Latest / Reflect Reclaim & Liberate - with Sallyanne Hartnell / Living Together Apart - Who Am I When I'm Still Living With Who I Was?

Transcript

Living Together Apart - Who Am I When I'm Still Living With Who I Was? · Reflect Reclaim & Liberate - with Sallyanne Hartnell

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate, a podcast covering all things relationships, separation, and divorce.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: How to create healthy, happy, fulfilling relationships without sacrificing any part of yourself.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: Supporting anyone feeling challenged in their relationship or marriage, these are confidential conversations for you if you're navigating separation, divorce or reorganising life afterwards.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Decide whether to stay or leave a relationship or marriage, divorce with less drama, and consciously choose what's next for you.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: I acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which this podcast is recorded, the Warrentry people of the Kulin Nation, and pay my respects to their elders, past, present, and emerging.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: I acknowledge them as the original storytellers of this land.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: Hello, hello, and welcome to this week's episode of Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: And in this episode, I'm going to be revisiting one of the most downloaded, most listened to episodes ever of the podcast, but with a new spin or from a new angle, let's say.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: And the topic is living together apart.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: But this is the identity episode.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: So it is who am I when I'm still living with who I was.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: So living together apart, but really focused on you and your identity.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: So I want you to picture something with me.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: This might actually be your lived experience, or it might be something that's coming for you, or it might be something that you have lived in the past.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: But picture this: it's early morning, the house is quiet, you're in the kitchen, your kitchen, making a coffee, the same kitchen bench, the same mugs, the same view out of the window you've looked out of for however many years it's been, and somewhere, somewhere else in the house, down the hall, the person you're separating or separated from is still sleeping.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Everything has changed, and yet nothing has changed.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Nothing has changed, and everything has changed.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: You are separated.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: You've made the decision, or it's been made for you, maybe blindsided you, or it's been made together collaboratively.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: However, it's been decided that your relationship is ending, ended, and yet here you are, still in the house, still in the kitchen, still in the life, still surrounded by every single physical, tangible marker of who you were, and who you were as a couple, and what this life looked like and felt like when it was something different.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: And at some point, in the middle of all the practical chaos, the conversations about who does what, who pays what, the navigating of bedrooms and schedules, and what to tell the kids and when to share what with them and how to tell them, you might find yourself asking a different kind of question.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a question that nobody really talks about.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: And that is who am I?
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: Who am I right now while I'm still living here with who I was?
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: Who am I when I'm still living with who I was?
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: Who am I right now?
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Not who am I going to be, not that five-year plan that I often talk about, not who will I become when, when this is all over and I'm living in my own space, but who am I right now in this strange, weird in-between, in this limbo, in this life that still looks a whole lot like my old life, but really isn't, is nothing like my old life.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what this episode is about.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: Because living together apart is becoming more and more common.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of people are needing to navigate a period of time living together apart when you are separated, separating, even divorced, but you're still living in the same space.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're looking for that practical guide to living together apart, the logistics, the legal considerations, the communication tips, the how-to, I do have two earlier episodes of the podcast on exactly that.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I'll try and remember to get them linked in the show notes.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: If not, go back and search for them, living together apart.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: But I would encourage you if you're looking for those more practical, tangible, how-to kind of tips, go back and listen to those, and then perhaps come back and have a listen to this episode because this one goes somewhere a little bit different.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: This one is really anchored in and about you, and it's anchored in and about the inner lived experience of being separated but still under one roof.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_00: The identity disorientation that almost nobody names, and the quiet, insidious, kind of unexpected way that even in this hard, grey, in-between space, you can actually you can actually start to come home to yourself.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: So let's get into it.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: There is a particular kind of identity disorientation that comes with a living together apart arrangement that is different, I think, than any other phase of divorce or separation.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to really speak to it, I want to name it because I think a lot of people, a lot of you perhaps are living it, are experiencing it without having words for it.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: Because when you physically leave or your partner, ex-partner leaves, when one person physically moves out, there is grief, yes, but there's also a real clarity, right?
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: That physical separation marks something.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: Your nervous system actually gets the message, gets the memo.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: Your body feels and experiences the truth of your new reality.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: But a living together apart arrangement doesn't give you that reality check, right?
