Mayim Bialik's Breakdown - Relationship Expert: The Real Cost of Staying When It’s Time to Leave. How to Prevent Divorce & What to Do When Your Marriage is Beyond Saving

Episode Date: May 23, 2025

Why So Many Marriages Are Failing—and What No One Tells You About Divorce   Thinking about divorce? You’re not alone. In this powerful episode, life coach, The Stay or Go podcast host & divorce community founder Britta Jo explores why so many women feel trapped in unhappy marriages, and the emotional, cultural, and psychological forces that make leaving so hard.   We dive into: - Signs your marriage is over - Should you get a divorce? - The real impact of divorce on kids - Why divorced fathers often grow after a split - The emotional freeze response in divorce - Coping with divorce grief and guilt - What women actually crave in relationships - Life after divorce for women - How to survive divorce emotionally   Britta offers raw insight into how to heal after divorce, how to trust your inner compass, and how to start over, especially when your life hasn’t gone as planned. Whether you're considering divorce, already in the process, or supporting someone who is, this is a must-watch.   Britta Jo's deep dive one-on-one coaching: https://stayorgocoaching.com/the-deep-dive/   The Stay or Go Community: https://community.stayorgocoaching.com/   Follow us on Substack for Exclusive Bonus Content: https://bialikbreakdown.substack.com/   BialikBreakdown.com YouTube.com/mayimbialik Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Without him, who am I? When you don't know what else could be possible, when you don't have a vision of the future, it's really hard to make any moves now. There's a huge fear-mongering out there about how awful divorces. It's all well and good to say, oh, get divorced and go live this big, vibrant life,

but you've still got all these internal blocks. We've been programmed to push down our needs or feelings because of fear of how someone else would react. Not only they're afraid for what's the results going to be for their children, but most of the women I talk to don't have examples of women really thriving post-divorce. What if I never find someone to love me? Or just not even having a clear vision of a future that could be different. Grief is such a huge part of what I work on with my women, because it's one thing to say I want to leave a marriage. It is such a deeply emotional, complex process. I have so many women who

want to leave and they are deeply grieving the disillusion of the dreams, the future, hopes for what that was going to be, even while in their bodies knowing it's the right choice for them. Ultimately, the decision of whether to stay or go really comes down to an internal knowing. Hi, I'm I'm B. Lick. I'm Jonathan Cohen. And welcome to our breakdown. Uh, who. Are you in a relationship that is bringing up aspects of should I be here or not?

And are you concerned that your partner might leave or is unhappy? Are you considering leaving because you're unhappy? Today we're going to be talking to someone who lives in the space of helping people understand the inner work that is required to be able to make a decision about whether you should stay in a relationship or leave it. And guess what? There's no easy answer. Very, very complicated.

and the work that we do and the work that our partners do can be the opening for a life that we literally never imagined could be possible. Today we're going to be talking to Britta Joe. She's a podcast host. She's the founder of the stay-or-go community. And she creates a space for women who are standing at a crossroads of marriage and identity. She unraveled her own life. She left Mormonism.

She identified a really, really enormous amount of abuse from her family, from her marriage. She shed layers of what she describes as patriarchal smallness, the belief that there was a way that society had designed her to be that was no longer compatible with the life that she was living. She's incredibly real, incredibly grounded, and provides a tremendous amount of support through one-on-one coaching and also the stay-or-go community, which will link to below. If you're a male person and you're listening to this podcast and you're like, that's not me. I urge you to listen because there are some key points here on how to improve your relationship, the types of things you should be thinking about to have better connection, a more solid emotional relationship, the foundation of what it means to actually connect, have better sex, have better happiness. This episode will help you get there.

Also, this is one of these episodes that when I was in my marriage, I wish someone would have sent me something like this. It did not exist. We barely had the internet. But this is the kind of episode. If you're having challenges in your relationship and you don't want to be seen as someone who's complaining, please share this episode with your partner. Because the way that Brita Joe is talking to me and Jonathan about this is the way that we kind of all need to be framing what she describes as kind of the cutting edge of where human relationships are going. So we really, really, really recommend that you share this with the man in your life in particular or a partner who might be resistant to thinking about how am I supposed to be part of fixing this relationship or you're just unhappy or you're just depressed. It's a really, really cool episode to listen to it together. I'm going to go ahead and say that. Jonathan and I listen to it together as we recorded it. So we recommend that for all of you out there. Let's welcome to the breakdown, Brita Joe. Britta Joe, welcome to the breakdown. Hi. Thank you so much for being here. I mean, Jonathan and I have been so excited and preparing to talk to you. And we each have so many different kinds of questions we could ask you. And we have personal stories. We want you to tell. We want you to kind of tell your story. But before we even go there, can you describe what you do for a living and why? I am first and foremost a life coach. But I specialize in.

working with women who are in a very intense period of time in their life, which can often span years when they are considering divorce. And the reason I am on that specific spot is because for a lot of women, that is a long time frame where they are going back and forth between do I want to stay or do I want to go. And when I first started coaching, I realized there are like very few resources for women in this spot where you're just holding space for the process rather than a clear like let's work on your marriage or let's get divorced. What was it in your life that led you down this path to have such an intense interest in should women stay or go?

Yeah. So that story, I don't know how much you want me to go into detail on that, but like some of the highlights of why I feel so passionately about this is I was raised from infancy in Mormonism, heavy patriarchal influences. And really, I mean, I can honestly say brainwashed from birth into not having an identity, not really seeing myself through a lens of, this is my life. I get to do what I want with it. And just followed that path straight into America. at 19 to someone I had only known for three months, which was normal. That was what my parents had done. That was encouraged and found myself in a marriage where looking back, I was deeply unhappy,

but I was just robotically, you know, this is what you do. And now you're going to have kids. And now you're going to be the stay home mom and all of this is going to be fulfilling. and found myself after my third child deeply depressed. Looking back now, I was having a lot of suicidal ideation, which is something I'm passionate about making more visible because lots of women experience it and don't realize how depressed, how unhappy they are. And through a really lucky break of a friend introduced me to an amazing therapist, she basically walked me back to myself over two.

and a half years, which led to me, you know, ultimately really changing my relationship with my mother who was very narcissistic, leaving my religion, getting divorced, becoming a coach, watching my entire family collapse. I have a podcast episode all about what happened in my family of origin. And then ultimately finding my purpose and my work, which is working with women who resonate with a lot of those same themes of losing themselves, breaking up one day in a life that everybody told them was going to be amazing and that they deep down hate and don't want to be in. There's so much interest, you know, kind of culturally in Mormonism. And as I've talked about here, my ex-husband was raised Mormon.

I didn't know that. Yeah. So I have. And some of his cousins may listen. Can you talk a little bit about, and this isn't to disparage Mormonism, and I've been very clear about that, that there's a lot of aspects, and a lot of my family is very, very religious, Jewish Orthodox. And so I see a lot of similarities in the conversations about the role of women, the value of women, what, quote, traditional values mean. And also we have, you know, it's not even a political issue, but we have a president who is kind of campaigning on, let's get back to traditional values. So can you talk a little bit? can you couch some of what you were told as a woman to expect in marriage and how that kind of can play out in a society that may sometimes challenge the needs of a religious, you know,

or cultural order versus your own personal needs? Yes. Yes, deeply. So I think the real disconnect here is as a woman being raised from birth, in that environment, I knew nothing else. So the heart of this is, I don't think you can really make good decisions for yourself if from the very beginning you were not raised to see yourself as a individual. You know, I was part of a family system. I was part of a religion system that needed me to be a certain person for those things to thrive. For me, the experience was full-blown brainwashing. There was no alternative choices along the way. For me and my family of origin, there was a heavy cost to not following the rules. So all along the way, and I know you guys are

passionate about mental health, I look back and I realize how much my mental health was sacrificed to have an external presentation of what other people felt was best for me that was never being checked all along the way with like, intrinsically, does this feel good for you? Are you, I get that for a lot of people, religion feels really good for them. Looking back now, I can see how much key aspects of myself were being steadily and systematically drowned in these bigger narratives for the religion, for the culture, for the government that wants me to function within it. So I work extensively when you say like, can I speak to that? Yeah, I think that's why so many women resonate with my story, with the work that I do with my podcast, because I speak directly to how

insanely, terrifyingly destabilizing it is to be a woman who that system doesn't work for and you've been told there's nothing else out there and then trying to leave that to find yourself again and reclaim a life that's yours. It's a shit show. It is tough. I mean, like, I just got chills when you said that because, you know, there's a reason that we have culture, religious structure, and, and in many cases, and in particular for women, it can be used as a sort of weapon. And that's not to say that there are not women who are happy in a traditional, you know, kind of environment. But I think what, you know, and what what I think a lot of women are, are starting to see is kind of exactly what you said. If you're not given other choices and you're told that there's

only one way and if you don't follow that way, you will be excommunicated, you will lose everything and God will punish you. Why would you even? think that you might be able to leave. Are you really choosing if the alternative is that? If you're in, and it is kind of like a simulation, almost like the simulation of my world because it was so heavily controlled, the narrative by my family, by my religion, that was the only people I really hung out around. You don't have contrast. I didn't grow up seeing women who chose a different path. They just disappeared. You know, they leave those circles and you don't know what happened to So to act, you mentioned the whole, like, there may be women who are happy.

