Your Divorce Was Not a Coincidence with Sara Fishkin

Hello everyone, happy afternoon. I am so happy to have Sarah Fishkin here with us. Sarah has an interesting story, an interesting journey, and I'm going to let you tell— I'm going to let you tell everybody about it. So welcome, Sarah, how are you?

Thank you, I'm doing really well today and I'm happy to be here.

Thank you. Yeah, me too. And we just found out we're bosom buddies because we both are living in New Jersey, so Who knew? That's cool.

Representing the Garden State here.

That's right. That's right. So Sarah, why don't you tell everybody who you are, where you're from, tell us a little bit about your story and what you do.

Sure. Okay. Well, first, before I launch into that, I just wanted to remark on something that I could already tell right off the bat being in this community that is there's a different feeling in this community. I have, I have joined other divorced women's Facebook groups, and I just want to first just say that, um, your community has a different energy to it. It feels like a very positive, um, growth-oriented healing space, and I just wanted to commend you on that because it's very apparent and I have joined and left other groups because I felt like the narrative was kind of going in the opposite direction. And so I just first wanted to, to say that to you.

Thank you for that, because that's exactly what we're aiming for. We don't want to be in the victim space. We want to be in the, this is my time to rise and shine. So thank you.

Yes, and that's why I felt immediately commented to interview, because that— I'll share a bit of my story, but that has what I have really— divorce was a gift to me. And, and I'll tell a little bit about my story, but my, my, my mission now is to support others to make it a gift for themselves. That really, it's like opening a portal into, the life that you've always wanted to live, but were being held back by, by certain things. So I'll talk about my story and, and, and what I do first. So, well, I'm from, I'm from the East Coast, and I grew up just across the river here, and I grew up in a divorced family. So my parents got divorced when I was about 7, um, going on 8. And that really made a huge, uh, impression on my, my life, though I didn't know it at the time. I, um, grew up, and when I left high school, I was really instantly on a search, pretty much like on a search to really understand, um, what my purpose is, what I, what I'm here to do, and, and really felt quite lost. Like, I really had a very strong sense of myself as a spiritual being as a very young child. I had a sense of, like, um, that there's a much greater reality than, than what appears to be. And my experience growing up, I was really around a lot of people who were not getting along, especially my mother and stepdad after my parents divorced, as if that wasn't enough. Then my mom actually had an even more difficult relationship with the person that she got together with. So I grew up around a lot of people who were constantly in conflict, and there was a lot of instability in my home life., and this, like, you know, this physical life that we see just didn't make a lot of sense to me. What made sense to me was, was the greater realms of the unseen. I was just that kind of a child, but it made it very hard to navigate the life. I didn't have a lot of stability growing up, so I grew up and then felt very, pretty lost and unstable. So I went on just this long journey and, um, never found the thing that was like my place. I, I started college and then I quit college. I studied herbal medicine, I quit herbal medicine school. I went to massage school, I quit massage school. There was always some reason that what I was doing was just not right. And that left me in a position of not having an established career or an established livelihood and put me in a position of then just settling for doing things for— to earn money that didn't actually nourish my soul. Um, I fell back on gardening and landscaping and did that for a long time. But wasn't nurtured by that. I would just like pick, you know, I was picking weeds out of the cracks of people's patios. I, I felt like an outdoor housekeeper. And all along I just was yearning to know what it is I'm supposed to be doing in this life and to do it and to be financially stable and happy and free. And I would write about these ideas I had in my journals for for, for years. I have stacks of journals where I would write about what it is I wanted to create and do, but none of it was happening. It was like there was some sort of block in between my inner life and my outer experience. And I, um, in hindsight, I realized that what happened was Growing up around so much conflict, my nature was to automatically try to take care of everyone around me. And I really lost connection with myself, with like, what do I love? Who am I? What am I here to do? What, you know, what do I, what do I even truly gravitate towards? It, it just became, um, something that I was totally disconnected from. And that even influenced choices I made in my relationships. So I married someone who, um, it's not that I didn't love him, but I wasn't in love with him. Like, I didn't even know what being in love with anything meant. I had just like shut that part down before I even knew I had shut it down. And I had 3 beautiful children with this, with this man, and we were together and like best friends. I mean, it wasn't like we had a bad relationship, but, um, deep down there was always this feeling of like, this isn't quite right. Same with the rest of my life. That's the theme I was carrying, just everywhere. And ultimately, the way that played out was he, um, had an affair with someone else. They fell in love, um, he left me, we got divorced, and I was suddenly, um, single parenting my twins who were 3 at the time and my older one who was 7, in the position of not having an established career, not even really knowing, like, who I really was, because I always put everyone else first. And just, um, really having to scramble because our finances were already quite limited. So when it all came time to split it up, and, you know, I got a pretty small alimony and child support package, and there I was just feeling uh, totally abandoned, rejected, um, lost and scared and overwhelmed. And that's all to say that sometimes we get to a point where what has come before finally gets to a head, you know, like a pimple, then it comes to a head and it pops. And that was my popping moment where it pretty much was the lowest point of my life. And I had a moment I remember very clearly in the shower one day, um, feeling so sorry for myself, where I had this voice come into my mind that just said, there's got to be something really good in this. There's got to be something good in this because life itself is good. I remember making a shift in the shower that day to, that said, to say basically, I'm going to find out what, I'm going to find what that is. And I remember opening the shower curtain and stepping out and feeling like a different orientation towards what was going on, whereas before I had been feeling so much like the victim, then I was suddenly curious to find what was good in it. And soon after that is when I met my mentor, Bob Proctor. I don't know if you know who he was. So that's a long loop around to say, so I'm a certified coach with his institute, and I'm also a— I call myself a transformational mindset and prosperity coach. And what I do now, like, after coming through that experience and working with Bob and his teachings to understand how literally my subconscious patterns from my childhood were, were the only cause of all of my life experiences— and I mean all, not— there's nothing that I cannot— that I can say is not included in that. Um, that is what finally helped me to, to discover my purpose, which is to help people. I help people to actualize their, their, their heart's desires in life through transforming their subconscious patterning, because that's what was stopping me. I didn't know it. There was just always something And Bob helped me to understand what that was, and it was my subconscious beliefs and, and habits that were keeping me from everything that I wanted. And I don't think I would have necessarily found that if I hadn't had to really face it head on through my divorce. Yeah.