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't give you that concrete marker because the external world looks and sometimes feels mostly the same.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: The house is the same, the routines are sometimes the same or nearly the same, the kids are still having breakfast and dinner at the same table, and yet the thing, right, the relationship, the us is over or ending, or somewhere in that painful process of ending.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: You've left the relationship, but you haven't yet left the life.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: There is no gap or space or concrete marker of leaving or being left.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: And this is genuinely disorienting.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: It is hard to navigate, it is hard to understand or feel into this lived reality of it.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it's also, I find, really under-discussed, it's not talked about.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Most of the advice around living together apart, including my own earlier podcast episodes, is the practical, the how to do it.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: And practical advice, support, tips, structure really matters.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: It matters enormously.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: But the inner experience, your inner world, the inner world of your reality, this identity piece that sometimes gets lost or glossed over or not spoken about or recognized, right?
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: So let's not, let's not just gloss over it.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: Let's actually sit in it for a moment because recognizing it and naming it is the first step to actually being able to hold space for yourself while you navigate it, right?
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: You might feel like you're living in a kind of weird juxtaposition type thing.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: You're separated and you're not, you're single and you're not.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: You're grieving and you're still having to navigate a space with this other person in it.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: You're still functioning, you're moving forward, and you're still almost standing completely still because you're still in that same physical space and you're navigating all of it all at once in the same house, in the same home, as the person who you're trying to unravel, untangle, disentangle your life from.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: That is real, and it is a real and specific experience, and it is exhausting in a way that is almost impossible to explain to people who haven't been through it.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: And part of what makes it so disorienting, so exhausting is that in a long-term relationship, your sense of self becomes sometimes deeply entangled with your roles, right?
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: Not just wife or husband or partner, but all the smaller roles within that larger, broader role.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the one who manages the school run, the school calendar, the events, the kids' medical appointments, the vet, the one who cooks on Tuesdays, the one who softens the mood or modifies things when things get tense, the one who asks how is your day when someone walks in the door, the one who does the ironing, like my ex or is the cat's favorite, whoever, whatever.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: There are all these small, smaller roles within the roles that we play as partner, right?
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: And these roles over time just become automatic, they just become part of how you move through the world, specifically how you move through this world, this house, this family, this space, this relationship, this way of living.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: And the thing about a living together apart arrangement is that those roles don't automatically drop away just because your partnership, your intimate partner relationship has ended.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: The house is the same, the cues are the same, and so your body, your habits, your nervous system keeps just dropping in and doing the thing, right?
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: It keeps you keep performing the role sometimes without you even realizing it.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you might catch yourself asking how their day was, and there's nothing wrong with that.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying that there's something wrong with this, I'm just using it as an example, right?
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: You might find yourself doing the laundry just out of muscle memory.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: You might still soften yourself or change the way you move and speak and interact and behave in rooms where they are.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, in all the ways that you've learned to be in partnership with them, those roles, the smaller sub-roles, I guess, still exist when you're in this space together, and that's really worth noting and paying attention to because every time you perform one of those tasks or step into a role that no longer actually belongs to you, you're spending energy you need for perhaps something else, and you're reinforcing you you're reinforcing the message or you're reinforcing a version of yourself that you are in fact in the process of leaving behind.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying this to judge it or to judge you because it's deeply human, right?
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: And it takes us time to unlearn, but starting to recognize it, starting to notice it, that can be the beginning of something.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: And for some of you, for some couples, the flip of that is actually true, and it can be a really harsh readjustment that you just draw a really harsh line in the sand and refuse to continue in those same expectations, performing those same roles, and whether you do that or your ex-partner does that, it can be that can be really destabilizing, right?
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: This expectation that you're still living together, um, but they're not or you're not performing your role anymore, it can feel really jarring.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: So both of those experiences and realities can be true, but it's really an opportunity to ask, okay, where am I still performing duties, playing a role, whatever language you want to put around it, that actually isn't mine anymore, and what might it feel like to gently, quietly put it down?
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: And is there another conversation that needs to be had with this other person that you're still living with about what that role renegotiation looks like?
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's also the grief piece, right?
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I really wanted to touch on this because it's real and it's and it's particular, it's specific to this situation because grief usually has some distance around it or built into it, right?