I really also want to push back on that a bit because I thought I was happy, Ma'am. I did because that's that sensation of being brainwashed and told over and over and what you see. This is why women have such high rates of the depression, the mental illness, the suicidal ideations. because when you're in a system that tells you, you should be happy and there's no other narrative around that, what are you going to do? You're going to internalize that. You are going to think, I'm broken. There's something wrong with me. Why can't I fit this mold? I'm going to ask a really crazy question. Are all women who are married and think they're happy not? Oh, my, take me there. Take me there. You know, I really do.

Since coming out of it myself, since my personal experience has just been a complete 180 for my life, like seeing who I was, what I thought made me happy, and realizing how deeply I was entirely disconnected from my body. I was not present in the moment. I was by all accounts now in contrast. I was just a robot performing for my family, for my, kids keep holding it all together for my culture, my religion, my government, my family, my husband, everybody but me. And I honestly am so grateful that I hit that wall of depression and

the suicidal ideation and just not being able to function. Because if it hadn't been for that, I think I might still be someone who's just like, yeah, I'm really happy. My M. Bialy's breakdown is supported by superpower. We all know the feeling of leaving a doctor's office and kind of feeling like we didn't get anything out of the experience that was useful. Maybe they're like, you're fine, drink more water. There's no real data. There's no game plan. This has happened to me many, many times, especially on the perimenopause journey. That's why we're fascinated by what superpower is doing. They send a licensed professional to your home or you can visit a nearby lab. One simple blood draw with over 100 biomarkers. That's way more than you usually get. It unlocks a

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our listeners get an additional $20 off with the code break. head to superpower.com, use the code break at checkout for $20 off your membership. And after you sign up, they'll ask how you heard about them. Make sure to mention my and Biotic's breakdown to help support the show. Well, I want to clarify because the idea of internalizing and turning against ourselves is probably more common than we realize. We know that if someone is not living by their values or is disconnected from their values

and they've adopted someone else's life or the idea of what will make them happy, because they haven't done the internal work, because it's really hard. As you said, you grew up, you adopt these narratives, you adopt the expectations of other people, whether that be you should work in finance versus something else, or you should be in construction when you want to be in finance. Like it doesn't actually matter the expression of what it is, but when we're off from what our internal compasses and we're told, don't look at your internal compass because these are the things that will make you happy on the outside.

We know that that can be this massive eroded. factor. For you, what was it, you know, if we get a little bit more specific, what was it that was going on for you that, like, wasn't working? Oof. Yeah, I want to dive into that. I just have to say real quick, Jonathan, you making that point of, like, them telling you don't look at your internal compass. To Mayam's point, I want to say, this is where religion, for me, got really rough, because not only did religion tell me not to look there, it told me not to trust that. Like it, in my religion, you need to always be looking to an external source for the right thing, the good thing that you should be doing. And, you know,

you as a person are fallen and sinful. So there isn't even a like, there's something intrinsically in you that you can trust. So I just have to point that out because I'm like, with my women, validating their internal compass is like step number one. That alone removes so, much. There's so much healing into someone saying you can trust how you feel. You're not crazy. Okay. So what were some of the things that I was noticing in my life? You know, looking back now, I am such a like brilliant, loud, bossy, sassy, my brain goes a million different ways, kind of human. And back when I was in the religion and focused solely on being a stay-at-home mom, I did not know that about myself. And if you look at the setup of staying at home with three boys,

24-7, my husband at the time was an investment banker, so like hardly any kind of support really there. He was so busy, that is not conducive to mental health for me. at all. Like, I know that clearly now. So just the entire environment I was in, not having things that were mine that I was creating beyond pouring myself into other humans, right? I was supporting my husband. I was supporting my kids. And the only real other involvement I had was in my religion, because that also takes a huge amount of your time. You're expected to do so much there. So there really was no leftover time for me. And even if there was, I was trained to feel guilty about it.

So when you say like, what was breaking down? I'm like, oh, everything. I just didn't know it at the time that the whole environment was not set up for me to feel good, actually. Like, now that I have the contrast now, I'm like, oh, yeah. I want to ask what might seem like a crazy question because I don't disagree with your thesis in terms of some people really need to leave a relationship. And at the same time, I'm wondering, like, if I just play the opposite side for a second, if it had been like, well, you don't have to be with the kids full time. You could be with the kids 50% of the time,

and you don't actually have to give all that other time to the religion. You could go off and whatever the passion project would be that would allow you to express yourself and be creative and have your mind harness all the ways that it goes in this awesome way. Now, I recognize that you couldn't have done that because you were in a system that wouldn't have provided it and that you were on a track. So I get there's a caveat here, but I'm just wondering if there's like you could have incorporated if you had known. Yes, woman in the green. So, okay, I'm going to, as someone who's not a specialist, I'm going to speak first and then we'll let Brida Joe take over. So the question, and I do not mean to denigrate you at all, the question is couched in a patriarchal structure that says, I need you. And I'm not saying that that's a bad thing. But for many elites, right, what we've been told is hire a nanny, hire a chef, the notion that if you don't even know who you are in the first place and you are not encouraged to develop those aspects of yourself or to see women in your community who are doing this,

you're already kind of in a goldfish bowl structure that then you're trying to like, well, what if we bridge to another goldfish bowl and I play in that goldfish bowl? And women like this make history and also break things that are very hard to put back together, which is why the impediments are so great. Meaning if every woman for all of human history felt like this, we wouldn't have any babies because we'd be like, fuck this. I'm not doing that. Jonathan, I love what both of you are tying in.

And I see exactly like where you're coming from. And it's going to be a two-prong kind of answer to your question. So I'm going to start with where I'm at now. Like this is why I do the work I do. When you say, why are you a considering divorce coach for exactly what you were saying of like, well, what about this other possibility? That's why I stay in the space of stay or go with my clients. Because as they get the tools with me of learning,

oh, this is actually what I desire. Wait, there is other options. We could try this instead. Then they can advocate within the marriage. They can talk to their partner and say, can we do this differently? And that's where you get to see the opportunity. Like, okay, if you have a partner who's open to growing out of, you know, very strict traditional roles and is open to you also getting to expand and maybe letting go of some

of his patriarchal privilege to support. and move you in that direction as well, then we've got a game changer. Now we've got an opportunity to stay. In my instance, unfortunately, the deck was just so stacked against me with the level of, I would say specifically,

the religious cultural conditioning. I didn't even have within me a framework at that time of even believing I wanted to have a career that I was, when I say I'm the spicy, loud out going, I did not know that. about myself because I'd been raised in an environment that did not fuel and support and try to teach me and show me that about myself. And that's why the outside world is considered in many

communities, not just Mormon communities in Orthodox Jewish communities. The outside world is seen as dangerous because if you see all these women in their bikinis on the street, you'll say, why can't I be in a bikini on the street? Or if you see all these, you know, women, You see Kamala Harris. She's wearing a pantsuit and sneakers trying to be the president. Yeah. It will change. And as you know from my work, that is what I'm most passionate about is understanding, yes, there's so much fear within these structures that have helped humans evolve.

You know, exactly. Culture has played a role. Religions have played a role. But what we're seeing now is women are done. being the holders of all the shit so that all the stuff can run correctly and are starting to really wake up and we see this in the amount of freedom that we have. And so many people are afraid of that. So many religions are afraid of that.

