73: The Messy Middle: Building Your Action Potential

In this raw and electric episode, Quinn cracks open what it really means to live in the messy middle — that in-between season where you’ve left the old life but haven’t yet stepped fully into the new.

You’ve filed the papers, moved out, maybe even bought new sheets… but somehow, you still feel stuck. This week, Quinn pulls together science, soul, and straight talk to show you that you’re not broken — you’re charging.

💥 In this episode:

• Why the middle feels like both everything and nothing is happening
• The action potential of the nervous system — and how it mirrors your emotional readiness for change
• How being “under your therapeutic threshold” (in hormones and healing) keeps you looping in self-doubt
• Why support, truth, and courage are the real voltage boosters
• What weightlifting and micro-tears can teach you about growth after divorce
• A no-BS reminder that you’re not a victim — you’re in training
• How to spot the safety lies keeping you comfortable but small
• And the key question: Where in your life are you just below threshold?

This episode is a wake-up call wrapped in warmth — equal parts neuroscience, midlife hormones, and post-divorce tough love.

🎧 Listen if you’re:

• Separated, waiting for clarity, and craving momentum
• Tired of “doing all the things” but feeling no spark
• Ready to lift heavier — emotionally, spiritually, and maybe in the gym too

PostDivorceGlowUp.com

Email: quinn@postdivorceglowup.com

Transcript

0:49

Hello Lover. I spent the weekend in Dallas with my bestie Brita Joe at her stay or go retreat, and I had the best weekend. I also had the honor of meeting women in person who I've only known through Brita's online community. And you guys, I am in love. I noticed after the first day that I was feeling all of this yummy lovey energy, and I told Britta, it's been a minute since I felt like I was falling in love with people and life and the way I feel when I'm around them. It was so much more than anything I could imagine. I came back so full of joy and love and support that my recovery from being away from home for a few days has been so gentle and easy. But we are not going to be talking about gentle and easy today. Today we are diving into something called the messy middle, that raw. Uncertain season between deciding to leave and fully stepping into your new life. Maybe you filed the papers, maybe you're separated. And maybe your toothbrush is still in the same bathroom, but your heart knows you are not the same woman anymore, and in this middle, that strange space where you've left but you haven't yet arrived. And if you there now. Now this one's for you. In this episode, we're going to talk about why the middle feels both. Everything and nothing is happening. The emotional whiplash of freedom and fear colliding. Why confidence doesn't come before the leap. It's built through leaping. How to anchor yourself when clarity fades and self-doubt takes over because the messy middle, it's not failure, it's not punishment, it's the threshold, the sacred pause between who you were. And who you're becoming. I talked with a woman this weekend who has been. Telling me for literally months, I'm in the messy middle and nobody talks about it. I honestly didn't understand what she meant, but I had a chance to have her explain what this looks like for her. She is separated, the papers are drawn up. She has her own place, but she finds herself unable to move forward. And she knows she wants to leave and can't quite go back. For her, it feels overwhelming and not enough at the same time, and I thought, yes, now I recognize that place. That's exactly what this part feels like. You're doing so much. Maybe the paperwork or the therapy, figuring out logistics, crying in the shower, but somehow it feels like Nothing is moving. It feels messy. It feels like you're stuck. It's like pushing on a door that won't open, and here's where my nursing brain comes in, because it clicked for me this concept called action potential. In your body, nerves only fire when they reach a certain electrical threshold. I believe it's negative 70 millivolts. Until then, nothing happens. You can poke it, you can nudge it, but until the voltage builds to negative 70 millivolts, there is no spark. No movement, and that's what the messy middle feels like. You're doing a lot, but if your energy isn't directed, if it's not building your voltage, it's like all of that effort never quite reaches the point where real change fires off. So the question becomes. What actually builds your action potential because when the nerve hits that action potential, there is exponential growth, there is exponential firing, and it goes from negative 70 to positive 30 in a matter of milliseconds. So again, what builds your action potential? What kind of truth, courage, or alignment gets you to that threshold where something finally shifts? A few weeks ago, I had to face this lesson in my own body. I started waking up again in the middle of the night a couple months ago. Hot flashes, insomnia. I am post-menopausal, and I had that restless feeling. That those of you in my position may recognize having such a hard time to get into my body and feel at rest, just feeling a little cray cray. And I've been on hormone replacement therapy for over a year, so I thought what gives this is new. I was doing what I felt like were the right things. Eating clean, lifting weights, managing stress. But when I went to my doctor, we decided to get some labs done, and I still waited for over two weeks to go get the labs done while still complaining about my symptoms. I was in this messy middle, even though I had in my hands the order to go and get the labs after I saw myself, I just had to laugh because what the fuck, Quinn? I finally followed through. I got my labs back and it turns out my estradiol was low. Even though I wasn't doing anything wrong, I didn't have enough insight to see what needed to change. My body was below its therapeutic threshold. My estradiol needs to be between 50 and 70, and mine was at 29. 