It's interesting because your story reminds me of mine in that I don't think I knew really who I was until I went through my divorce. I don't think I, I feel like I was more of a, like I watched my life. I didn't lead my life.

Yeah.

Until I went through my divorce and I was like, wait a minute, who's in charge?

Right. Right. Yes. And my divorce, this was the real kicker for me. This is how I knew, like, okay, there's something in this that is a teaching for me big time, because the way my divorce played out was almost an exact replica of my parents' divorce when I was a child. My mom met someone else, left my dad. There was the similarities.

Were—

to, to someone who doesn't understand the laws that govern, um, manifestation, they would say, wow, what a crazy coincidence. But no, not at all. Literally what I ingested as a child just became reflected in my adult experience, almost to like exact details, almost. Yeah.

Yeah. It, it's interesting to hear you say that because I think about who I had as a role model. And again, my mom, right? And she's awesome. Um, but I modeled a lot of how I showed up in my first relationship after how I saw her showing up in her relationship with my dad and in her relationship with us, because a mom was always Mom always took a, took a back seat. It was first, it was my dad and then the kids. It might have been the other way around, maybe her kids first and then, you know, my dad. But she was never part of that equation because she always put other people first. So I always thought that the way for me to be a good wife was to put my husband first, to put his needs first, to help him grow his business, to do all of these things. And when I came out of my divorce, I was like, who am I and what do I want?

Yes. And, and these things we don't even necessarily— well, you said you thought. For me, most of the way I behaved in my marriage was just automatic. I didn't even intentionally think any of it. It just was how I was based on exactly what you said, that modeling. And that's what I mean by these subconscious paradigms and these patterns. Like my mom, when I was growing up, she was an adamant stay-at-home mom. And she would say, I heard her say a few times that she would rather be on welfare than go to work and put her children in daycare. So what did I do? When I got divorced, I pretty much went on welfare automatically, assuming there's no way I can really get, um, a job that would allow me to earn plenty of money and also be really present for my kids. That just wasn't what was modeled to me. It was sort of like either or. You either just stay home and fully give it to the kids, or you go and you work and you never really see them. It's like, but that was all automatic. It wasn't conscious.

And, and I'll tell you, I say I thought because that's where I landed after I did all my own, right?