So many governments and are terrified and are saying get back in the box. And my message is, I get that it's gotten us this far. but the only constant in life is change. The only constant is evolution. And we either evolve and we move forward or we die. And what I'm noticing is there's a lot of marriage is dying because specifically male partners are not willing to let go of that privilege, the benefits they've been getting from their partners taking the shit for so long, which I get it.

We've been programmed to think that's okay. That was similar. You know, my ex-husband is not a bad guy. Is he a casualty of what he was trained in in the patriarchy? Is his marriage a casualty of that? Yes, absolutely. I was unhappy. I think also, you know, there have been incredible stories of women voicing this,

you know, throughout history. And every kind of tradition, you know, has these stories of incredible women. You know, even in, you know, Old Testament traditions, there are bold women. There are women who stepped outside of those. bounds. And in many cases, they are Jezebels. They are Liliths. They're, they're demonized. Or, you know, the worst accusation, they're lesbians, right? Like, oh, they couldn't, they couldn't get a man. Love the lesbians. I'm like, yeah, that is such a compliment now.

Such a compliment. But I wonder if you can talk a little bit about, I want to, I want a devil's advocate it for a second because what, unfortunately, what we're hearing. And I don't, don't even know if I should say, unfortunately, this is what's bubbling up in our culture, is that many people feel empowered to explicitly say, this is what feminism got you. This is what you deserve, meaning women being empowered is going to cause the crumbling of intact families. And what about all those children who are being raised now in divorce, right? Can you talk a little bit about kind of culturally what has changed and what we know in particular about children raised in homes where there is a disparity of power and a lack of

distribution of resources for mental health, meaning as long as I'm fed and dad is happy, who cares what mom is experiencing is I think the way a lot of us were raised. Can you talk a little bit about that? I mean, for one, the research doesn't show it. Like, I think the numbers are like 75 to 80% of kids, two years post-divorce, have like normal levels of functioning. So there's a huge like fear story, fear-mongering out there about how awful divorces. And I'm always very about statistics around marriage and how kids do because of my own experience, which was that I stayed in, you know, I was raised in a family that on the outside looked really great because my parents were married.

and on the inside was fraught with lots of emotional abuse and ultimately undiagnosed mental health issues, that I can now that I see them track back through the generations of my family. Like, there it is in my mom. Oh, there it is in her parents. There it is in her parents before her. So when we talk about feminism and women now leaving marriages and, oh, these families disintegrating, right? I don't see that as a negative because I came from a family that was a product of that

was really honestly shitty. You know, the story on my podcast of how my family disintegrated is one of the most, like, powerful examples of us prioritizing things that look great on the outside that for many of us internally don't feel that good. And what I have seen personally is as you empower women, The game changes. Contrary to what I feared, you know, I've been divorced now for five years. And it's different for everybody, right? But in my instance, my children, I see them growing up so much more dynamic. They see a very different family. You know, there's my husband, my ex-husband, there's me.

and my ex-husband in many ways has been forced to do his own growth. Through me leaving, there was a vacuum there that not all men choose this, but he did choose to go do more of the work. And he has turned out to be a much more involved, much more compassionate and connected dad because he has to raise his kids half the time. I want to kind of zoom in. You know, you obviously speak to lots of women with lots of different experiences. And I've been divorced for almost 13 years.

So I am on the, a different side of it. I don't want to say the other side because I don't really feel like you get over it. You just keep getting through it, you know, and it keeps shifting and changing. But I want you to talk about some of the reasons that people give that they're afraid to leave. Because one of the things that I often hear, I mean, sorry, I was one of the first people, as we said, I was like a trend setter. You know, I was one of the first people I knew that was divorced. So I didn't have anybody else to talk to about it. But when I hear from people or when I talk to people or when I know people in this phase of life,

I'll be honest, because I'm on this different side of it, all I hear is you're afraid and don't know what to do. Meaning people come up with reasons of like my grown children won't be able to deal with it. Or, you know, what will his mother say? You know, can you talk about what are the reasons people say that they're afraid to leave? And obviously, I know you help people through different phases of the decision, but what are some of the reasons people say they're afraid to leave? And what do you really think are the main reasons people are afraid to leave? What an awesome question.

Okay, let me see if I can narrow down, like the top three that I see the most often. I definitely think finances, for sure, are still an issue. I'm actually surprised at how many women I coach that aren't. There are quite a few that are like that's actually not the issue. But it still is a huge, it can be a real barrier and a real fear, a space of just uncertainty. So I would say finances. The next is just, I call it an empathy Achilles heel, which is where women who are so empathic have been like overtrained to feel their partner's pain and like do not want to leave because

he's going to be so sad or what's going to happen to him or that is actually like one of the most common is and it's a it's a codependency right it's yeah I was going to say that sounds so freaking sick it's really really common for a lot of women like feeling in their bodies physically ill at how upset and depressed because often, you know, in a lot of instances, their partners have not been doing the work. So their partners are about to lose a structure that's really helping them function in life. So they are losing their minds about this ending. That's astounding to me that we've been programmed to push down our needs or feelings

because of fear of how someone else would react. It's just so sad and I get it. Like I'm not saying I don't have compassion and even in the worst situation. Of course, you feel badly for someone, but the notion that this be like, maybe I shouldn't leave because he's really going to be sad. This is the reality. Myam, this is what I'm working with. I want to reframe that a tiny bit because I think the issue is not in feeling it, but not knowing how to feel it and also feel themselves. Yes.

I think it's actually extremely powerful and it's a superpower that they know that this person that they are connected to and have been connected to in the most intense ways and have built a life with, is going to suffer that pillar of stability, the support being taken from them. It's true. Men absolutely thrive when there is that consistency in support. It's been studies have been shown. Men do better in marriage and live longer when they're married. And so knowing that that's going to happen to that, it is true that it is the opposite for women traditionally. Now, I think, like, let's save that we can reformulate the combination that would be great for both people for later on in this episode. But I just want to say that I think it's not, I think it's actually positive that they can feel that because it's going to be a seismic shift. The tragedy or the trap is that you should be able to feel that, acknowledge it, and then sort out what their need is from the empathy that they have.

Which is that emotional emmeshment. And that is absolutely like when I was writing down what is some of the biggest key points that we work through in the coaching that I do. being able to process emotion in your body and also allow other people to have their emotions without you needing to take them on is key. I mean, that's like mental health 101. This actually goes to a thing that we've spoken about, but I was actually just thinking about lately, this idea that there are no right, quote unquote, decisions that don't also come with grief and loss and sadness. Like people think, oh, I'm going to make this decision because it's the right thing for me. They don't also always realize it's going to come with potentially

years, maybe longer of emotional loss. Like there were things in that marriage that you loved, which is why you were in it in the first place. It doesn't mean that, oh, I know that I need to grow. It doesn't come with a lot of other emotions that are complicated. And especially if you have children. All of their emotions too. All the kids' emotions, but also you don't just get divorced and stop interacting with this person, you're now like dealing with them and are still in a relationship with them. That relationship just is now sometimes more complicated.

There are other people involved. That person changes and no longer is in the same dynamic that you used to be. So some of the conversations that you used to be able to cut right through and build a joint understanding are now even more complicated and there's kids and hurt feelings involved like it gets really messy.

Which is why I love, of the considering part. So many people want to get you to the divorce or want to get you back in your marriage. And there's so much beautiful work. That work right there, Jonathan, like the preparation that you do, if you do end up getting divorced, of learning how to fill your feelings,

of learning how to be aware of what you're desiring, of learning how to communicate it, of how to regulate your body down when you're starting to get activated. All of that are key things that you learn when you're going through the process of deciding. That's the way I frame my coaching is like, no matter how long this process takes of deciding,

we're going to get every bit of growth out of it because absolutely you're going to need it going forward the rest of your life. To get back to what reasons people say that they're afraid. So finances, which I think is a very significant one and very, well, sorry, finances was one. the empathy Achilles heel was another.

What would you say is the third thing that you see? And then I want you to sort of give us the reasons that you actually think people are afraid to move on. That final one, you know, I'm kind of torn between it being fear for their children. And then ultimately, you know, where, what comes next, you know, not only they're afraid for like, what's the results going to be for their children, but most of the women, I talk to don't have examples of women really thriving post-divorce. What if someone doesn't love me? What if I never find someone to love me?

