Why did I marry my Father?  Why do I over-react when my spouse does certain things?  Why do I make the same mistakes over and over again?  Try this explanation out...

What if we married the person, possibly on a sub-conscious level, who would lead us to clean up all the adverse emotional baggage we have been carrying around all of our lives?  What if it takes this divorce to allow us to finally heal ourselves?  What if this divorce is the means to letting go of the psycho-babble that has kept us from being the person we were meant to be?

Let's say that you married someone who resembles your Father or Mother on an emotional  and psychological basis. All the old stuff you went through in your childhood gets repeated and reactivated.  Say your Dad was overly negative. Now you are extremely sensitive to anything that smacks of criticism and of course your ex was critical of you.  Even when they weren't being overtly critical, your buttons got pushed anyway.  Here's what might be happening:  As kids, we make our parent's behavior mean something negative about us.  If your Dad was negative, it wasn't about him simply being a negative person. It was about you not being good enough.  There's the emotional baggage: not being good enough. So we marry someone who will reinforce that belief of not being good enough.  When we don't feel good enough, we over react emotionally and we do it over and over again.

That emotional baggage should have been attended to long ago but most of us aren't even aware of it. Our divorce can reveal the stuff we've been carrying around for far too long and we now can clean it up once and for all. Divorce can and should move us to heal all the  old emotional baggage  that has stopped us from being the person we were meant to be. Could it be that we chose our spouse in order to finally do that healing?  Could it be that once we have taken the time and made the effort to heal we will finally live a happy life.

Could be.

As a Divorce Recovery Coach,  all too often I hear tales of infidelity.  More often than not, the spouse who has been betrayed makes it mean all sorts of terrible things about themselves.  Their partner cheats and it becomes all about what is wrong with the betrayed partner:  I obviously was not good enough, I am not lovable, he/she doesn't really love me, I'm unworthy, I'm not attractive enough, I'm stupid...on and on and on.  The fact is someone cheated and the betrayed makes up all kinds of meanings about that fact.

No one knows what goes on inside someone else's home.  But what comes up for me in this instance of the Tiger woods episode is Elin Woods.  On the surface here is a gorgeous, young woman who is the Mother of his children.  He obviously wasn't looking for a younger, prettier model as Elin is just that.  Tiger's words alone offer a glimpse into the crux of the matter: I have transgressed.  It would appear that Tiger has some big-time issues on sexual activity and loyalty.  He has to examine himself deeply and come to understand himself better.

As I said, we don't know what goes on in their relationship. A relationship is two peopole and both have to claim responsibility for their part.  But I hope that Elin is not beating herself up too much by creating all sorts of meanings about herself because her husband cheated. His cheating is his issue. Their relationship is their issue.

I have clients whose mates have cheated on them and they end up feeling like a failure, a reject, ugly, stupid...you name it.  In so many of these cases, if you peal back the layers of the onions, the cheating is less about the betrayed than the betrayer and the relationship.  Tiger's cheating does not mean that Elin is a reject or a failure. It means that Tiger cheated. Sometimes a table is  table and nothing more.  Why he cheated is another issue and one that the two of them need to work out obviously.

I say this in the hopes that if you too have experienced  a philandering spouse, watch that you don't make it mean too much about yourself.  Separate out the facts from the meanings you create about the facts.  How you feel today, when the pain is fresh, is not how you will feel in the future.

Watching the memorial service for 9/11 this morning, I listened to a young choir sing Mariah Carey's song,  Hero.  The line that resonated for me was, " You will come to learn the truth that the hero lies in you."

To have survived the loss of a loved one who was snatched from them so suddenly and violently is hard for me to wrap my mind around.  Yet, the mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, wives, husbands and children of the dead did just that.  So many of them used the tragedy of 9/11 to advocate for justice for their loved ones as well as laws and initiatives to protect us in the future.  They turned their individual stories of tragedy into ones of redemption.  They replaced their status as victims to that of heroes.

