Happily Even After with Life Coach Jen
Happily Even After shares weekly insights and tools to create more fulfilling relationships with yourself, your family and God. Jennifer is a certified life coach that was married for 26 years . She has 4 amazing children and 1 son in law. She doesn’t have it all figured out but she has lots of personal experience and has learned what to do and what not to do in relationships. I help women and men who have experienced betrayal in their marriage or have been divorced learn that their is happiness to be had even when your life doesn't go as planned.
Happily Even After with Life Coach Jen
Breaking Free from Post-Betrayal Comparisons: Reclaim Your Happiness
Have you ever found yourself comparing your happiness to that of your ex-partner? Today, we unravel the emotional turmoil of post-betrayal comparisons and how they hold you back from true joy. Join me, Jen, as I share my personal journey through years of emotional abuse and betrayal, and the transformative process of rebuilding my life. Learn why it's essential to process all of your emotions—anger, sadness, devastation—to pave the way for genuine happiness. Let’s break free from the toxic cycles of judgment and comparison, and focus inward to reclaim your worth and potential for a fulfilling life.
In this episode of "Happily, Even After," we explore the damaging habit of measuring your happiness against your ex's, especially when they've moved on or remarried. I dive deep into why their happiness does not diminish your worth and how to shift your focus inward for self-growth. You’ll understand the importance of dealing with the aftermath of betrayal by fully feeling your emotions. Together, we'll tackle the myths that plague your mind and keep you stuck. Remember, the reality of why your relationship ended is key to your healing. Let's work together to help you live happily, even after.
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My website is www.lifecoachjen.com
Welcome to my podcast. Happily, even After. I'm life coach, jen, I'm passionate about helping people recover from betrayal. I rode the intense emotional roller coaster and felt stuck and traumatized for years. It's the reason I became a trauma-informed certified life coach who helps people like you navigate their post-betrayal world. I have the tools, processes and knowledge to help you not only heal from the betrayal but create a healthy future. Today, we begin to help you live happily even after. Hey friends, welcome to today's podcast.
Speaker 1:Okay, so this topic that I'm talking to you about has been well. I've had to be coached and discuss this often, and it takes a while for at least for me to have really accepted this. And it's my happiness is different than their happiness, meaning my ex-partners. So I think, especially when you've experienced betrayal, there's just all these negative emotions. And then, if you've gotten divorced and then your partner gets remarried and I think, even if you got remarried I haven't been remarried yet, but my ex-spouse is remarried and even though I never see him, of course, we invent lots of things in our mind, right, and our mind goes crazy, and so we think things like and so we think things like I wasn't good enough. They found someone that's better. You know, what did I do wrong to deserve this? We go inward and think of all these negative things about us and we can only see positive things about them, right, even if we're not seeing them, it's just our thoughts about them, okay, because we might be still healing. It's just our thoughts about them, okay, because we might be still healing, at least for me, like I'm still, you know healing from years of betrayal, from emotional abuse, from the toxicity of my marriage, what that looked like, and then you know, rebuilding right, which I honestly never knew. Getting divorced, I could be this happy, like I am very happy, but I take my happiness and compare it to his happiness and it's just not an apples to apples comparison and I think we try to make it that and we're going to lose every time. We're going to be miserable. That is not a recipe for happiness, okay. So just recognize that if you are focusing more on your ex and how he appears to be happy, it's going to make you feel miserable. We need to go inward instead of outside of ourselves. It is so important.
Speaker 1:If you find yourself doing this, like I, just I don't feel happy, or how could they do that and be happy, right, like we judge. Okay, if you have judgment, you've got to drop the judgment. But make sure that you've processed all your emotions. You have to feel angry, sad, devastated. If you haven't processed those emotions from your divorce, from the betrayal, you cannot feel happy, joy, peace. So we have to feel the bad, hard emotions in order to feel the good emotions, Because if we choose to feel no emotion, we will feel no emotion. That means happy as well. We a lot of times avoid the negative emotions, but if we do that, it's almost impossible and really hard to feel even the good emotions. Okay, so the better you get at feeling all those negative emotions, the better you're going to get at feeling all the positive emotions.