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: Someone leaves or is gone, and the absence, as painful and as heartbreaking as that can be, the absence actually becomes the container, right?
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: The container for your grief, the container for your mourning.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: You grieve the gap, you grieve what was there and is no longer.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: But a living together apart arrangement removes that.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, it doesn't allow us that gap.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: You are still grieving or processing or untangling or all of the above, but the person that you're grieving is still there in your face, in your space, making noise in the next room, using the bathroom, existing in your in your space.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_00: And that is that is a challenging experience to navigate your way through.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's its own particular kind of grief and its own particular kind of ache, and it doesn't have an easy way through it or a specific or clear name.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't fit that standard grief narrative of loss, right?
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: You are grieving and you have lost something, but that person is still right there, and so you might find it really hard to navigate or hard to feel into the grief, and particularly to explain to others around you because you know the questions might come, but you know, you're still living together, you're still there, at least you still have the house, whatever it is, you know, it can be hard to explain this feeling and even to explain it to yourself.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_00: But I just want to say it's real, whatever you're feeling in this phase, the weird mix of relief and grief, and anger, and loss, and love, and fury, and sometimes a strange kind of softening or tenderness because once the decision has been made to separate, to let go, many couples, and I know we did, many couples feel or experience uh as I said, a softening or a sense of relief, like we don't have to fight so hard to hold everything all together anymore.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: We can actually soften and settle into whatever this is, all of it.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: So all of it's allowed, none of it is actually contradictory, although it can feel really strange to suddenly soften towards this person that you've been perhaps arguing with on loop for however long, now that you've decided to go your separate ways, right?
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: It can feel it can feel contradictory, but it's not, it's quite a normal experience in my experience.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, all of it makes sense, even if it feels strange or weird or like it actually doesn't make any sense at all.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you do want to go deeper on the grief piece specifically, there are two really beautiful past episodes of the podcast, rich conversations on this with the wonderful human that is Bria Richards, that you can search for in the podcast or find her on Instagram, and she really goes deep and goes places with grief that I think might really help and land with you if that's where you are.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: For now, I really just want you to know that whatever you're feeling is not a sign that you've made the wrong decision, you're doing this wrong.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's just a sign that you're doing it.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard, and it is a strange kind of limbo experience.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so we've named a limbo, we've talked about roles, we've talked about grief and the weird strangeness of it all.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: Now I want to shift slightly and talk about something else.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: Something that I think is one of the most unexpected and quite profound things about this phase or this chapter, if it's your experience, a living together apart chapter.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: And it it it lands particularly if you're paying attention while you're in it, andor you can look back and reflect on it if you're through.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yep, even in the grey zone, even in the limbo, even in the house, even in the house and a life that still looks like your old life, and that is that she, he, they starts to come through that new version of you, and I don't mean in a big dramatic way, like it's a sudden awakening, lightning bolt clarity moment.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: I don't mean that, I mean in small moments, small things, quiet moments, flickers, glimmers.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a morning where you wake up and there's just a moment, just a moment of clarity, of stillness, of peace that feels like it's yours or yours.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe not peaceful exactly, but it's just yours, a moment that's yours.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a decision or a choice that you make.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: Could be something really small, practical, completely or totally unremarkable, and you make the decision, you make the choice, and you realize I just did that all by myself.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't defer, I didn't check, I didn't soften it or run it by anyone, I just decided.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a preference that surfaces something that you've forgotten about, something as simple as a song you'd forgotten that you loved, or a way you want to arrange a room.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I often talk with clients about making your bed because if it's just yours, you get to make it however you like, or not make it if that's how you like it, right?
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: So it's about it can be as simple as the way you make your bed or the way you arrange a room.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: It might be a version of a weekend morning that looks and sounds and feels for the first time in a really long time like something that you would actually choose because you've got space and capacity to choose it.
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: And while they seem insignificant and small, they're actually not small things.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_00: These are the first flickers of you coming home to yourself.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: And this is important.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: Coming home to yourself is not only about remembering, it's not just about reclaiming the person, the human who existed before this relationship, before the roles, before the years, before the years of accommodation and just adjustment and um I was gonna say erasure, um, just adjusting in a life that involves another human that happens in so many long-term relationships, right?