50 to 70 is the. Therapeutic threshold that will impact my hot flashes and insomnia. I felt like I was taking a big dose of estradiol. I was being consistent, but I needed something more. It hit me because how often do we do that in our emotional lives? We meditate, we read the books, but we are still underdosing ourselves on truth, on honest feedback, on courage on community. Or support. We think that we are failing, that we are stuck in this messy middle, but really we're just under our therapeutic threshold. We need more of something, and it's usually some kind of support. I've now increased my dosage and it may take a few months to see the results in my symptoms. So for now, I carry a fan and I do what I can, but I do not neglect increasing my dosage of what will ultimately help me. Sometimes it is not that you're doing it wrong, it's that you're doing it alone without the mirror of someone who can see where you are stuck. Someone who can call you on your bullshit. You get so caught up in telling the same story over and over and over again. It becomes this, this little blanket you're wubby that you can't go anywhere without. And a coach. A friend, a therapist, a mentor, someone who will be compassionately and sometimes brutally honest with you so that they can tell you what's missing and you can't always tell yourself. And that's what that good coach or therapist, or friends does for you. They don't fix you because they can't, and they're willing to risk the relationship in order to tell you the truth. They help you reach your therapeutic dose of honesty and support. They help you reach that threshold so that you can fire, and sometimes you can only fire if you're holding someone's hand. We have in this country this. Toxic individualism and me going and spending the weekend with all of these women and having them witness me and having me witness them, loving each other, holding each other, hearing the truth of each other. It was incredibly therapeutic and has lit a fire under me to continue to create the support and the community and the network that I need in my life because again, sometimes in order to hit that threshold and fire, you need to be holding someone's hand or know that someone has your back. Now, you know, I love dropping some love for lifting weights and building a strong body. So here we go. If you've been going to the gym, lifting the same dumbbells for months and you're not getting stronger, the solution is to not quit. For many women. It's to lift heavier, you've got to increase resistance to grow. I do not care if you are sweating, if it is hard for you, if you are not making progress, something is off. And that's why people hire personal trainers and dieticians to help them see where is something. Off. We need people in our lives who will tell us, you need to lift heavier and I will be here to spot you. You can do it. I've got your back. Because when you lift You have to push your muscles to tear. To literally tear that is the burn because those micro tears is how the muscle rebuilds stronger. Now, I will add the caveat that you must also dial in your rest and recovery so that your body can repair and get stronger, but most of us, especially in the gym, ladies, you are not. Lifting heavy enough and it's the same in life after divorce. If you want to grow stronger boundaries, deeper confidence or more self-trust, you've gotta fucking lift heavier emotionally and practically that means having the hard conversation, telling yourself the uncomfortable truth. Facing the part of your life that may feel too tender to touch. You can't tone your way through transformation. You have got to tear a little, just enough to build back stronger. Now I wanna say something and it might sting a little. You are not a victim. You made the choices that have brought you to this point. And being here in the messy middle, it is not a problem unless you keep repeating this story and staying right here. It's like playing with your poo and offering it to other people. Stop it. Stop it. You can also choose to believe that you are in training. This messy middle is not happening to you. I promise you it is happening for you. It is a call to radical honesty. If you are telling yourself stories like, I can't leave because of the kids, or I can't heal until he apologizes, or I'm too old to start over, or if I push all the way through with this divorce, I will lose him as a friend. Those are safety lies. They keep you comfortable. They keep you numb. But they also keep you small. They keep you in the messy middle without the capacity to build the voltage, to hit the spark, to take action. And this, my friend, is your invitation to get deeply and maybe painfully honest with yourself. Because every time you tell yourself the truth, even when it hurts, you build more voltage. Right. Confidence doesn't come first. God, I wish it did. I wish I could just become confident and then do all the things, but confidence is built by doing the thing scared and the result is confidence. You get to harvest confidence by doing things while scared. Each brave step is an an additional electrical charge. And then one day snap, you hit threshold and everything fires. You move forward, the door opens and you realize you are never stuck. You were just charging. That's the messy middle. And resistance isn't proof that you are broken or that you can never have what other people have. It's simply proof that you're building. So this week I want you to ask yourself, where in my life am I just below threshold? Where am I mistaking? Motion for forward movement. Are you on the treadmill and trying to just run faster on a treadmill, baby? You can turn off the treadmill. Just step off and take a step forward. What kind of truth, support, or resistance do you need? To finally fire forward because babe, you are not broken. You're just in the middle of rewiring your life. Like every nerve, every muscle, every cell in your body, you are building charge. You're learning what it takes to spark again. So lift heavier, ask for help. Raise your therapeutic dose of truth and keep building your action potential your next life. The one that feels magnetic and alive and connected is waiting just beyond that threshold. All right, girlfriend. Until next week, be brave. Be bold. You can do it. And remember, the messy middle is just the prelude to your glow up. I'll talk to you next week. I.