Fear of not finding anybody or just not even like having a clear vision of a future that could be different. I often will coach women when I meet them on my 90-minute sessions and we talk about like where you're at now, where you're going. They have no big, one of my biggest things is like opening to them like, here's what else could be possible. So when you don't know what else could be possible, when you don't have a vision of the future, it's really hard to make any moves now towards something that doesn't exist.

Okay, so what are the three things that I think they're actually really grappling with underneath? I think the biggest one is just straight up fear. Learning to be with fear and develop bravery in response to it. that's not something that, at least not something that I as a woman was trained to do. I think, you know, in a patriarchal world, men kind of get that a lot through that striving and that pushing and speak up for yourself and seeing that like I can talk back and it's going to be okay. A lot of my women, the fear literally cripples and paralyzes them into inaction. And in fact, I, what was the, I know, I wrote down a note because it was called, it's this really great word that I recently

found and I was like, oh my God, that's what it is. There we go. Functional freeze response. Like so many women are stuck in this freeze response where they are like appearing to function normally, but internally they are in just a state of utter shutdown. So I would say that is what blocks most women is we have to overcome that total body mind paralysis shutdown that they've kind of been living in and just getting through the day on. Can you flesh out what this functional freeze response looks like? This is what most women are just like, they think this is just how they are. This is where I was at like four or five years ago where you appear like you are

functioning normally, but inside you're experiencing a lot of numbness and disconnection, the feeling of immobility, like I want to do something, but I can't. And the heart of this is being in like fight and flight all the time. And this was something I wanted to bring up on your guys' podcast was a lot of my women, I think also are experiencing complex PTSD. So when we talk about divorce, we're actually talking about an area where like we've got multiple things intersecting at the same time. So what's the biggest issue I run into with them?

they are often in a state of their nervous systems just being fried. You know, they've, they've been ignoring their bodies for so long. And so any little bit of fear feels absolutely insurmountable and sends them into a tailspin of thoughts. And then just, you know, for a lot of them, their responses are to freeze or to fawn. And so breaking out of that, you have to really start building safety back in the body, being able to trust your body again, being able to trust that it's safe, to have your own thoughts, to ask for what you need, to set boundaries.

Like, that's all part of the process that you kind of have to go through to figure out, am I going to be able to stay with this person or not? And a lot of women don't even know that because they can't even speak it yet. I wonder if you can talk a little bit about this intersection between trauma and the indecision, right? Or the feeling that maybe something's not right in your marriage and should you or should you not go. are we talking about people who may be experiencing trauma just from things in their childhood or if they come from, let's say, a particular religious structure or a very strong

cultural norm around how they should behave? Or in many cases, is there kind of micro trauma or lowercase T trauma occurring in marriages, meaning emotional abuse or, you know, being intimidated or being, you know, in some ways threatened, right? Like, you'll never be okay without me. Is that what's sort of going on that's leading to this intersection? I would say all of the above, for sure. And it's a range. It's like a spectrum.

So I would say the baseline level that I see in most women is almost all women have trauma from being raised in a patriarchal culture that has told them, like, your wants, your needs, unless you had parents that were really encouraging that. There's just a baseline idea that like it's wrong of me to want things. It's selfish of me to desire more and I should be happy with what I have. And my job is to make everybody else feel good. So you have that. And then you just start layering on from there, right? Were you part of a very fundamentalist religion? Do you have a partner who tends to be more narcissistic in their dynamic, which then leads into emotional neglect, emotional manipulation, gaslighting.

So when I have women come to me, it's, you know, each one is their own beautiful microcosm of trauma. I mean, the majority of us, that's why when people are like stay married, I just find it so offensive or divorce is bad because it completely negates the incredibly complex experience of an individual human within that marriage and their entire life that came before that marriage. And then all of the interactions that came from the two of them meshing their perhaps unconscious, unhealed trauma together and re-traumatizing each other. It's way more complicated than just stay married, don't get divorced. I want to tie this back into something you said earlier

about how when you were growing up, you couldn't trust your feelings. And so in your marriage, you couldn't even access the part of yourself that knew there were something else. I think one thing that people really want to understand is how do you start a process of starting to listen and trust yourself when it's covered in all these social messages? You're disconnected. Maybe there's been past experience, especially growing up, letting you know that, wait a second, if you trust your in your experience, it's going to be negated or argued against. You're going to be devalued and told not to connect to it. So how do people start to even hear that signal more clearly to know, is this just

them needing to vocalize more and change the past pattern of being told that they don't matter and their needs don't matter? Or is it also, you know, a really big issue would be, I'm going to leave my marriage, but not actually fix this and then I'm going to get into the next relationship. and it's going to be the exact same dynamic. That's my favorite game. Yes. And it's a very common when.

I had a period where I was coaching like three women at the same time who were all in second marriages. And I remember when all of them had their moments of like, oh, shit, this is just my first marriage in a different form. And I was like, yeah. You save a lot on lawyer costs and other problems if you just kind of address it first just to make sure. Yeah.

So, oh my God, Jonathan. and you have so many good questions here. I want to pop to that one real quick. The one you just said of like, well, why, you know, if you're going to have to do it a second round in a second marriage, why not just stay in this one? Not exactly. Just to, I think it speaks to the first part,

which is like, how do we make sure we're trusting a potentially static signal of our internal cues when in a world where you've been taught not to value those cues that even listening to them may be dangerous and have negative impacts from the, the people around us. Because if we don't do that, we don't know if we should stay or go. We don't know if it's intuition or fear that's guiding us. And the likelihood of repeating whatever the dynamic is in a subsequent relationship is going to be much higher. I think the starting point for that

that I see for so many women is, it's very like, it feels very internal and kind of secretive. It's when women start reading books like untamed. I see that just, that's like a, it's when women's see other women living different lives and breaking the status quo and not being, you know, burned on crosses or throw, right? Like it's, you go, oh, well, she's doing it. So maybe I can do it too. That's where the podcasts come in. You know, I have so many women that are like, just hearing your story and knowing you chose a different path and it's working out for you. And they usually feel that by like internal resonance, right? when someone says something and you feel that like, ooh, that's like my truth.

Because if there's anything I've learned through coaching, it's that like truth is so subjective. It is very much created by like the way we view the world and our realities and our thoughts. You can see it right now playing out heavily in America. Like the battle for a capital T truth when the reality is I've found truth is very, it's an internal experience. just like, you know, my truth was it was not going to be a place for me to heal in my marriage if I stayed and it was to go. Other women, it's to stay. So you have to have your experience validated first by other women outside of you that you're like seeing and you're like, oh, okay, I resonate with that. And then comes the process of like learning to be with your body.

And this is where getting professional help is so key. Because when you have grown up in traumatic environments where you did not have adults to co-regulate with to teach you how to be in your body, to feel your feelings, that it was safe to trust yourself. You kind of need to go through those developmental processes now as an adult. So that's where the coaching, the therapy comes in, where you are able to go start saying those things you're feeling aloud to a compassionate witness who instead of saying you're bad, you're evil, you shouldn't trust yourself, is like, hey, that sounds really hard. It sounds like you're hurting. Tell me more. And you gradually, and this, you know, it's amazing when you can do it with someone who, like a therapist or a coach, but I've seen it even

happened with just a friend that really loves you unconditionally and is like, this is not okay. You can trust yourself. Those are the little things that start opening you to going, okay, maybe I want to go down this route. And then I think what really adds fuel to the fire is when you start getting educated. When my women start getting the language around attachment styles, around emotional flashbacks with the complex PTSD around the narcissistic behaviors, then they start doing that individuation, that clearing up of the emotional emmeshment and becoming their own person. and I can think my own thoughts. I can feel my own feelings. I want to clarify one thing just because I want to try to make this as accessible as possible.

Because I can make up a few points in this narrative. But if I'm thinking about some of the men in these relationships who are like, I really don't want my relationship to end, but I actually don't know what I'm supposed to do to help this person feel all the things they want to feel. And like I don't intentionally want to subvert them, to make them in any version of them that they're not, but I don't know how to help. What I'm hearing, and correct me if I'm wrong, is that there's a level of emotional

connection and validation that people are not getting. Women are specifically are not getting. And like that is probably the core underlying thing. It's like, dudes are like, I'm in my reality. I'm going to work. I'm coming home. Like, you're upset? Okay.