Consider the number of widows and widowers who had to find a way to survive, let go of the past and move on with their lives.  So many of these men and women had children to raise and they had to find a way to move forward no matter their pain.  Somehow they had to access the inner strength and resolve to continue. They did.

I rememeber a powerful concept to which I was introduced to when I was doing additional training in divorce coaching.  Turn your divorce story around.  Initially, our divorce story is painful, not to mention depressing. It is filled with loss, pain, resentment, regret and blame.  In the telling of it, we fall into sadness and all too often, anger.  Many of us are victims.  We go through a grieving period and if we put forth the effort, we can begin to see that our divorce story needs to be changed. We need to go from being the victim of our story to the hero/heroine of that story.

How?  After time, we will begin to see the gifts, life lessons and deep wisdom that our divorce has handed us.  We use these lessons and wisdom to transform ourselves, to let go of old emotional  baggage, to grow and evolve as a human being and thereby to craft new lives that offer us happiness, meaning and fulfillment.  We learn to use our divorce as a catalyst for something better for ourselves. 

We take a  look at that old divorce story and  rewrite it.  Instead of being a victim, we are the hero that survived, overcame challenges, let go of old demons, perhaps found a new career or job, managed to raise children in a safe and secure environment, learned to let go of bitterness, regained hope and optimism for life....on and on and on.  We transform that divorce story from one of victim-hood to one of heroism.

So how can you begin to rewrite your own divorce story?

I know from personal experience that one doesn't just let go of the past one day and everything is hunky-dory forever.  Ah were it so!  Divorce Recovery like any other discipline is an on-going process.  Even the best of us have a blip on the screen of life every now and then.  That nasty little gremlin, our mind chatter, rears its ugly head from time to time and needs taming. 

The all-important thing is being aware of that  mind chatter when it first starts so that we don't allow it to take over.  So as much as I know on a very deep level that the only person that I can control or change in this life is myself, every once in a while I fall back into being disappointed or resentful over something my ex says or does.  We have kids  so we are tied together for the rest of our lives. 

The good thing is that I have become much more conscious of my backsliding and can more often than not catch myself...albeit not always.  Always is a long, long time and a very high expectation that in my book is unrealistic and unenforceable.  I take it a day at a time.  Every backslide is yet another lesson for me in which to access the wisdom I have and then apply it towards my future.

So all of this has led me to create a free tele-seminar on Acceptance which is the cornerstone of divorce recovery, letting go and moving on after your divorce. I invite you to join me on Wednesday, September 16th at 9pm est for look at the most important step one can take in our quest to take back our lives after divorce...acceptance.

Go to:


http://www.changecoachshelley.com/life_coaching_resources/teleclasses.html

I saw a play last week in NYC entitled, Next to Normal.  The story is about a woman who is bi-polar.  Her disease was set off by  the death of her 8 month old son. She was unable to accept his passing to the point that he actually was alive for her.  She saw and communicated with an 18 year old son who was not there.  She created her own reality that was a fantasy.  Ultimately it drove her mad.

I attend a good deal of live theater in New York City.  I believe in taking  advantage of this incredible City that is at my fingertips and the theater in NYC is one of passions.  As in life, some plays are phenomenal and some not so great.  A few nights ago I saw a not so great play entitled Happiness BUT it did give me something to think about and a tool to utilize on those days that I am feeling not so great.

The Perfect Moment.  The concept presented in the play was this:  10 or so people are trapped in a subway car, all of them suddenly made aware of the fact that they have died.  The conductor informs them that they must come up with a Perfect Moment from their lives and if they do so, eternity can be spent in that perfect moment.  Oh if that were actually true!

So slowly but surely, each of them arrives at their perfect moment.  For an older woman, it is a moment from the 1940's when she was dancing with a soldier at a USO dance and he asked her to be his girl.  For a doorman, it was when his Dad took him to the 1954 playoff game where he saw Willie Mays make a ground-shaking catch.  For a young Hispanic bicycle delivery man it was when he dressed up as the tooth fairy and gave his daughter her 50 cents.  For a young woman who spent her life in Manhattan selling perfume at Bloomingdales and living in a make believe world of the rich, it was a night on the beach in Brooklyn with her sweetheart.  And so on.

