One Step At A Time

One Step At a Time

Divorce can be scary and filled with all kinds of questions. How do I get started? What will my family and friends think? How much will it cost? What will my life look like afterward? Will I ever be in a relationship again? Will my kids be ok? Will I be ok financially? What will we do with the house?

Your brain may have you focused on all these big questions in an effort to convince you to stay put, even when you know that you need to move on and that your marriage is over. Your brain is doing its job to protect you and guide you to the path of less resistance. Instinctively, brains don’t like change or doing hard things, even when it knows that where you are now is not where you should be.

The beauty is that you are smarter than this. You have the ability to control your thoughts. Your higher brain power knows that in order to make any change, including creating the life you want, action is required. It takes getting out there, moving forward, and being uncomfortable.

If you know that it is time to move on from your marriage, do so with love and be kind to yourself. Be easy on yourself. Whenever I coach someone to a better life (including the decision to divorce), I encourage them to sit down and write out their goals. What do you want your life to look like? What are the things you want to accomplish that you are not accomplishing? Take a time out, breathe,e and work backward brainstorming on what you need to do to reach the goals in your life. This works with any goal, not just divorce.

If you are contemplating divorce or even made the absolute decision to move on from your marriage, breaking it down into small, doable steps should be your first goal. For example, one of the first things on your list should likely be to understand your legal rights. Then the next step might be to get information on the different processes to consider when going through the divorce. Then you consult confidentially with a family lawyer and when you are ready, together, you decide the next steps. See, the key to reaching any goal is just to keep moving forward, one baby step at a time.

Baby steps are easier to deal with than thinking about it in total. Baby steps are achievable. So while going through a divorce is never a pleasant experience, it can be the key to the life you want and deserve. And YES – you can do hard things. You got this – one step at a time.