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Kindness In Divorce: Navigating Conflict Without Losing Yourself · 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.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: Supporting anyone feeling challenged in their relationship or marriage.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: 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 Warren Tree people of the Coolin 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: Welcome, welcome to today's episode of the podcast all about kindness, particularly kindness in divorce and how to navigate conflict without losing yourself.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: This is a conversation about choosing kindness, choosing courage, choosing compassion, especially when it isn't coming back your way.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: When you're navigating divorce, going through the messy middle of separation, kindness can actually feel like the last thing you're supposed to choose, the last thing that feels natural to choose, especially when others are perhaps telling you to go harder, or when the system feels the family law system feels cold and scary and adversarial.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: So in this episode, I will share part of my own story of not finding kindness in the family law process and why I decided to choose it and create it and hold on to it anyway.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: When I was going through my divorce, I did a bit of lawyer shopping.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: And if you've been around the podcast and my social media for a while, you'll know that.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I did a bit of lawyer shopping and I sat across from a lawyer with a draft agreement that my now ex-husband and I had drawn up together, you know, a beginning point really.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: And she told me, you could get more, you could go harder, you should push harder.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember thinking, but that's not what I want.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't trying to win a fight here.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't trying to drag my ex-husband, the father of my children, down through the mud.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: I was trying, I was actually trying to protect.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to protect our children, yes, but also something deeper.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to protect a relationship that had roots that ran really deep.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: A relationship that had been built over years and was woven into our shared history, into our mutual friends and into our extended families.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the story that had brought us together in the first place.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't just trying to survive the end of our marriage.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: I was trying really hard to preserve something deeply human while we did that, while we unraveled our marriage and reorganized our family afterwards.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't want to drag us both through high conflict.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't want to drag us down and I didn't want to burn everything down just because the structure of our relationship, our marriage had changed.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: But that lawyer couldn't see that.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: What I needed in that moment wasn't strict strategy, it was sensitivity.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: I needed to feel seen, to feel that someone in the process understood that I wasn't just a legal client on paper.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: I was this whole person moving through heartbreak and fear and all of the big emotions of leaving or shifting or changing a marriage.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: I was a person navigating one of and still one of the hardest transitions of my life.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: But I couldn't find compassion and kindness and gentleness within the system.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: So I created it.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: I created it for myself, I created it for our children, I created it for us.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: And then I went on to try really hard to create that same kindness and compassion for others.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the journey, well, that's part of the journey, I guess, that's brought me into the work I now do.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: Supporting people, navigating the hard stuff, separation, divorce, and a system that is often cold, harsh, transactional, destabilizing, and emotionally disorienting.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's what this episode is all about.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness in divorce.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: And kindness not just in a coaching space with me, not just in the content that I share, not just between you and your ex-partner, between co-parents, but even in the lawyers' offices, even in, if you end up there, the courtroom.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: Right throughout the whole messy, raw, beautiful, not so beautiful, let's not call it beautiful, human experience of it all.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Because what I know now after walking my own road, my own path through separation and divorce, and then supporting so many others on it, is that kindness in this space isn't weakness, it isn't naive, it isn't going to leave you behind or damaged or at risk or the loser.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: What it does is protect your integrity even when the system doesn't.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness won't leave you exposed or vulnerable, it will serve to remind you who you are even when everything else feels like it's falling apart around you.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's what helps you walk away or walk through this without losing yourself in the process.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: So in my work, in reflecting on my own lived experience, I've come to see that kindness in law isn't or shouldn't be optional.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a luxury, it might be a choice, but in my lived experience and knowledge, it's a powerful choice.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness in divorce, yes, for some might seem radical, but it's also restorative, it's about healing, it's about freedom.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I believe it is absolutely essential to allow you to maintain your own sense of integrity, to allow you to navigate this conflict without losing your sense of self, and to allow you to do that in a really values-aligned way.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: So let's go back to my story and what I was trying to protect.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't trying, as I said, to crush the other person, my soon-to-be ex-husband, this man I had built a life with, who I'd created two beautiful children with.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: I was actually trying to preserve and protect the parts of that that still mattered.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, our kids, our wider families, but the years of shared memories and the integrity of how we ended, we chose to end something that once meant everything to us.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted dignity, I wanted care, I wanted compassion, I wanted kindness, and I wanted to minimize the damage.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: But sitting across from that lawyer, I quickly realized that the legal system, the family law system, didn't actually know how to hold all of that.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's better now, some years down the track, but there's still a long, long way to go.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the lawyers when I was lawyer shopping, the lawyers I met with were efficient, they were polite, and they, you know, went by things by the book, but almost none of them led with their heart, led with empathy, led with kindness.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: They're focused on their absolute zone of genius, and that is the law, right?