I give my clients undergoing divorce a 'time-out' exercise that allows them to bypass a negative emotional reaction. They sit quietly and spend a minute or so taking deep, cleansing breaths to slow down their heart rate and thus calm themselves. In the past, I have asked them to then visualize a time when they were joyful or at peace.  Now I plan on using the Perfect Moment.

Here a few of my Perfect Moments:

- playing in the woods with my gang of neighborhood friends when I was a kid
- Sitting   at a dinner table with my dearest friends for my 50th birthday
- Lying in bed with my teenage daughter and just talking about her life
- Falling asleep with my children when they were young, cuddled up to me in my bed
- Awakening from a deep sleep and seeing my two year old son, standing with his blanky, staring intno my eyes.
- Hiking in the rain-forest
- Sitting on my Dad's lap
- Immediately after my wedding ceremony when my ex and I sat alone together for a half an hour to ponder the wonder of being married..
- Lying with a sleeping infant on my chest.
- Talking on the phone late at night with my first boyfriend

There are so many of those perfect moments in our lives but we forget about them all too soon.  Its the muck of life that seems to be on our minds most of the time. We have to remember to remember the perfect moments in our lives, especially when life is not treating us so good.  These are gifts we can give ourselves to bring a smile to our face and realize that life is indeed good. 

In divorce recovery as well as any other major loss in life, acceptance is the most important step we must take.  By acceptance I mean the acceptance of your reality as it exists for you right now:  what is and not what we think should or could be.  Acceptance means being grounded in reality with the release of blame, resentment and regret.  The ability to let go of those negative  emotions is true acceptance and gives you the freedom to move forward.

A couple of recent occurences in my life have reinforced this concept.  I recently received an e-mail from a cousin of mine who has been terribly sick with cancer this past year. Really sick, near death far too many times. She had a bone marrow transplant. This is a woman who also experienced divorce when her two kids were young and has aised her chlldren on her own. 

For those of you having trouble accepting your reality, I want to share this with you:

"Hi Shelley-
How are you doing?  How are the kids?
I am recovering - still. Unfortunately, I have Graft vs. Host disease. The disease basically means that the transplant is not working right now. The host (me) and the donor (graft) immune systems are battling and hopefully my donor's immune system will win. I am also suffering from severe osteoporosis. I have been left with a deformed spine, 7 fractured vertebrae which has led to quite a bit of nausea. Because my torso is now deformed to accommodate my new structure, I have trouble processing and digesting food. Let's see, I have lost a lot of my sense and smell, I have an inoperable hernia. It is inoperable because there is a high risk for infection, so no surgery is allowed. I wear a spine brace and I am in a lot of pain. My physical demeanor is that of an elderly person. (Note: she is only in her early 50's)

 BUT on the flip side I am above ground and I do appreciate life. I have a big support system. I have good medical care and  my friends and family are the best. I just want to get on with my life and stop being a patient.

My girls have been awesome through my whole ordeal, their  compassionate character makes me proud. My best friend and caregiver is without a doubt, an angel sent from heaven. We live together and he is my shadow. He has been caring for me physically and emotionally and I am very grateful. Of course, without my mother's help, I wouldn't be here. So, there are many things to be grateful for, it is just hard to be me right now."

It is simply mind-boggling to me that she can be talking about gratitude given her life situation!!  She could be stuck in anger, depression or victmhood but I heard nothing of that in her e-mail.  Her life has taken a terrible turn and she has accepted her fate.  Of course, she has depession...who wouldnt given the cicumstances. Yet I hear someone who has acknowledged her reality and who wants to live the rest of her days with love, compassion and gratitude for what she does have... or in her own words, " I am above the ground."

Next up, Melissa Stockwell.  I saw an interview on television with this Iraqi vet who lost a leg in the war.  She has gone on to compete in the para-olympics in Bejing where she set  a recod in swimming.  Despite the challenges of adjusting to life with one leg, she has taken on one physical challenge after another, proving again and again that she can still be a formidable athlete.

