WHAT THIS EPISODES ABOUT…
Welcome Ladies, I’m Shauna Hoffman. Thank you or letting me pop into your life again today. I have to say I have been so grateful for the emails and messages I have gotten from so many of you about the podcasts. You know sometimes when you record alone in your office you feel like you are talking to a void. So it is so fun for me to hear from my listeners about how the podcasts are helping you. Or just making you think!
I thought I would take a happy jaunt through Guy Free World today and talk about the idea that when a relationship ends you can still have a relationship! Ok, maybe its not the same kind of relationship. But what if you could change the form of the relationship and still be in each other’s lives? Ha! Some of you are saying no way! I just want him out of my life. Fair enough! But there are many of you that miss the friendship or the love.
Listen in…
LEARN MORE ABOUT THE CONTENT DISCUSSED…
• Guy Free Podcast: https://guyfree.com
• Guy Free Facebook Group: https://guyfreeworkingonme.com
• Shauna’s website: https://www.workingonme.com
WHEN DOES IT AIR…
April 25, 2020
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:
Welcome Ladies, I’m Shauna Hoffman. Thank you or letting me pop into your life again today. I have to say I have been so grateful for the emails and messages I have gotten from so many of you about the podcasts. You know sometimes when you record alone in your office you feel like you are talking to a void. So it is so fun for me to hear from my listeners about how the podcasts are helping you. Or just making you think!
I thought I would take a happy jaunt through Guy Free World today and talk about the idea that when a relationship ends you can still have a relationship! Ok, maybe its not the same kind of relationship. But what if you could change the form of the relationship and still be in each other’s lives? Ha! Some of you are saying no way! I just want him out of my life. Fair enough! But there are many of you that miss the friendship or the love.
And then there are those of you who really can’t just walk away. You share kids with each other, or friends, or family! I had one woman whose mother kept inviting her ex to every family dinner or game night. And she and her ex weren’t even on speaking terms. So our work, other than her having deep a conversation with her mother, was to find a way to change the form of the relationship.
I can already hear the gasps through cyberspace. Just listen to the whole podcast and then see what you think and feel about what I share. Let me give you some examples of some relationship changes friends and clients have had that did work! And see if you can think of your own examples.
I had not one, but two clients that stayed such close friends with their ex’s that they walked them down the aisle when they got remarried. I just think this is a brilliant metaphor in so many ways! He handed his ex off to her new beloved. And they all remained great friends!
Another couple had been best friends. Then they got married and had 2 kids. After a long and painful few years they came to see me. They sat down on the couch and before anyone could say a word, she turned to him and said, I’m done…are you done? He said yeah, I’m done. And that was that! Seriously! No tears, no sadness.They were just done. I have to say I was kinda speechless. But even as before…they thought alike, in-sinc with each other. They had so much love and respect for each other that they didn’t want to drag each other through the muck anymore. They stayed great friends. They supported each other through the good times and the bad, just no longer together as partners. These two became the best example to me of changing the form of the relationship!
I had another couple, two women. One wanted children and the other absolutely did not. They had been together for five years and this had become a huge sticking point in their marriage. The one woman who wanted a baby was constantly sad and resentful. The other woman just shut down so she didn’t have to engage. After a lot of work with both of them they came to a very hard decision. For both of them to be happy they could not be happy together.
I say this to my clients and believe it wholeheartedly… Just because two people love each other does not mean they are meant to be together. Clearly these two women loved each other very much. But their values were so different that together they couldn’t find happiness. Was anyone wrong here? No. This couple was not meant to be together in the form they were in. Did they change the form of the relationship? Yes! It took some time for the healing on both of their parts. But after about 6 months they reached out to one another and rekindled their divine friendship. You see love never dies. But it can change form to a new and glorious relationship. Oh.. and yes! There were happy endings for both of them! The one woman found a new partner and eventually she had a beautiful baby boy. And the other found love with someone who was passionate for adventure and travel. Now they Whats App from all over the world together.
Love lives on!
Ok, these are just some of the fabulous stories of everlasting love I like to share. But now lets talk about those of you who NEVER want to see your ex again! Hey that is totally valid! When we are truly self aware and have realized that someone is not good for us, for our happiness, for our health, for our self esteem or just for our lives, the best thing we can do is walk away. And often we are so wounded and hurt that any love we feel for that person is tarnished and gone. It also could be that we don’t have it in us to be “friends with them”, even though they may want it. It hurts too much. After all, how do you really make friends with someone you don’t respect anymore?