Okay.

But when I, when I was going through it, it was like, well, this is just like— I— it wasn't even like I didn't even think because it was just normal that this is how, yes, it would be.

Yes.

So the, the, the awareness came after. Okay. It was like, okay, yeah, it's, it's not all his fault. I clearly had a say in this, you know, how this relationship went. So let me do a little digging. And yeah, that's how I learned about, you know, all the different things I learned about.

Yeah. And I would say, you know, even me, and I don't, I don't have regrets about being married and having the children and all that. I, I accept it all as a beautiful part of my journey. But if I'm 100% honest, The very fact that I said yes to marry someone that I didn't have a 100% I, I know, like full body, I know I want to be with this person was exactly modeled by my mom. She, the person that she then was with after my dad was, was that really? Yeah, was not, was, um, she wasn't coming from I'm totally in love with this person. And so it's a long history. We pass these things down through generations of abandoning ourselves, and we don't even know it.

There's a lot of social conditioning in that, right? Because there's a lot of— we behave— we behave— most, I would say, or a lot of women behave in a way that they think is how they should behave based on what society says. This is how a woman should behave. And I don't know if it's because I hit 50 plus now, I'm like, says who?

Exactly right.

Like, says who? Like, first of all, the rebel in me that's never come out in my whole entire life is now, don't tell me what to do.

Yep. I see that. Right. Yep.

And, and now it's like, okay, it's my life, my rules. And it's such an empowering way to live.

Yes. And that's why I love what I do. So what I do is I help people to realize that the power, the creative power is within us. It's within us. And it has everything to do with how we are Um, thinking and then feeling, and it's our feeling that controls what we do. And but the power is on the inside. There's nothing happening to us. It's happening through us. It's—

yeah, what you just said right now, the image that came into my head is Luke Skywalker. Training with Yoda.

Yeah. Right.

The Force was always within.

Yes.

And it's exactly the same for us.

Yes, it is. And I like to use— I love that analogy. I like to use an analogy of, like, that old-fashioned movie projector. So there's the light, right? And it's shining. And that is the— whatever your spiritual or religious orientation is, it doesn't matter. That is the undying consciousness of, of, of, of life. It just is, and it's always shining, and it's eternal. And then there's what we see on the screen. There's the movie that's playing, and then there's the film. And where we come in there, we think that it's all on the screen. And if we don't like what's playing, those— like, we're all trying to just go up to the screen and change it, but there's nothing actually tangible there to grab onto. It's all in the film. And so I'm here to help people just change the film, because if you change the film, then what you see on the screen has to change. The light's going to shine through whatever you put in there. It doesn't say, ooh, those are really self-negating, self-limiting concepts there. Don't put that in. It doesn't say that or not. It's unconditional. It's fully accepting. It just is. We're the ones who have to decide, okay, I don't like what's on the screen, so what am I running? And I realized, whoa, my life had gotten like— I really didn't like almost any of what I was seeing on the screen. And I really was, if I didn't have 3 kids, was ready to just— because I was fine on the spiritual plane. I, I knew like I would be good. And this, it was this physical life that was so hard for me. But I wasn't going going to do that, obviously. So what I learned how to do is change the film.

Yeah. So when you work with people, tell us a little bit about the process that you go through with them.

So what I like to do is the way that I work with people is in a goal-oriented way.

Okay.

So I like to first help people identify their purpose. Like, what is— like, why are you here? What are— what is your unique reason for being here? And it's— some people are like, oh my God, what's my purpose, big capital P? But it's like, another way of saying that is like, what lights you up? Yeah, that you just love, that is your orientation, that maybe you, you knew when you were really young but you lost it because you had all this conditioning about what you thought you should do or couldn't do or What is your purpose? And then I help people to build a vision for their lives. And that's why I call my coaching business Inner Vision Coaching. We build a vision of what does your life look like as the expression of this purpose? Like, what are you doing? What are you— how are you spending your day, your time? Who are you with? Where are you living? What is— what kind of activities are you are you in? And this is all coming from an ideal inner orientation towards what makes your heart sing. And then we create 1 or 2 goals, because I work with people for about 6 months at a time.

Okay.