And she does not waste time with regrets or dwelling on the past.She was very clear in the interview I saw that there was no way she would waste a moment in blame or resetnment or a yearning for what was. She let it go.

"When I signed up, I knew I was taking a chance," she said. "I'm proud of how I lost my leg. I was proud to wear the uniform. I  still am. I've done more with one leg than I ever did with two," she said. "I have bigger dreams than I ever would have had with two legs. I don't know if things are meant to happen, but I'm very happy."

These two women humble me.  They make me think about all that I have to be grateful for and how my attitude will dicate the quality of my life.

President-Elect Obama’s theme of change strikes a common chord.  The world and everything in it, whether animate or inanimate, is in a constant state of change.  This is an unarguable fact, the truth.  Physics confirms this.  Just take a look at the world around you and you will see that everything changes and nothing remains static.  The one thing that you can always count on is change.  So why are we so afraid of change?  Why is it so unsettling?

I believe that it has to do with the unknown and our uncertainty with the unknown.  We want and need to be in control, to know what is going to happen.  The paradox in this need is that one can never know what the future holds, not a minute from now or a year from now.  We cannot control the outer world.  Things happen, they always have and they always will.  Just when we think we have it down, something else pops up to challenge us.  It is how we handle what life throws at us that is important.  It is our inner world that we can control which will ultimately elicit the change we want in our outer world.

You want to adjust your perspective on change from one of fear to one of a belief that everything will work out in your best interest.  You need to learn the difference between what you can control and what you cannot and thereby let go of the things that you cannot control and concentrate on those you can.  You do have full control over how you choose to handle the changes that life brings you.  More important, you have full control in being the change that you desire.

What do you want to change in your life this year?  Do you want to be healthier?  Then put all your full attention on that intention.  There is a saying that when you are fully committed to something, the universe will align itself to give you what you want.  I don’t know for a fact whether that is true or not but to live as if it is true would be a welcome change, an empowering perspective. The belief that you can become healthier can only move you in that direction but it must coupled with you taking full responsibility for being healthy.  Responsibility for our intentions is empowerment.

Creating positive change in your life begins with your belief and commitment to what you desire.  What you desire must be of great value to you. Focusing your attention on that change and weaving it into the fabric of every day is the key to success.  Doing whatever needs to b done is mandatory.  If you need help then get it.  Trust me, you don’t have to go it alone.  A prima ballerina will have spent years of practice with instruction and coaching to reach her goal. So too a star athlete.  Access all the tools and skills you can to move you forwards.  

A final thought for you to ponder:  What would you regret never having done in your life?  Don’t find yourself heading into the great unknown and wishing you had done this or that. Now is the time to initiate the changes that you want.

I wish you the change that you want in your life this year.  I know that you can access your inner wisdom and strength in order to achieve what it is you want.  I wish you health, happiness and joy in this one precious life of yours.

I believe that New Year’s resolutions are unique and meaningful opportunities to commit to positive change in our lives.  For those of you who are undergoing a divorce or are recently divorced, a deep commitment to create change that will move you forward into a new life is hopefully very compelling.  What better time to promise yourself that you will do all you can to let go of the pain of the past and move into a future filled with possibility than a new year?

Resolutions must be extremely compelling to us personally in order for us to keep them. They must resonate on a deep level.  They need to be truly important with a clear connection to our values and passions.  That is why so many people fail in their resolutions…they just aren’t important enough to them.

What could be more compelling to a woman who is newly divorced than to resolve to heal herself and build a new life based on what she wants now? In order to determine what she wants, she needs to know herself, the self that is emerging from the end of her marriage, a phoenix rising from the ashes.  The past is gone with no hold on your future self except the hold that you choose to erect.  It really comes down to choice.  You are blessed with free will, the will to choose how you want to live your life.