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: My intent, my entitlements, not necessarily also hearing and holding my intentions.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: I really wanted to be seen and heard as a person, as a parent, as someone navigating something heartbreaking, the mess, the heartbreak, all of it.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: I needed kindness, I needed to be shown kindness, and I needed to be able to offer kindness, and it wasn't there in that space.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: And the absence was it was really jarring actually, and it was painful, but it was also eye-opening and clarifying, and it made me start asking questions.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: You know, what would it look like to go through this differently?
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: What could it look like if somebody had been able to hold space for my grief and my values and my desire to end our marriage with grace, with compassion, with kindness, even love?
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then I began to build that first just for myself, you know, through therapy, through reflection, through self-kindness, self-compassion, and to try and build it into the way I communicated with the father of our kids, my kids, with my kids or our kids, in the way we navigated that whole time as a family, but as a family shifting into a different version, right?
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: And then later in my work as a coach and a support for others navigating the system.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: Because what it made me realize through conversation afterwards is that I wasn't the only one.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't alone, and what I had wanted and searched so hard to find, many others also wanted and needed, even if they didn't realize it was possible to divorce kindly, to do it compassionately, to uncouple with tenderness and grace.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: There were many others who wanted that.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know, so many people going through separation or divorce have a real deep desire to act with integrity, with kindness, in a values-aligned way, but there's so little support that actually supports them to do that.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: And especially so when the systems around them, the legal, the cultural, the societal systems around them, actually reward that hardness, the disconnection, and the fight to win at all costs, that energy and the shame and the guilt and the blame.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's all rewarded.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: So kindness is not actually held up as something to strive through strive for through separation and divorce.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: So, what I'd like to talk about next is what kindness in divorce actually looks like on a practical, tangible level, what it really looks looks like and what it means in this in this space.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's not fluff, it's not about being passive or polite or agreeable, and it's definitely not about rolling over, acquiescing just to keep the peace.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness in divorce is strength, it is based and rooted in your personal values, it is taking that radical personal responsibility for yourself, for your behavior, for your communication, for your responses and your reactions.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: That is part of what kindness in divorce is based on.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: It is values aligned, it is keeping the humans centered in the space, it is keeping the humans at the core, the human emotional part of separation and divorce at the center, not the law, not a fight to win attitude, but the human the humans, the people and the emotions.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: Prioritizing the people involved rather than reducing it to a process or a simple legal strategy or an adversarial way of thinking and behaving and communicating.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's choosing dignity, quiet, calm, compassionate communication when tipping into or being sucked into the drama might be easier.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's discernment, it's choosing, it's consciously choosing, it's meeting fire with water.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's not throwing oil on the fire, it's meeting that fire with water, it's absorbing aggression without taking it on or throwing it back.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's about choosing to diffuse rather than escalate.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: And that kind of kindness doesn't just shift conversations or mediations or negotiations, it doesn't just make things nice or smooth or more palatable, it actually changes outcomes and it's about staying grounded in your values and focused on where you're headed, even when everything around you feels unsteady and uncertain.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: So kindness is not weakness, kindness is strength.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: If what I'm sharing about in this episode or any episode is speaking to you and you would like to explore working more closely with me, there is an opportunity to book a free intro call with me in the show notes.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: I would love to support you through your own reflect, reclaim, and liberate coaching experience.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: And there are six key truths I've learned through my own divorce, but probably more through coaching others through the thick and the mess of their divorce that I'm going to share with you about kindness in divorce.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: And the first one I just touched on.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness isn't softness, it isn't weakness.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: It is clarity coupled with compassion.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about avoiding discomfort or keeping everything nice or calm at all costs.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about just saying the things that the other person wants to hear.