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just about reclaiming and remembering, although it is that coming home to yourself is also about becoming, right?
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: Because the person, the woman on the other side of this isn't just the earlier version of you magically restored.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: She's something new, she has been shaped, expanded, stretched, probably pummeled a little bit by everything, including this, including the hard thing that you're in the middle of right now.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: So when those flickers come and they will come, even here, even now, even in the messy hard parts, I want you to pay attention to two things.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: One, what am I remembering and reclaiming?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: And two, what is emerging, surfacing, rising up?
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, what am I remembering about myself?
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: What things do I love that I'd forgotten that I love?
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_00: What did I want before I learned perhaps to want what they wanted, or to want less, or to want whatever.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: What did I want before I learned lessons about wanting?
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: What parts of me went quiet?
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_00: What parts of me did I keep quiet that are starting to just make a little bit of noise again?
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: And the second part, what's new?
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: What is coming up?
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: What is emerging?
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_00: What is rising that perhaps wasn't there before or wasn't visible or accessible to you before?
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: What do I want my life to actually look like on the other side of this?
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: Not the life I'm leaving, but the life I'm walking toward.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: What do I want that version of my life to look and feel like?
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: And asking these questions is not necessarily about having all the answers all right away.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_00: You don't need to have them all right now.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: You're still in the house, you're still in the thick of it, you're in this live apart to get live together apart, sorry.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um weird limbo.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: But the practice of asking the questions, that's the bit that matters right now.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: The noticing and the asking that is the beginning of building something and building something new, something more, something beyond.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: More clear, more free, more anchored, more alive, more at home in yourself than you have ever been.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the gift of this kind of in-between limbo lived experience, right?
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: You get to start this work now, and you get to move towards a life where you are more at home in yourself than you have ever been.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, you're not yet on the other side of the messy hard parts, the divorce, there's likely a lot of messy and hard and even heartbreak still to come, but you're also already starting to arrive right here, right now, while you are still in the in-between.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: So let's get a little practical for a moment.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: I still want to stay in this identity frame about the live together apart model because I think it shifts what the practical advice actually means.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: But this is about how to hold yourself together while you're still sitting in this hard space, right?
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_00: So, what I would suggest you try is create one space in the house that is entirely yours.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: And that's awesome if you if it can be a separate bedroom.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I know for some of you who are l living this, um, even that's not possible.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but a separate bedroom helps and it matters practically and legally.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm talking here about a space that is just for you, a space that reflects who you are becoming, not just who you were, and claim that space for yourself in this physical space, this physical home.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: It could be a corner, a chair, a shelf, almost a little altar to yourself, right?
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: Something that is yours and only yours, and that you choose and make for yourself deliberately.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't need to be big, it just needs to be intentional.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: One small space that is entirely yours, consciously chosen, intentionally created and all yours, right?
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: The second thing is notice.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: Notice when you drop into performing old roles and make a conscious choice about what that will look like in this in-between phase and also into the future.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: But for now, notice when you drop into those old roles and consciously choose is this something that I'm comfortable with.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: Not with judgment, but just noticing.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: Do I actually want to do this or am I functioning on autopilot?
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: Have I dropped in?
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the answer will be yes, I'm actually choosing this because it's the kind thing or it's practical, it makes sense, it's good for the kids, right?
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_00: Fine.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: But sometimes the answer will be no, I'm doing this because it's a habit, it's something I don't yet know how to stop.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: And that noticing gives you information, it gives you data about yourself.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: So if there are things that you are doing, roles that you are performing, dropping into on autopilot, and you want to stop, you need to start noticing and choose differently.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: As well as trying to create that one space within the home, within the house that is entirely yours, also have somewhere outside where you can be, show up fully you, fully yourself in all the mess and all the glory and all the beauty, right?