And so in that process of 6 months, we are setting out to achieve these goals that are helping you build out this vision that are connected to your purpose. And these goals are, um, very interesting. They are— they're not something you know how to do. You already know how to do it. I say, let's go back to the drawing board and, and find another goal, because the whole purpose of this goal is your personal growth and to cause you to draw upon your true inner power.

Okay.

And so You set these amazing goals that you have no idea how to achieve, but it's something that you really, really want, and you're really excited about it, and it kind of scares you a little bit. And then we get to work immediately on looking at, okay, what are your beliefs regarding these goals? Like, what are the voices in the— in— what are the— who are the naysayers in the room right now that are coming up that are starting to talk to you about your ability and probability of achieving these goals. And then we work with a process that involves a lot of visualization and autosuggestion, okay, that reprograms the subconscious mind to start affirming a new belief. And then we integrate that into behavior by identifying what are the habits that you currently have that are the, the biggest gaps between what you know and what you're like— what you know would take you closer to your goal, but you're not doing it, and what you know is really holding you back, but you're still doing it anyway all the time. We start to work on those, those habits. And when you're, when you're working on belief with the, with the, with the affirmations combined with the habits combined with the visualization um, a lot starts to shift. And then we, we keep going. We go step by step through a program actually that I facilitate that was originally created by Bob Proctor. It's called Thinking Into Results. So it's a 12-step program that takes place over 6 months that takes you all the way from setting your goal all the way through the process of transforming your subconscious paradigms. And reprogramming your self-image, how you see yourself, how you feel about yourself, integrating that into your behavior, dealing with fears, dealing— it's like it, it goes step by step through a logical progression, basically. And I coach people through that and bring my own personal experience to it. And we also really heavily delve into studying the, the laws, meaning like the Law of Attraction, the Law of Vibration, the Law of Polarity, the Law of Assumption, because Law of Cause and Effect. When you understand how these laws work, because they're working anyway, yeah, you might as well use them to your advantage. If you don't know how they work, what's happening is you're unconsciously allowing them a lot of unwanted stuff to get caught in that system, and it's gonna, it's gonna do the same thing no matter what. So when you know how it works, then you have ability to deliberately operate in a harmonious way, as opposed to just sabotaging and creating chaos everywhere in your life. Now you're, you are deliberately operating in, in accordance with these laws, and, and things really start shifting in a very positive way, and in a way that from the outside people are like, that is a crazy synchronicity, that's an amazing coincidence. But it's very logical when you understand the laws.

Yeah, that sounds very, very, very cool. And how you— it feels like it's methodical, but it comes from the heart.

Yeah.

Which I love.

I love that way of saying it. I, I agree. I feel that way too. And I was, I had all the heart my whole life. I was really missing.

Didn't have the method.

I was missing, like, 99% of the methodical.

Well, now you have it, which is a good thing.

And it's so helpful because it brings organization. It brings order.

Yeah.

To us, to our lives, to our minds, and it— we need that.

Yeah. So, um, any final words before we sign off? Anything that you think is important for the women in the group to know?

And yeah, well, yeah, just back to— well, I guess there's women in this group who are, you know, some have been divorced for a long time, some are just newly divorced. I think especially what I want to say to those who are newly or recently— and when I say recently, I mean, gosh, anywhere within like first 5 years of being divorced feels recent to me. What I want to say is that this truly is, as you had said, it's an opportunity to really discover who you really are and what you're here to do. And what feels like adversity is— there's— it's always a gift in disguise. And that, for me, that was the biggest thing when I just started to look for, okay, I don't know what it is, but I know there's a gift in this. I know there's something good in this. When I, when I switched, made that switch inside of myself to just be the detective to find that, it started— it was then able to find me. So I, I just want to say that for, for more the newly divorced, uh, women, just to even start to just ask yourself that question, because it can be pretty dark and, um, hard at the beginning when everything is crumbled.

Yeah, yeah. And piggybacking on that, I think it— the approaching things from a place of curiosity versus a place of judgment. Yes, that's when the work begins.

Yes, yes, exactly.

That's when it all starts.

Exactly. Yeah, awesome.

Sarah, thank you so much for being here. Everyone, thank you so much for watching. If any of what Sarah said resonated with you and you want to get in touch with her, she'll put all her links in the comments below. Don't hesitate to reach out to either Sarah or to myself. We hope that you enjoyed this interview today, and I guess we'll see you on the next one. So thank you, thank you everyone. Sarah, thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.