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: It is clarity coupled with compassion.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: So that means being honest, even when speaking the truth, is hard.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: It means saying what needs to be said, saying those hard things but gently in a way that is respectful and preserves dignity, both your own and the other person's.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's about saying hard things in a way that the other person can hear.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's holding your boundaries with grace without needing to fire up, to shout, to opt into the drama or high conflict in order to be heard.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: It is about clearly, calmly communicating.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness can be the difference between avoiding conflict.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: Let me rephrase that.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness is actually the key difference between avoiding conflict and managing conflict and managing it wisely, between reacting from hurt and responding with intention.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's telling the truth without tearing someone down, it's declaring what you want and what you need while also holding space to hear from the other side wants, needs, preferences, desires.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's holding your ground, standing your ground without turning things into a battlefield or a stalemate from which no one wins.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: In divorce, kindness can actually be the quietest thing in the room and still also the most powerful.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: The second truth about kindness in divorce is that under stress, our nervous system will always pick survival.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: So kindness needs conscious effort.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: Divorce is hard, it is activating, it is triggering, it is traumatic for many.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: And when we're in fight, flight-freeze fawn mode, we're not our best selves.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: We're in amygdala hijack, our conscious brain is hijacked, and we are actually unable to make solid, sound, conscious decisions.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: So we need kindness to move out of that fight, flight-freeze fawn.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: We need kindness offered to us for us to be able to regulate our nervous system and emerge from that fight-flight-freeze state to be able then to make those conscious considered decisions.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: And we need kindness for ourselves.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness in those moments doesn't come automatically, it's actually way out there.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if you're in fight-flight-freeze, kindness is not a natural option for you, it has to be a choice and it has to be a practiced one.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: So it is something that you have to tap into when you are not activated, so that when you are, you've got options to dial down your nervous system and come back to kindness.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: You need practice.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: So we need tools to regulate, to pause, to respond rather than react, and to remind ourselves to tap back into or drop back into a kinder state.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: Again, that's where the real power lies.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: Building those skills and practices so that when you are activated, you can drop back into a more regulated state to activate your kindness.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: The third truth is that kindness is a practice, yes, it's an ethical practice, not a personality trait.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: People say, Oh, she's so kind, he's so kind.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness is a practice, not a personality trait.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's a choice, it's not just about being nice, it's about showing up, behaving in a way that respects everyone involved, including yourself.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness is integrity, it's alignment, and it's a value we can choose, even in high-stakes legal settings.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: And that goes whether you're a lawyer, a mediator, or any other professional involved in divorce and family law, or whether you're personally in the messy middle of separation or divorce.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: You can choose kindness as a practice, you can choose kindness as one of your leading values, and still not allow yourself to get walked all over, still not be a pushover.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: You can act with kindness and integrity and also not get walked all over.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_00: You can choose kindness, respect, and dignity as an ethical practice through your divorce and beyond.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: Truth number four kindness in divorce, particularly for other professionals, so kind lawyering sees clients as whole people.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you're a family lawyer, a mediator, or another support person, you're dealing with real humans, not just files.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: Divorce is primarily a human and emotional and social issue that happens to have legal and financial consequences.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: We need to center the humans, and that goes for individuals too.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're listening to this as someone navigating or experiencing moving through separation and divorce, remember it is a human, emotional, and social issue for you first, and then secondarily, financial and legal.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: Clients bring all of themselves to yes, coaching, but I'm also thinking to lawyers, to mediators, right?