Well, maybe you shouldn't be upset about this. and then there's a huge, and there's a huge breakdown. So in some regards, it's like, how do men give them the space to remove themselves from the cultural narratives and allow them to feel their feelings and hear what their experiences? Is like, can you paint us a picture of like when someone in a relationship can actually do this work and be in touch with themselves? And the guy is kind of doing his role to support that. Yes.

Oh, my God, Jonathan. then I love this question because I would love to speak to the opposite side, right? Like, okay, these guys who are in the marriages that are like, I can see, she's going through shit, it's breaking down. What do I do? And what so many men do is they go to save the marriage. And it is such a mistake because what I see in women is when men see the marriage like, oh, she's considering divorce, they go all in.

I'm like, well, now I'm going to do all the things she told me to do. I'm going to buy her the flowers. I'm going to go take the kids to school. I'm going to do all this. But deep down, it doesn't feel like he's doing it for her. It feels like he's now afraid he's going to lose shit he needs. And so what the answer is is when you see your partner waking up, which is really what it is, right? She's going through her journey.

You go start doing yours. The biggest thing that is missing in these marriages is partners who are willing to go acknowledge their own trauma, who are willing to say, Oh shit. If this marriage is breaking down, I'm not going to go focus on you and supporting you because you're the crazy one that needs all the help. I'm going to fucking look at me. I'm going to go stand in front of a mirror and I'm going to go figure out my stuff as well.

I cannot handle how many men out there are like, my family was great. You know, when somebody comes to me and they have no awareness or at least a more complex understanding of what they grew up with, but I'm seeing in their life the results. I'm like, dude, you got trauma that's undiagnosed. You can see it in your life. And yet you want to sacrifice the potential for what's here right now by preserving the story of your childhood being perfect. You have to go look at those shadows, those demons. And the more men that do that, that's where I think we're going to start seeing the change is when men go. And, is when men go not how can I support you, but it's like, how can I go start doing the work

to be walking next to you on this path? Because women want to be seen, like you said, the biggest thing I feel like my women are coming to me and saying is missing. It's, because men will step up and start doing all this stuff. It's, I want authenticity. I want realness. I want him to know my soul. I want to be seen. And that is not shit you can fake. I want to focus a bit, you know, I think it's important to sort of re-remind people that you are not a divorce coach. You are a person who, and I love your podcast, not because I'm looking to stay or go, but because you talk about the deeper issues that are going on really for all, not just for all women, but kind of for all people under the surface. Like you're really like peeling back all those layers.

Sometimes they only come out when we're at this kind of crossroads of should I stay or should I go. But as you talk about, like, the work that you're helping women do is work that they deserve to have done, whether they stay, go, never get married, find love again. It's the work of not what kind of partner can I be so that I always have someone by my side, but who am I? Like, this is the inner journey. One of the things that comes up and that you talk about a lot, you deal with women who feel paralyzed a lot. You deal with women who are like, I don't know what to do. And what I was told in this situation is if the beginning of the sentence is, I don't know, it means you don't yet know. So we have to gather more information so that we can start to know. But one of the things that

comes up so much for women and for some men, but one of the things that comes up so much is this magical word, guilt. Guilt for, I mean, fill in the blank. And I used to listen to Dr. Laura Schlesinger back in the ancient days. And Dr. Laura used to talk about there's appropriate guilt and there's inappropriate guilt. And guilt is, it is a mechanism that our body has designed that indicates that there's a mismatch in intention and authenticity and action. And guilt can be a very important and empowering emotion to experience. And it often kind of realigns us and makes us, I don't know, stop doing things we shouldn't do that are hurting other people. You know, it can get us back on track. But a lot of what you deal with is women who are using this guilt

word as the fundamental reason that they can't even make a decision, right? Can you talk about what is guilt when it's not doing the thing that physiologically it was designed to do? What's it doing. The guilt you're kind of talking of, I think of it as like a quick pop, you know, it's that like, oh, in your conscience, like, oh, that's, I'm out of integrity. And when you have a functioning psyche, like you are aligned internally. You can trust yourself. When that pops in, you're able to like, okay, realign. I know who I am. I know where I want to go. This is off. But when you don't have that internal like compass Jonathan was talking about. The, the signal is just so muffled on that. All guilt does is like add in five other signals because it's that inner critic voice,

just hounding. And in moments like that, and that's really where we come back to like regulation in the body, if your body is in constant fight or flight and guilt, I think creates that, it's like a little, you know, you're just taking a little hit again and again and again, which I want to compassionately say is what most of us, the drug most of us were raised on in childhood. Like this is a coping mechanism. Most of us developed, especially, you know, if you're very empathic and a feeler and you're raised in a family where that is not being supportive, what else, what other tool do you have to use?

but then to stroke yourself mentally with guilt over and over and over to try and tame yourself or make yourself do less or be more. It is the go-to tool for women and men as well, right? I mean, for those of us that have trauma and childhood, a lot of us used guilt to try and be more perfect, to try and accomplish to be loved. And when you're trying to figure out, what do I want to choose and you don't know, getting more information isn't going to help because that just keeps you up in the body up here where the inner critic and the guilt is just spinning. The answer that I've seen so much with my women is getting them to a place where it is safe enough to drop down into the body because ultimately the decision of whether to stay or go

really comes down to an internal knowing. Like I've seen for so many of my women, it is not a like, here's the checklist. These are all the things that logically make sense. There are so many women that make the choice. I mean, me entirely, right? It did not make logical sense to go. I was a stay-at-home mom that had no income. I remember my attorney when we were going through my mediation being like, what are you going to do, honey? What are you going to do? Like, go teach English. Like trying to find a career path for me because logically it did not make sense. But in my internal knowing, it was like, this is the path for me. What is the inner work involved that helps women. I mean, some people may not even know what you mean, drop into your body. You know, and we've had, obviously, we've had a lot of

people on who talk about it and Michael Singer talks about it and Suzanne Geisman talks about it. We've had a lot of people talk about it. But what is this, because what you say is that before you decide if you should stay or go, there's work you have to do. And if you don't do that work, your decision may actually not be accurate to what you need or it may not hold or you'll come crawling back, right? What's this inner work? Like, what is sort of, you know, if people wanted to know what kinds of things are we talking

about? Like, is it emotional? Is it physical? It's a huge smorgas board, right? I mean, it's so hard to just say, like, here's the path. And that's why, like, when I work with individual clients, it's, I don't have a set curriculum. It really genuinely is.

I know all these tools. I know all these areas. And as they're presenting to me, we dive into the different areas. But some of the biggest ones are what I said earlier. The inner work is really learning how to validate your own experience. And you do that through support, through community, through either, you know, your best friend that's got you the podcast you're listening to. So that's part of the inner work. That's like individuation learning. I get to have my own thoughts and feelings. I get to want my own things.

Then you have to do the body work. And as much my clients love the thought work because we do a lot of coaching is a lot of understanding like how does my brain work? How do my thoughts create my feelings and then drive my actions? And that feels really yummy for a lot of us, especially in the West because of cognitive behavioral therapy and we love talking about it. But without a doubt, I would say that's like 25% of the work, 75% of it is learning to trust and be in your body again. And we do that through just, you know, on my coaching calls in the community, when I have women coming in that are really distressed, it's me guiding them back in. You know, where are you feeling that? I feel the tingling in my stomach. I feel the buzzing in my fingers. And,

learning to be with sensation in your body without escaping because we escape into our phones. We escape into our food, our work, our exercise, whatever else. So most of us spend our lives way up here, up in our head the whole time. And that's why it's so helpful to have somebody hold you in that process because it can be, because what happens when you go in the body is you find your trauma. You have your parts, one of my favorite books, No Bad Parts by Richard Swartz, like your parts come up and want to talk to you and they want to cry with you and they want to tell you about all the shit they've gone through in your life. And they want you to hold space and sit with them and be able to feel through that. It's like you get to re-parent yourself, basically.