So what do we do with that love that we may still feel for them. Or the love that is deep in our hearts under all of the hurt and sadness? The love that brought them into our life in the first place? I have a saying that I believe I stole from my friend Marianne Williamson. But truly, I have been saying it for so many years I am not sure where I got it. Here it is…
I’m leaving… with love…but I am leaving. I’m leaving WITH LOVE but I am leaving.
I believe that spiritually once you love someone you really cannot stop loving them. Romantically you can but not spiritually. I believe that once that space is made in our hearts for someone, when we end the relationship it leaves a void unless you fill that space with another kind of love. Not another lover. That void or space was opened up in your heart for this one soul. You are going to have to do something with it! There are many other spaces for your new loves. But this space needs to have something replace it. Something that is not pain or anger. That is way too much to carry in your heart.
What if you can change the form into something else. Now let me clarify this. It doesn’t mean you have to keep them in your lives. For many of you it may mean that you honor that space in your heart, the love you once shared and you walk away forever.
I got into this some in the last podcast when we talked about forgiveness. That under the pain and the hurt and the sadness there is love. Remember, anger covers hurt, hurt covers sadness, sadness covers love. Take a listen to that podcast to understand that a little more. But for now, do a self check to see where you are on that continuum of healing. Anger, hurt, sadness then love. You may find that once you get past the anger or hurt, there is still a love, a human love, not a romantic love, but a non ego, non special love for that person. And yet you may still choose to not have them in your life anymore.
I am leaving with love, but I am leaving!
Don’t ya love how that saying allows you to be pure of spirit in your heart and still get the hell out of a relationship that you are done with? So how have you changed the form of this kind of relationship? The answer? You have changed it from within your heart. You have taken off the negative onus of the END of a relationship. You have wrapped it in love and light! You have found a way to leave in peace.
A true self awareness and honoring of self.
Most importantly, you have left a relationship but not turned your thoughts or heart into something that you don’t want to be. So many woman feel they have to be cold, or mean or unloving in order to end a relationship. We think it is what keeps us strong in order to get out, or stay away after the split.
I actually think that will injure you more along the way. And worse, it will take you so much longer to heal from the relationship. When you leave…WITH LOVE…but make the grand exit, you honor the relationship that you had. That relationship that YOU chose in your past. By doing this you honor YOUR SELF more than anyone else! After all, you were the one that chose to be in the relationship in the first place. If you can leave it with kindness and gratitude for all that YOU HAVE LEARNED from it, then you have honored your self.
In one of my first podcasts in the series and in my book I say this to remind my clients that you are always on this path to becoming a great human. I remind them that “ You did the best that you could in the relationship with the tools that you had at the time.” We are constantly growing healing beings. So maybe in that last relationship you just didn’t have the tools to make it work, or the tools to leave earlier, or the tools to speak up for your self, or..or..or.. But here is the clincher. Maybe your partner didn’t either! So when we can walk away and say to ourselves, I did the best I could at the time but now I am leaving with love but I am leaving, you honor the constantly growing beautiful soul that you are. And you allow the same understanding for your ex.
Here is one of my favorite analogies. Imagine that you are this beautiful garden. You are filled with fruit trees and flowers, fresh vegetables and sunlight! Now, you used to let your ex into your garden all the time. But in the end you felt like he never watered the garden anymore. He would pick the vegetables and pull the whole plant out along the way. He never weeded the garden or fertilized it, and he stomped on the plants as he would leave.
Well hell. When you left him you put a great big fence up with a padlock on it and he is no longer invited into your garden. But guess what. If you have to see him with your kids, or family or friends you share, I give you permission to go into his garden for a bit. Don’t stomp on the plants. But you don’t have to water it either. Visit the garden, don’t ask for much and then get out.
Then go back to your garden and play with all of the beautiful friends and family that are worthy of being there with you!
This is called taking back your control! Honoring your self and all the beauty that you are! Learning to be a beautiful garden with no animosity or sadness. And surrounding yourself with people who cherish you and all that you are and all that you give to the world.
So today ladies, sisters of the sisterhood, go out and honor yourself, cherish yourself for all you are and all you give to the world! Tend to your garden and only let those people in who tend to it, and cherish it too. Be good to yourselves! Then I look forward to popping into your life again next week.