I took a wonderful yoga class this week that reminded me of how impactful the practice of mindfulness can be on our well-being.  The instructor gave us many affirmations to recite, each corresponding to a different chakra.  One of them really stood out for me because it seemed to apply to my clients in divorce recovery.  It states:  The process of purification dissolves who I am not and reveals who I am.  If we substitute the word purification for self-discovery or divorce recovery, it clarifies exactly what divorce recovery is all about:  finding out who we are now and creating a life that is based on that person.  

We dissolve the mind chatter that attempts to sabotage our self-esteem and confidence, the mind chatter of our wounded ego and the pain that wants nothing more than to keep us stuck where we are after our divorce.  We reveal the person behind that mind chatter, the person who we have always been meant to be.  We dissolve or let go of what holds us back and venture into a new life filled with possibilities for our future.

Use your divorce and the New Year as opportunities to heal, let go, claim your power and a life that will fill you with joy, meaning and fulfillment.  Resolve to move beyond your perspective of pain and doubt and to remove anything that is standing in the way of your happiness. Resolve to do the work of divorce recovery.

All around us we see the repercussions of the financial disaster. People have lost the bulk of their life savings that had been invested in the stock market.  Unemployment is rising everyday and all around us people are losing their jobs.  Credit is unavailable. Home values have plummeted and many of us have mortgages that exceed the value of our homes.  The holidays are approaching and we simply cannot spend what we do not have.  This is a scenario that our parents or grandparents lived through in the 30’s, that they repeatedly warned us about and one we never in a million years imagined could touch our own lives.  But it has.

We rail against Wall Street and the government.  Blame is raging.  How could this have happened in our day and age? Well it did happen, it is what it is and now we must accept what is and take the necessary steps to move forward. More important, what lessons and deep wisdom can we extract from our present reality that will help us to grow and evolve as human beings?  What do we need to learn so that we do not allow this to happen again?  What are the gifts of this experience?

Here are some insights that I have personally gathered:

1.    The signs were there all along.  We simply chose not to see them or we chose denial. We may not have been able to imagine just how bad things have become but we certainly saw the warning signs. From insanely inflated real estate prices to an overblown stock market to over-spending on our own parts, the signs were there.  
2.    We gave up responsibility for our own lives. I can see how I personally absolved myself of personal responsibility in my own investments by leaving it all to the so-called experts.  Ultimately, we and we alone are responsible for our lives.
3.    We get to choose what is really important in life.  We need to determine what our core values are and live them everyday.  So the kids don’t get as many presents this year.  It is time tor return to the values that hold real meaning in our lives: responsibility, acceptance, giving back, common sense, frugality…you know what I mean!
4.    We need to become more creative.  Insanity is doing the same things over and over again and expecting different results! The government is going to need to do things very differently now because what they had been doing didn’t work. Same for Wall Street, same for us individually.
5.    Greed is destructive.  Unbridled greed on everyone’s part is an element of what got us here.  Back to the basics of right and wrong.
6.    We went unconscious. What were we thinking?  How could we have not seen what was happening?  We went unconscious.   We need to remain aware at all times of what is going on around us.  Only when we are aware, can we make real choices on how to best handle life.
7.    It is a time to pull together. We are all in this together.  Collective responsibility will be the road to positive change.  Obama talks about change we can believe in…be that change.
8.    Wall Street’s use of leverage brought down the markets…so too did our own personal use of leverage.  We need to return to the theory of the gold standard where a dollar has the backing of a certain amount of gold.  We spend what we have and do not leverage ourselves to the hilt.
9.     We need to learn to accept what is and then move forward.  What is is the mess we find ourselves in. Until we let go of should be’s and could be’s we will not be able to create the changes we so desperately need.
10.     We need an attitude adjustment, a new perspective.  Perhaps if we can look at this as the crisis we needed to make the changes that we have needed for so very long, then we can move forward with a positive and empowering perspective that this is all for the good.  
11.    We need to let go of what we cannot control: most everything in the external world. We need to determine what we can control in life: ourselves and how we choose to handle what life throws our way.

Your thoughts?