It's the journey of the childhood parts of you coming up and saying this really hurt and you finally sitting with them and saying, see you. I'm so sorry. And then on top of that, education, right, you've got to learn. And then you start applying that. You start setting those boundaries. You start taking the risks. You start asking your partner for what you want if you haven't been. You start seeing clearly what's available with this person now that I am showing up more fully myself. I wonder if you can talk a little bit about fantasy and how much we use the fantasy of what we want to believe or what we believe should be in a marriage versus the reality of what's happening. You know, I was told very early on, like smash any images you had of what you thought your life was going to look like. You know,

you, meaning there's a grieving and a loss to that transition, right, if you, if you are leaving a marriage or even if you're thinking about it. And I was very very, very hung up on, but I'm supposed to be married, but it's supposed to be like this forever. But I was told that you only have one true love and like, what if this is your soulmate? Like, you know, all these kind of like fantasy thoughts that in many cases, it's not so much that it drives us to not leave. It inhibits the ability to even make a decision about what you need. Can you talk a little bit about like fantasy versus reality and what suggestions you might have for someone who's really hung up on?

but this is how it's supposed to be. This was my dream. Yes. I love you bringing up fantasy because I would say, like, when you asked, what are the other reasons that keep women that they don't realize? Fantasy's in the top three. For sure. And I actually was speaking with a woman yesterday who was talking about this exact thing that, you know, I'd coached her in the aftermath of kind of coaching and us, me very clearly pointing out the level of emotional neglect and abuse in her marriage, that validating piece. She already knew it, but I was just validating her. She talked about the grieving of having to let go of her role as the savior. Like this is when we get into the complexity of understanding just because your partner's narcissistic does not mean you don't also have the full other side of the

coin of codependency, which is when our, and you're eager. is terribly tied up in your value being sacrificing for others and showing up for them. And so it's all well and good. This is why I'm like, it's all well and good to say, oh, get divorced and go live this big, vibrant life. But you've still got all these internal blocks. And that's what you talk about the fantasy, the programming that we have. And when you ask how do you work with that, I'd say that's really where the gift that I learned as a coach of understanding, specifically Brooke Castillo from the Life Coach school teaches the model. And that tool just breaks down so beautifully how the mind works in chunks that like, oh,

okay, that's what we're working with. And what it does is it helps you find the beliefs. Because your fantasies are beliefs you were programmed with that you have thought so many times, right, the really just thoughts that have been thought so many times now they've become a belief, a truth to you, that then inhibit or limit what's possible for you. So you have to find those and then sit, right, in, I think Jonathan mentioned it earlier too, in the grief you did just as well. Grief is such a huge part of what I work on with my women because it's one thing to say I want to leave a marriage. It is such a deeply emotional, like, complex process. I have so many

women who want to leave, and they are deeply grieving, the disillusion of the dreams, the future, the hopes for what that was going to be, even while in their bodies knowing it's the right choice for them. I've heard it even said that you lose your past memories with that person, too, because, you know, now all of a sudden you no longer have someone to share the trip that you went on or the honeymoon that happened and all those good aspects and the moments that there was connection that allowed you to fall in love in the first place, you kind of have to grieve those also. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's...

Do you need us to hold space for that right now, Jonathan? I got you, Jonathan. See what I have to deal with? No, I'm being serious. It's very heavy. I really love Jonathan's perspective. I keep hearing from Jonathan, this is so fun for me, because I don't get to talk to very many men. I have had a few come through, and I've embraced that that like my role is I coach women and fuck yeah because I feel like women have had a rough go. But Jonathan is bringing forward that opposite side that I think a lot of men do experience and

that I know my ex-husband experienced for him. That grief, the grief for me was there, but I would say it was three times as much for him on that side. So yeah, there's definitely a complexity of, and I hope maybe you'll find somebody who does this on the other side for men because I would love to hear the perspective for men on the other side because it is a very different journey,

I think, for many of them. I want to get back to focusing and passes back to mine because I know she has a lot of other questions, but to touch on this for a second, I think there is an entire industry available to talk to men about what the model looks like when it's working. Meaning when you talked about, oh, you have to go find your family trauma and you have to look at the parts of yourself that weren't nurtured as a child, men are like, but okay, how is

that going to help me? Right? Yeah. I think there's a lot of guys who are like, I found a wife or a girlfriend and we like to hang out and she does some of the stuff that I like to do and we're going to have sex and we go shopping. It's going to be great. we deal with food stuff together

and like sometimes she cries and I kind of have to navigate why she's upset but most of the time she's not upset and then like we get to watch movies together and it's like cool like I'm having a great time and I find them attractive and like life is copacetic

I don't really think they understand how going to therapy for themselves how looking at their family narratives like they're like well what again like show me the end result give me the version that works They don't recognize having a shared narrative about the world beyond just like politics or business. Jonathan, do you think this is because of patriarchy?

Because this is like one of my core things of like, I think patriarchy has sold men upper river as well in that their privilege of like, it's fine. It's because it is pretty okay. that they're not willing to go do that deeper work for it to be, you know, what women are asking for. I hope this doesn't come across and get me fired from this podcast. But when I hear the word patriarchy, I think most men tune out. Most men are like... I can rephrase it without that word. Get it, Ma'am.

Get it, because I cannot. No, because they're like, this is just the system. And like, I, yes, okay, I benefited from being white and from being, um, a male, but like, that's all I know. And there's only so much that I could do to say the entire system is broken, like give me a model and steps that we can take within that. And I can, look, I can, again, fill in the details and I want to explain a few of the ways that I believe men will benefit from doing this work just in their own personal life about feeling more, connecting more, not being all in their head. But, you know, first, Miami, and then I'd love to hear

sort of both of your takes on what you think that then does specifically for the relationship itself. This is a sticky point also because I think for a lot of women, and especially a lot of women like me, like Brita Joe, I think I can speak for Valerie. The term the patriarchy can be very off-putting because I think people associate it with a lot of other descriptions of the patriarchy that I don't think is necessarily what we're talking about. And I don't necessarily think that the patriarchy implies that all men are privileged, per se, meaning that may be true, but that's not the conversation we're having. I think the question is, in a system that historic, and this is just a lot of words to describe the patriarchy, in a system that for thousands of

years has favored, in many cases, biological differences between men and women, meaning women are the ones who give birth, women are the ones who nurse children historically. right? In a system where biological tendencies of men and women have been over-emphasized for, I mean, all of human history, with some exceptions, when those things are over-emphasized, it does create a structure in which there's not a tremendous amount of advantage for men to be like women, because women used to get support from their lady friends. We were not raised to correct. There is no community really for women, and which is why what Brita Joe is trying to do and what so many of us are trying to do is create a virtual community. And in some cases,

it's in person. But the fact is, it is very, very recent in the history of homo sapiens sapiens that men were relied upon for emotional support or for emotional coddling. And I don't mean that women need to be coddled. I'm saying, when you were hurt, when you had your period, you were surrounded by other women. And those women took care of your kids when you couldn't. They even nursed your kids when you couldn't. Like, has anyone ever tried to nurse with a migraine? It's not fun. I'd love to hand that shit off to somebody else, right? So what we have is we now have a society where I believe feminism is ultimately reaching a higher good of equality and understanding of the equal value of men and women's experiences. And it is relying very heavily on men. And,

to step into a position that many of them are not equipped to step into. And there's all different kinds of men. A lot of men are not interested. And I know a lot of women who are not interested in their men being interested. So the fact is, there are wonderful opportunities for men to step into this. And also, it is very, very difficult, as we've talked about here before, men who lean into feelings are seen as weak. boys who lean into their feelings are called horrible names, disparage.

Like, I mean, gender roles are super important when it comes to these things. So I think the notion is like a lot of men also may think that they are meaning well in saying, like, well, what does she need? But what it is is it's a tremendous amount of emotional labor, as Brida Joe said, not just to lean into like, okay, I'll do the flowers. I'll set a reminder. But like, what are you bringing to the table if we want to walk this path to? together, it takes hard work. And we need more therapists geared towards helping men, right,

tackle these things in ways that are supportive for them and not just for the relationships they're in. This is beautifully said. But then you could just say the patriarchy and that's what we mean. That's what I mean. No one understood that besides you to. Thank you, Maya, for getting that on the record. But like, who has four minutes to talk about the patriarchy? It's like, the be a jerry. Now we know. We'll put it on substack so everyone knows. Lots of women get it. But I totally am so glad Jonathan was like, can we break this down? Because it's needed to be broken down. So thank you, Maya. It was a fantastic explanation, which also leads to the point of men are not incentivized to feel their feelings. We're actually disincentivized. We're taught from a very young

age. And I think that's changing now with the younger generation. I'm 45, but there was never a landscape. We also process, and I know this is a generalization, but we process our emotions, whether it's through atrophy or biological difference, we process them differently. We're often slower to process them. We don't have the language around them. We don't tune in in the same way. And so like, there's like a racehorse and we're like limping along being like, let me try and help here. This is the image we all needed. Yes. But we're flooded and then we're overwhelmed. and then we revert to shutting down or anger very, very quickly. Or she's just like my mother and this is why I don't talk.