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: Heartbreak, fear, trauma, grief, shame, blame, that all comes with them.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_00: And when as practitioners we ignore that, we do harm.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: If it is you as an individual experiencing that, choose your team wisely.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: Choose the kind ones, choose the ones who act with integrity, choose the ones who act with dignity and respect.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: Choose the ones that do less harm.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: And when we acknowledge it at practition as practitioners, as support people, we create space for kindness.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, we open space for more kindness, but that creates space for healing, even in the hardest moments.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: Truth number four is that kindness creates safety, and that is especially so for any marginalized group or human.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: Systems and family law system is particularly one.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: Systems are not neutral.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: If you're female, apparently culturally diverse, from a lower income back background, from the LGBTQIA plus community, you may.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Not feel safe within the system that is family law.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: And in those cases, particularly, for those people particularly, kindness from us as professionals isn't just helpful, it's vital.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's justice, it's an equalizer, it creates safety, and safety is what allows people to show up and be able to advocate for themselves.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're a practitioner listening to this, remember that kindness creates safety, especially for individuals from marginalized communities or groups.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: We have a responsibility, a collective responsibility to show up in kind ways because it creates safety.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: And finally, number six, kindness is courage, especially when others in the space aren't being kind.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: When tensions are high, emotions are raw.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness can feel like the last thing you're supposed in inverted commas to lead with or to offer.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: The family law system is adversarial by design, right?
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: Friends, family, even other professionals might be like my experience, like in my experience, urging you to go harder, ask for more, to protect yourself by you know hitting out first, you know, making the first move or digging in.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: And in that space, in that climate, in that environment, choosing kindness can feel scary, it can feel risky, it can feel lonely, it can feel vulnerable, like you're swimming upstream, like you're going against every other thing, every other person in that space.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes the hardest part is that you know your kindness won't be met.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: It won't be met with kindness, it might be misconstrued or misunderstood as weakness, vulnerability, it might be seen as something to be taken advantage of, or it might just simply go unseen or unacknowledged.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: But here's what I know choosing kindness isn't actually about getting a particular response, it's about staying anchored in your values and staying in integrity with yourself.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's about knowing and anchoring into who you are and refusing to let the process, the other person, the other side shape you or force you into becoming someone you're not.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness in divorce is about holding your values steady when everything around you, everything else around you feels unstable.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it is one of the most courageous decisions that you can make, especially when no one else around you is modeling it, and especially when it's not being mirrored back at you.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so, even if you're not met with kindness coming from the other side, there is absolute power in you showing up kindly.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's for you and for your kids, not necessarily, but it can be also for the other person, for your ex-partner.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: Kindness in divorce is absolutely courageous and it's worthwhile for you, for your kids, for the other person, for your extended family, for your friends, but mostly, mostly for you.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: And for me, kindness isn't kindness in divorce, I should say, isn't just a concept.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's integral to the work I do and the way I work.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's something that I looked for, I longed for and couldn't find.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: But that absence became the seed of something else.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: Because I couldn't find kindness in the family law system, I created it.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_00: And now it underpins and it shapes everything I do.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: How I show up as a coach, how I support my clients, how I walk through life and support people in hard spaces, in pain.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_00: If you're going through a divorce or supporting someone who is, I want to say this.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: You can be kind and clear and firm.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: You can protect yourself and show up kindly without destroying the other person.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: You can choose to honor the past and to look kindly on that even as you move forward and step into a different future and create something different for yourself.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: And if the people and the systems around you don't model and reflect kindness, you can be the one who does.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: You can be the one who shows up with kindness, with compassion, with integrity, anchored in your values, focused on the future that you most want to create for yourself.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: As always, thanks for being here.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: If this episode resonated with you, I would love you to share it with someone who needs to hear it.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: And if you are thinking about separation, navigating divorce, and want support that is deeply rooted in kindness, compassion, courage with a little bit of no BS strategy sprinkled on top, I would love to walk with and work with you.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_00: You can always book a free intro call via the link in the show notes.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about how kindness can actually be one of your superpowers and one of your biggest strengths through separation, divorce, and beyond.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, bye for now.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Sally Ann Hartnell, divorce coach and strategist, and you've been listening to Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate.
• 28:12
  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.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'd also be so grateful if you would follow and review the podcast so we can get in the ears of a whole lot more people just like you who are ready to reclaim and liberate themselves in life and love.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you'll join me next week for another episode of Reflect, Reclaim and Liberate.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: Until then