Speaker 1:So when you go down the path of what if now you know we've been to all this marriage counseling and now that we got divorced they're going to use all the skills that they learned on their new spouse and we somehow get hung up on that? Right, that is not going to help us. Okay, it's possible. Maybe. Maybe they did meet a person that better fits them. But what I want you to remember why did you get divorced in the first place? What was going on, what was the reality. Remember, you have to deal with reality, the reality of your marriage, especially if you're experiencing betrayal. I promise you, betrayal did not make you happy and so remembering those things it's going to help you realize. So it's possible. They probably are a different person with this new person. Of course, we act differently around different people, but that does not equal you aren't good enough. Okay, it's a separate. We're comparing their oranges to our apples, okay, so just remember when you go down that that you're a different person. You don't want to be married to that person. You got divorced. So stop comparing what they're doing. Focus on what you're doing.
Speaker 1:Okay, I want you to make a list of what makes you happy. I have been working on this. Okay, try to get really detailed on what makes you happy and even if you don't feel super happy right now, just like, what things do you like? Dig deep, like, do you like chocolate, ice cream? You like walking with your friends, buying new clothes, spending time with your kids, listening to Taylor Swift that's that was for me, right. What are your favorite songs? Like? Just really get specific. It could be anything and everything, things that make you happy. And because if you were married to this person.
Speaker 1:I was married to my spouse for 26 years. I know exactly what makes him happy. I mean, probably not exactly, but I have a good bet, right, like I have a guess Figure out what made them happy. Chances are there are a lot of things on his list that you hated, that you didn't like, that did not make you happy, right? Drinking wine is one of them that I thought of. It's not going to make me happy. I don't drink, so that would not be on my list. That's going to be on his list, okay, I guarantee it. And so it's like.
Speaker 1:Then now we're seeing like, oh, what makes me happy is not what makes him happy, right, and I don't want to actually do some of the things on his list those don't make me happy. So really get clear on what makes you happy really and then figure out, like I think it is helpful to see like okay, oh yeah, things in their life For me, what makes me happy are my kids spending lots of good quality time with my kids. Your spouse maybe really doesn't enjoy that. Or they might like running and doing marathons and you're like I don't like doing any of that. That's not going to make me happy, okay. So remember we're different and we're not supposed to be alike. Like that's not why you got divorced is because your happiness list was different. It's just helpful if you are divorced to kind of help your brain decide like, oh yeah, we have different things that make us happy. At least this has been for me.
Speaker 1:Okay, having an affair apparently made them really happy. Right, they told you how happy they were, but for me, if I had an affair I mean I that would go against everything I believed in and it just would that would make me miserable. And so remember that, pay attention. Things that they did would not make you happy. So really pay attention. So it would make me miserable and maybe not Okay, so just really focus on the different lists. Them leaving was not about you, so stop making it about you.
Speaker 1:Okay, so we like to make things about us, right, but it's not about us. Stop making it about you. Okay, so we like to make things about us, right, but it's not about us. Stop making it about you. But you are the one that gets to choose to be happy. It's out of their control. We shouldn't rely, and we can't rely, on other people to make us happy. We are the ones to make ourselves happy.
Speaker 1:So some things that in my mind, were a gift that I gave myself in creating happiness. I was thinking about this. I never have to wonder where or who my spouse is with again. Like, honestly, the relief that I feel from that daily is a lot. That is, that was worth all my pain and me getting divorced. I think about that often because I am now. I don't have that nagging wonder anymore and that makes me feel very peaceful and happy. I don't have doubt, any doubt, about my decision to get divorced.
Speaker 1:Owning your decisions okay, don't't second guess them, you've just got to own them. When you do that, when you own your decisions, you're going to feel more empowered, you're going to feel more at peace and you're going to feel happier. When you think well, I'm alone, you might be alone, but just because you're alone doesn't mean you have to be lonely, okay. There is a huge difference if you're feeling alone or lonely right, lonely is different than being alone. Discover new things, figure out hobbies. What do you enjoy? Finding your people. You've got to be intentional about doing this. When you do this, you are going to feel happy. Spend time reconnecting with yourself.