And nothing good is going to come out of it. And look, what I'm about to say again could get me fired from this episode. But when men are trying to show up and then they show up and it explodes or gets worse or there's not a shared language of nonviolent communication and there are not eye statements and then they feel blamed or attacked for whatever situation, their partners finding themselves in, they're shut down and feeling like there's no space for them

and all the guy hears is like, you've made no space for me and he's like, how have I made no space for you? I haven't even been home all day. Jonathan, we had couples therapy already this week. We talked about this on my desk.

So I think there's like, and then there's just triggers. So I just, I believe that there is possible and where I was going to go with, like how it actually works is, oh, you slow down. Both people are coming into relation with one another from a far more somatic feeling spot, which, as you said earlier, women want a man to see their soul, which you can't fake. So if I had to translate that to a dude who's like, well, how do I see their soul? Actually, what it is is becoming more embodied. And again, that's

another word that a lot of people just don't understand. But when you're slowing down, when both people are having much more emotional experience and feeling one another, there's a felt sense that is palpable. Call it chemistry that doesn't happen to be sexual, but is just like an intense emotional connection that can only happen when we move outside of our logical brain into our feeling brain and what prevents a lot of people from being connected to that feeling sense is their past childhood trauma or story. And again, I want to take away trauma even because there's a backlash against that word where people think it's overly diagnosed and we're using it too loosely. So even if we remove that word, if we look at how our caretakers and parents or caregivers

showed up for us, were we allowed to feel our emotion? Were we told to compartmentalize? told it wasn't important or we were taught how to rationalize our way through our experience so that we lose our felt sense. You don't have to call that trauma. You can just call that conditioning. Then you're conditioned not to meet your partner in that way. You're not taught how to show up in that way. And if I had to make a pitch for men, I would say, if you learn how to do this in your relationship or you learn how to do it for yourself and then bring it into the relationship, You become more intuitive. Your business decisions that you want to help navigate become clearer.

You're able to see sort of beyond what the data provides. And actually, there's an enormous benefit that all people can get from doing this, what you describe as inner work. Also, you will have more meaningful and better intimacy and sex if you are in alignment. Yes. When men are like, oh, she's just a dead fish. I'm like, mm. You know, yes, this is why when I'm like, oh, the patriarchy as Mayam has has fucked everybody over on these deeper levels, right?

Yes, you can get all the shit. Yes, you can get the pretty house. Yes, you can get the external looking stuff within this system. But if you are a human that happens to be on what I consider to be the, like, edge of the way humans are evolving, which is into more emotionally. aware and wanting to connect in those ways, this is what this is what's ahead for you. And I loved you pointing out that, yeah, they're just at this moment in time, there are a lot of men who are not seeing the value in that and the bummer for them is women are getting the resources to support themselves then and leave. Women are so good at managing their own expectations.

at least the women I am coaching, they are not the women out here that are like, I want this and this and this and this and this and this. They are the women that are like, you know, I think I want to be married to someone who actually wants to have sex with me. You know, like these are really low expectations. We've kind of talked about, oh, I want them to see my soul. But like a lot of the women I'm meeting, the marriages they are in have heads. levels of emotional neglect, verbal abuse, partners who have a real lack of being able to manage their

emotions or connect in any way. So yes, I've kind of set the standard of what a lot of women are wanting and what I experience in the relationship I have, which is soul-knowing. But I do not feel Like I rarely have to, I don't think I've ever had to manage the women I'm coaching's expectations because what they are hoping for is so low, honestly, in comparison to what I have seen that's possible. Now, I don't have my women, that's the thing I kind of push up against you because so many people are like, well, marriage is about compromise and you can't have everything you want and it needs to be, you know, you can't have it perfect. But I see those narratives used so often to just keep women heavily in the box when what I've seen, Maya, when you talked about affairs is actually a lot of the

women that I coach that have had affairs, those affairs are not an escape from their marriage. They are an awakening. It's like, oh my God, there's somebody who actually likes what I have to say, who's interested in my mind, who finds me fascinating, who does see my soul, who I feel finally alive with for the first time in my life. So it's, it's a little different out here. No, I know, I really, I appreciate that distinction. And I think also, you know, I was going to ask about affairs. It, in, in many cases, do you see it as a, sort of cry for help or what what does that awakening do and i am curious how do you kind of counsel women who you know are going outside of the bounds of a marriage and they're learning things

about themselves but you know is that also creating a new sense of guilt and fear that then makes them want to stay because i'm such a bad person and i did that and i should just be stay and be happy it's such a complicated process when an affair gets included it is a huge part though a a lot of my women's journeys because who is that a fair partner? They are that person that you realize. A lot of women don't realize what's possible until they experience it with a different partner and all of a sudden they're like, oh, I don't have to have sex where I am like completely shut down just hanging in there till he gets off. I can actually have a partner who slows down, who taps into my energy, who's interested in my body, who can't get enough of me. But I think the way

the scales have run previously is very negative towards women having affairs in our history. They are the pariahs. They are the jesabels. They are the, they are very. So there's enough societal programming there on shaming them and gilting them for it to start that I approach it very much as a, the analogy I was used is like Jean Valjean, stealing bread. Like if you starve someone long enough, right?

They're in these marriages where what they need is. as a woman and because of the cultural way we've built marriage, because marriage is, like you said, we are now demanding more emotionally out of a marriage than we ever have before. That still doesn't negate, though, the individual experience of I'm in this marriage where I am starving. And I see in many women that go have affairs, they do feel deeply. It's not like, I'm going to go cheat on my husband. And it is often, after years and years of pain and disconnection in the marriage, that that happens and what it does is it awakens them to like, oh, I'm not dead inside. And I see that as movement.

I want movement. The notion that an affair is obviously people breaking their vows or someone else breaking vows, that's very complicated, and I'm sure that's not something that you primarily get to deal with. You're more interested in what's emotionally going on that has led someone to feel they need to go outside the bounds of their marriage, and what information can you get? Now, I'm just going to devil's advocate it here again, just because I think this is important. Like, when you, if you go have an affair with someone, like, you don't have to worry about the kids with them. You don't have to worry about chores. Like, is that, I'm going to ask a dumb question. Is that why?

the sex is better? And then you just think, oh, sex is so amazing. My husband's not giving me this. I need to get divorced. Yeah. So this is where we get into the complexity. I'm pro you making a decision that that moves you out of that paralysis we were talking about earlier, where you're not, you're not taking in any more information. You are just robotically living your life and letting your one life slide away. when you have an affair though this is the two sides you know it's a double-sided sword you have a whole bunch of other work that comes with that and yes it opens up a whole different can of worms that we then have to process and work through which absolutely does involve you know if you had if if if you are somebody that integrity wise does not like lying and cheating and hiding

things that is going to tear you up inside right so we have to do clean up on all all of that. Often affair partners are not actually people that you could be married to and have an actual life with. And a lot of my women, the coaching that we do, like, they know that. As we coach together, they can see. I mean, I have clients right now who, like, their affair partners, like her husband is a covert narcissistic individual and her affair partner is more overt. So she's getting narcissism in both relationships, right? But what having the affair did is it cracked open something in her. It woke her up to like, I am starving, I am not happy, and I could feel differently somewhere.

Now, a lot of women externalize that and think it's the affair partner that's creating it. I know that is not the case. I know it's not some magic man who's coming to your life. And so then the work becomes, you know, often it's like, oh, am I going to pick my, stay with my husband, or go with my affair partner. I'm like, no, it's never that. It's what is the path for you? Where is your path? Where is choosing you? And I love that affairs often just get you started on that journey. As we're talking about all of the emotional development that we would like male partners to do, and for some of us feeling like that's an impossibility, I know many women who have decided to date women.