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_00: It might be that one friend who really knows you, who really gets you, it might be with a coach, it might be with a therapist, it might be in your journal, a walk you take by yourself, somewhere, a space where you are not having to do or perform anything, not managing anything or anyone, not being careful, not holding it all together.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_00: And in a live together apart experience, this is essential.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a luxury, it's a necessity.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: Your inner world needs somewhere to land, somewhere to breathe that isn't the shared house.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: You need a space for your nervous system to settle completely, a space just to be and be just you, not holding it all together, not sitting in roles, not sitting in the space where things feel weird.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_00: You need that external space for your nervous system to really calm and settle.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: The next practical thing I'm going to throw in here is to start asking yourself the questions, even if you can't answer them just yet.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: Who do I want to be?
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_00: What do I actually want?
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: What does my next chapter look like?
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean, really look like, not the safe default version, but what's the big dream vision I have for myself and my life?
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: What start asking the question, even if you can't picture it yet, even if you don't know the answer.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: They're not necessarily questions you need to have answers to right now, today, but letting them rise, letting them live in you, sitting with them rather than ignoring them or pushing them actively away, that's also doing the work in air quotes, right?
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: And it's work that you can do while you're in the messy limbo of live together apart.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: Also, really important protect your energy and protect your energy with more conscious effort and more intention than you think you need to.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: Living together apart is costly, it's hard, it's exhausting, and it takes more out of you and more from you than you probably will recognize, and then most people around you would understand.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: So be protective of where you spend your energy, where your energy goes, what are the leaks, where are you losing energy, and what replenishes you, whatever that is, do more of that, and what depletes you, limit it where you can.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: So protect your energy fiercely if you're in the limbo of live together apart because it drains you, it is exhausting, it is hard.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: So recognize that it is and focus on what replenishes you, plugging your energy leaks and consciously choosing where and how you spend your time and your energy.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: And in closing, I just want to leave you with this living together apart is hard.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's in some ways one of the hardest configurations of divorce or separation.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: It is practically and logistically complicated, it can be emotionally exhausting, and it can feel profoundly, deeply destabilizing, disorienting.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sharing this episode to pretend that it's not hard, but it is also, and I say this having worked with many navigating this exact situation, it is also one of the unexpected spaces where you can actually start finding yourself again.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's an opportunity to gently unpick and unravel things while still in the relative kind of emotional safety of your old life.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: You can gently pull things apart without blowing everything up.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: Because what I've noticed is when there is that distance, when you've moved out, when the divorce is finalized, when your new version of life has begun, there's often this sense of right, well, now I can start, now I can figure it out, now I can work out who I am, now I can begin.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_00: But the reality, the truth is, she's not waiting for you.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: They're not waiting for you.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: That new version of you starts coming through long before any of that final stage, right?
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: Long before they she comes through, like I said, in the quiet mornings, in the small decisions, in preferences that you've reclaimed or likes and dislikes that you've allowed to resurface in the questions that quietly nudge at you, that kind of won't stop asking themselves.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: So this new version of you is not necessarily going to wait until all the other pieces have fallen into place.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: She's already in there, she's been in there the whole time, and the weird limbo, the living together apart, as strange and as hard as it can feel, might actually be the first place you really start to hear yourself again.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're in this right now, I know it's a lot, I know how much you're holding, I know how exhausting it is, I know what it's costing you to be in a house that a life that looks like your old one while you're still or while you are trying to build a new one.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: But I also know and I want you to know that you're not stuck, you're not lost.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, you're in the in-between, and the in-between is not nothing.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's where you can start to come home to yourself if you allow time and space for the stillness, for listening, and for the questions to surface for you and in you.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you are navigating this and you like support, real grounded, high-touch support through this phase and what's coming afterwards, come and find me.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: Book an intro call or jump straight into a clarity consult, but come have a conversation with me.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_00: There are links in the show notes for all of those options, and I can help you answer the question: who am I?
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: Who am I now when I'm still living with who I was, as well as who am I becoming?
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_00: As always, thank you for being here.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: If you know somebody who is sitting in this limbo or is considering separating or would benefit from listening to this, please share this episode with them.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, bye for now.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Sally Ann Hartnell, divorce coach and strategist, and you've been listening to Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: You can follow me on Instagram at Reflect Coaching, and if you can think of anyone who would love or benefit from listening to this episode, please share it with them.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'd also be so grateful if you would follow and review the podcast so we can get it in the ears of a whole lot more people just like you who are ready to reclaim and liberate themselves in life and love.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you'll join me next week for another episode of Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_00: Until then