Speaker 1:Women especially, we lose ourselves in marriage, with raising kids. This is now your time to work on you, rebuild your confidence. Your confidence, your self-esteem will take a huge hit when you've experienced an affair, but that doesn't mean you can't rebuild that. You have to be intentional, though. Okay, you need to learn to love yourself just the way you are.
Speaker 1:Love is the catalyst for change and acceptance. So I always think about our bodies. A lot of women hate their body, and for many reasons. Right, but hate will not bring about as much change as love will. So learning to love your body means, then, you're going to want to start taking care of it, you're going to want to eat better, you're going to want to exercise and through that love, your body may lose weight, you might start changing, you might build more muscle. So when you have things that you hate about yourself, just try to see if you can love them, because once you can change that thought in your head, I promise your results are going to also happen. Right, you might hate yourself to losing a few pounds, but it's not going to stick and you're probably going to gain 10 pounds more. So really pay attention as you're reconnecting yourself. Love yourself where you're at. That's when change happens.
Speaker 1:I think sometimes our brain thinks, well, if I love and accept myself, then I'm going to be this way forever. Simply is not true. You aren't going to want to be. Whatever you feel like is the thing you want to change. If you love yourself, okay, focus on rebuilding your relationships. I think after divorce, if you've experienced divorce, and even if you are still married and you feel like you've lost yourself in your marriage, in your life, rebuild your relationships. The first one I would start with is yourself. Rebuild with your kids. Recreate whatever relationship you have with your kids.
Speaker 1:My favorite thing, my best thing, I think, is rebuilding my relationship with your kids. My favorite thing, my best thing, I think, is rebuilding my relationship with my kids. We have had so many amazing experiences. I've been very intentional with them and tried to be purposeful with them and done some really amazing work, and I feel closer to them than I ever did before because I was bringing my authentic self, my healed self, to them and they felt that, and so we've been able to really connect on a different level.
Speaker 1:Reconnect with your parents. If your parents are still around, you know having compassion for them, because if you're a parent, you know how hard it is, so maybe you can see them with a little bit more compassion like, wow, raising kids is hard and I can see why they made those choices right. And every generation, I feel like, gets better and better and makes different mistakes and they have different trials and different challenges. Reconnecting with your siblings, your friends, neighbors, work, colleagues, whoever whatever relationship that you want to try to rebuild, I think is so important and you're going going to feel happy. So, in conclusion, my main focus of this podcast is just because someone else experiences happiness in a different way than you, doesn't make it right or wrong.
Speaker 1:And stop focusing on what makes them happy, especially your ex if that's who you're focused on, okay. Your ex, if that's who you're focused on, okay, just because they get a brand new Porsche or a car, or they got to go on a European vacation and they never took you on a European vacation, or whatever you're comparing, right, they make more money than you, or they have a better relationship with the kids, or whatever you're comparing. Stop comparing because I promise what makes you happy and what makes them happy is different and the only person you need to focus on is you, and it's okay that even if you think it's wrong or you're judging them like that's where you're gonna have a problem. But just redirect your brain back to you and say you know what that would actually make me miserable like golfing every day for five hours like miserable. Or having an affair miserable, only seeing my kids once a month miserable. So redirect your brain to whatever you think and it's don't know. We don't know what's going on for them. They may not be as happy as they appear to be, because people's outward appearances always look different than what's going on from the inside. So really focus on your inside experience. What's inside of you? What's true happiness to you? Make your list and practice reminding yourself that it's okay, that they're happy right, it's okay. And how can you be happy? So I hope that was helpful.
Speaker 1:Thanks so much for listening to my podcast. If you've enjoyed this or any other ones, please like and share with your friends. Remember that we are going to find your happily even after betrayal, and I can help you do that. So send me a message and I'd love to be your coach If you want to learn how to live happily even after. Sign up for my email at. Hello at life coach Jen with one n dot com. Follow me on Instagram and Facebook at happily even after coach. Let's work together to create your happily even after.