And one of the reasons that they give, well, there's a lot of reasons which I think are hilarious and interesting and like you could just go on raya and you'll see why a lot of women don't want to compete with those women. But a lot of women are saying that if you can put aside the fact that there may not be a penis involved, there could be fake penises, I get it. But if you put that aside, the emotional connection that a lot of women are wanting, many are seeking with other women. Are you seeing this? Is this a thing that's happening? Yeah, I mean, I would say, maybe not so much women coming directly out of divorce when they're considering. But when you start dating post divorce and the issues Jonathan was bringing up of like men just not being motivated

to do this work, it's like I said previously, it's, it's you have to give up privilege to do this work. You have to go embrace the uncomfortable when life's been really comfortable. Women don't have to do that. There's a lot of women out there that already are in the same soup, the patriarchal soup. So they get it. You don't have to explain it. You don't have to convince them to go do their own work. And I think this is why Glennon Doyle's untamed for so many women that come to me. That is like an anthem because it's a woman saying, I'm not going to sacrifice my emotional experience with another human. I mean, the reality is some of us just want that depth with our romantic partner.

I do. It's something I can't live without. It's the top of the top for me. I want my partner to be the person who sees me in the most intimate of ways, sexually, emotionally, mentally. And I happen to find one in a guy, but there are plenty of women out there that are realizing if the choices between having that, or not having that and having to be a guy,

I'm open to it being male or female. I wanted to also give you the opportunity to talk a little bit about the importance of community and part of what you do and the services that you provide, part of what you do is you have a place where women can hear from other women. And can you talk a little bit about why being in your own head is not enough,

why in some cases working with a therapist or a coach is often not enough. What is it about this life transition that seems to really need to be able to see other women who are going through the same thing? I think similar to what we were talking about earlier with the amount of guilt and self-shame, typically when we're considering divorce, it is a very isolating process. Usually, I find most women do not tell other people. They can't tell their family.

If they do tell a friend, it's, you know, usually one friend. And it goes on for so long, the considering that friends get tired of hearing about how you're still unhappy in your marriage. They don't want to hear how you haven't, like, left yet or figured it out, right? So to come to a space where you can all, I think the biggest thing too is being able to give, right? They're sharing their ideas. They're also commenting back on other women and supporting them.

You no longer feel like this drain on the people around you, but you're also seeing in these other women the nuances of them, right? I think when you have, we'll use an affair, for example, when you have an affair and you've kept that hidden from everybody and nobody else knows about it, when you can go to a space where other women openly talk about the complexities of that, what they're going through. Now we're all working through that process together. And you can learn so much faster from women that are just a little bit further down the road from you looking back and saying, hey, here's some of the stuff that I was learning at that point with my affair partner or, oh, here's something to look out for. It just, it's the power of community to up-level individual growth through the mirroring of seeing those

patterns in other people and feeling less alone in the process. I love that. You just, you do unbelievable work. I also wanted to sort of give a shout out, well, your podcast, you know, as I said, is not just for people who are not sure if they want to stay or go. It's just a great podcast. And you talk about so many interesting aspects of human development. And I think, you know, what you get to sort of also tackle is like all the things that make people who they are because you're finding them at this point in their life where there's been an accumulation or there's been some sort of crisis or both and especially you know the the episodes that you do talking about attachment theory and talking about trauma your episode on complex PTSD like I lost

my mind and sent it to everyone I knew because these are the things that factor in, you know, that many of us want to feel like, oh, it's just this, like, simple thing. Like, oh, I'm unhappy and should I get divorced or not? And I think, like, what's true is that, as with so many other things that we now understand about the mind and body connection, it is so much more than that. Where can people find you if they want to learn more? Yeah. So my website, stay or go coaching.com. I'm also on Instagram considering divorce. Those are the best places. Come listen to the podcast. Yes. I loved you saying it's not just people, considering divorce because it is. Divorces

where all these different arenas intersect. So if you're in that space, it's a lot of different things. It's not just am I going to stay or go. Brida Joe, thank you so much. This was really, really awesome. Thank you.

Jonathan, one of the things that Brida Joe has talked about is sometimes all it takes is one 90-minute session with her to know that you have to leave. And that kind of terrified me. I understand that every case of hers is different, and I think that's really important to emphasize. We're not sort of like giving advice or suggestions for the general population. But I think that's really fun. Can you imagine

being at a point in your life with whatever information you have in your head that you go meet with her 90 minutes later, you're like, that's it. Now I know. What did she say? Well, here's how I think about it. people are are stewing in this information for such a long time and feel like you can't tell your best friend because they know someone who knows someone who knows your husband or you can't tell this person. So they're, they're just bottling it all up inside. And they're scared. They don't know what the next step was going to be. They don't want to admit it to someone. And then they finally get into a session where they're not being judged, where they're being seen, they're being. heard and all of a sudden the floodgates open and a clarity that they were afraid to even tell

themselves is now evident. And once it's on the table, you can't take it back. Yeah. And I think that's also important because she said that like there's that inner knowing. And I think for some people, just having that reflected to you may for some people confirm like, oh my gosh, I wasn't making this up. There's a feeling I have. But I think for a lot of people, it can take years. I mean, what's the longest you've known, you don't need to name names, what's the longest you've known someone talking about divorce who didn't get one? You see those couples who are in their 70s? I know people 20 years.

20 years. Yeah, but I know couples who are in their 70s who are like, they've been married 50 years and they're like, I can't stand this person, but I love them, but I can't stand them. And in that regard, it's like, well. That feels a little different. Well, it feels different because the caveat I wanted to make is like, all marriages have problems.

and there's like the divide, well, is it 80, 20 or how much good, how much bad? And what she's talking about are people who are, I think, systematically and fundamentally dealing with things that are likely not going to be resolved, extreme narcissistic personalities, verbal abuse, neglect. Well, a lot of her women stay, though. I mean, I didn't ask her the percentage, but no, I think what she, if I can be more specific, I think what she's dealing with is women who come from, in many cases, a culture or a religious tradition or in many cases just sort of our tradition of nice girls don't

have needs or shouldn't leave and that's the indecision and I think in many cases she is talking to people who end up staying but I think what she's all about is like know yourself literally know yourself know what it feels like to feel okay see what changes you or your partner can make and she's not, she's not the divorce, you know, dula. I want to be careful about it. It's not like, we should all leave because. No, that's not the answer. But I think that, I think it's really interesting.

For me, like, she has talked about, you know, this notion that like, well, if you've been with someone forever, you just have to stay. You know, I think there's different complexity to that. I know people who literally knew for 10, 20, 30 years. They knew. And if you really ask them, did you know day one? They would say, absolutely. I knew that I was getting married because I thought it was the only way out. Or I didn't think anybody else would love me.

Or I thought that I should be okay with and then insert it. Their drug use. They're drinking. Their affairs, right? Like, I know people who, what is that like for decades and decades to sit? to sit in that. It's not healthy for either partner, right? It's not healthy for kids. I wish we had gotten to talk more about the kids part. I really wish I had asked her that. You know, as she said, the statistics simply don't support it and kind of fill in the blanks. Think of the kind of woman

that we're describing that she counsels. What kind of mother, right? Meaning, how does it feel? If you're having suicidal ideation and you're numbing out and you're like having sex with him but don't want to. Like what is that like to them be like pancakes everybody? It's time for pancakes. There's just this disconnect. You have to kill off a part of yourself. And that's what I heard her talking about is people who have really disconnected are reconnecting and saying what do I feel like? What is my life? What's possible for my life? And that level of reconnection and reintegration. into hopes, dreams, ideas, feelings, all of a sudden brings back a vibrancy and now you're no longer a dead fish and you have some agency. And I don't mean dead fish in sex. I mean dead fish in life. Because when you know that, it takes so much work to keep it bottled up and not just say it.

So it makes total sense to me that people are getting a new lease on life. So glad that Brita Joe came and spoke to us. And yeah, check out her website. Also, check out her podcast. There's an episode. I may have to somehow flag it in this universe. The episode she did on complex PTSD, I could not believe the way she was breaking this down.

And it touched on so many aspects of the human experience. So really appreciate her for that as well. Make sure to follow us. Check us out on Substack. My Ambialx Breakdown is on Substack with bonus content that you cannot see here. It's not here. It doesn't live here. It lives over there.

Join the community. Enjoy the community. Make sure you're subscribed here. And please go over to Substack. And let's have conversations about all the things that we talk about and more. From our breakdown to the world. It's my and be all. Let's break down.

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