEOs. All kinds of people create alternate versions of themselves in order to practice stepping into power, and almost always they anchor that alter ego with a symbol. Serena Williams, the tennis player. She used to wear a pair of earrings as a cue and Beyonce. She famously created an alter ego named Sasha Fierce, which she said gave her permission to express herself more boldly on stage because these symbols. They trigger the unconscious mind. They give us permission to step into who we are becoming. So this is not just about materialism and get another thing. It's about using. Something, giving it meaning and using it as a tool to become more of yourself. But let's, let's zoom out for just a second and talk about why do symbols even matter at all? I come from a deeply symbolic culture. Within Mormonism, there were literally secret handshakes and certain symbols on Mormon underwear that. We're to signify covenants made with God, but it's not just Mormonism. There are several religions, whether it's the cross within Christianity or the Star of David within Judaism. I think it's safe to say that. In most cultures, probably every culture rites of passages were marked with. Something like a necklace, a tattoo, a garment, a ritual. Like even the ritual of marriage is a thing with the things that you wear. Something borrowed, something blue. You being dressed in white. Having a ritual to begin something as significant as a marriage and not having a ritual to end it is. A disservice in my mind those of us coming to the end of a marriage, I think that we need more ritual. for those of us that pass through this challenge of divorce. I say challenge, but God, I'm so glad, I'm so glad I got divorced. Anyway, using these symbols to mark a ritual to carry us forward Is important psychologically to our brains. It's like when the stoics of. Ancient Athens, they would wear simple garments to train humility or how warriors paint their faces before battle. Or women in indigenous cultures would receive a mark or a new name upon childbirth or widowhood, or when they bled the first time. Symbols help our nervous system make sense. Of chaos. It gives us the message that this chapter is different. You are different. You have gone through something, something that was really challenging and really awesome, and now we're going to go forward. And modern psychology agrees. In trauma healing, we talk about meaning making as a key to recovery. So when you mark your transition with something concrete, your brain can begin to file it away and orient toward a future. It puts an ending like. Period and helps you orient towards new shores. So when you light a candle and you write your new name, when you wear that custom ring or that found ring, or when you tattoo a butterfly on your ribcage, you're not being frivolous. You are becoming. And you are the one that gets to give meaning to it. It doesn't matter if anybody else understands. Yes, of course. You want people to understand and you want people to support, and sometimes they will and sometimes they won't. It's not their responsibility, it's your responsibility. So if this sounds good to you, find your path There are a few famous women who I know of who have used symbols post-divorce. specifically Adele. She reportedly got a Saturn tattoo after her divorce referencing her Saturn return, which is a symbolic astrological shift that represents a major life change. Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of Eat, pray, love. And Big Magic, which is one of my favorite books. She created Sacred Altars while traveling Post-Divorce. So even if you don't have a lot of space, even if you are in transition, you can gather physical objects to represent phases of your healing. Or Reese Witherspoon actress. Businesswoman overall genius in the world. She's spoken about reclaiming her life post-divorce through art and work, but also through specific daily rituals to reground herself because if there's one thing we need after divorce, it's to come back into ourselves. Most of us poured so much of ourselves into the marriage and being the wife. that to now draw back into yourself to, to re re cultivate yourself and to set some new boundaries. Having a symbol or a ritual can be a beautiful way to do this. So I wanna leave you with this. If you created a symbol. To mark this rebirth of your post-divorce life, what does the woman that you are becoming look like? What object or image or phrase can you carry with you? To remind you that you are becoming her, that you are her, and I also want you to think about any old symbols that you're ready to retire. For me, it was mostly religious symbols, like removing pictures of Mormon temples and Mormon men from my home. And filling my home with pictures of women. I have kind of this, I have a thing I have found that I love pictures of women with. Plants growing out of their heads. I'll have to post some online so that you guys can see, but I love those kinds of images where there is part woman, part plant. But for you, perhaps there is. A ring, maybe it's a tattoo, maybe it's a playlist that you blast every morning that makes you feel just so empowered. The first few months of separation, I would play the same song to my kids on the way to school every single day. It's a song called I Love Me by Meghan Trainor. And someone else, I can't remember, but it's such a fabulous song. I'll see if I can, if I can find it and, uh, put it in the show notes. So I want you to figure out your symbol. Something that can give you courage and anchor because there is a possibility. Yes, for sure. There's a possibility that you shrink after divorce that you become less than, but. I want you to know that, that drawing into yourself for a time of healing does not have to mean that you are shrinking. It can mean that you are healing. But one of the things that can be so helpful is having a symbol, an anchor that is on the shore while you feel like you are in the depths of the ocean trying to. Excavate who you are becoming and who you want to become. So until next time, build an altar. Sit under the full moon. You are the phoenix rising. You are everything that you need to be. You already know your next step. Just take the next step. You got this and I got you. I'll see you next week.