How to get over a Divorce

What's going on? Everybody? Man, I hope everybody is doing good. This is my first time streaming on YouTube and Facebook at the same time. And so kind of trying to figure it out still as we go. But like I said, we were going to be doing a fire away question and answer on here and so I got some questions that I'm going to be addressing. But first off, let me, let me get a couple things on here. If you're in here, go ahead, drop a comment so I can see if it, if, if I'm able to see it over here through the streaming software that I'm using. See here. Okay, it looks like I got two people in. Awesome. Awesome. About to get started here in just a couple of minutes. Not even minutes, just a couple of seconds. Drop a comment for me if you can hear me. Okay. Drop a 100 emoji. The. If you're able to hear me and you can see everything. Good. Drop a 100 emoji for me so that I know that you're there, so I know that everything is working perfectly. And then we're going to jump into some Q and A. I got some questions that I'm going to address already. But also if you got questions that you want specifically answered, just make sure you drop them in the chat. Dominica, what's up, Dominica? By the way, when it comes, I, I think I saw something about your subscription. Just restore the purchase. There's, there should be a button to restore the purchase in the app. Just hit that. Barbara, thank you so much for being here today. It's good seeing you. I wish you had a little profile picture so I can see what you look like. And then I could actually say really good seeing you. Awesome. Awesome, man. So this is going to be recorded so it's going to stay up here on the channel. You'll be able to find it here on YouTube and so you can come back to it whenever, whenever you're ready and just want to kind of review the content and in case you, you're just gotta go and do something, right? But I'm excited to be doing this on, on Fridays with you guys. Let me just give a little bit more time for some more people to, to come on here. And again, this is a question and answer. So I'm going to be answering as many questions as possible. So just let me know if you have a question, put it in the chat. See here. Sorry I'm messing with all this stuff. This is so new to me right now. Okay, awesome. Cool. Okay, so one of the Questions that I got the other day that I really wanted to address. It's this question right here, and it says, you think it's fine that broken families are so normalized in today's society? Oh, hey, what's up, Coach V. Good seeing you here. That's awesome. I think you're on Facebook, aren't you, Coach V. No, you're on YouTube. Awesome. And so do you think it's fine that broken families are so normalized in today's society? I don't think, first of all, I think we got to address what a broken family really is. And there's a lot of. There's a lot of families that have gone through a divorce and now they've reestablished their family and it's not a broken family anymore. Right? And so when, when we use terminology like broken family, we gotta really define it. Because if broken family is somebody who's gone through a divorce and a kid that has experienced their family going through a divorce, then that's pretty, pretty, pretty normalized nowadays, right? But it doesn't have to be a bad thing. Again, life, life happens on its terms, but life has always experienced all on our terms. And so at the end of the day, if you want a broken family to be something that is negative, then it's going to be something that's negative. But you have the power to change that because you get to design the life that you want. Right? And so where broken families, I think really, everything really goes wrong is when the individual parent, not both. When one individual parent is not willing to do the necessary work to become a healthy individual. Because all a kid really needs is one healthy parent, right? And so you got so many people that get obsessed with like, well, my co parent isn't this. And they're not doing that. That's fine. That's absolutely okay. Because guess what? You're giving your child a precious gift of a different perspective in life. And when they get older, they're gonna get to choose exactly what it is that they want out of this life. Do they want to continue to walk down the blueprint that they're coping that your co parent is laying out for them, or do they want to walk out the blueprint that you're laying out for them? And so this is where it's not about man. Is it normalized? Is it not normalized? I think a better question is, is regardless of what happened, can you still build a healthy family? And I believe that you can, right? I really do believe that you can. So obviously the best thing to happen would be for divorce rates to just completely decrease. And that's where we come in. Like, we can play our part now. Like, one of my visions for. For everything that the conquerors stand for is to change the statistics of divorce in marriages. And I want to do that. I want all of us to do that. If you're here right now, you're part of that. I want us all to do that here, literally, in the next three decades. And I believe that we can. How are we going to do that? How are we going to. How are we going to do that, though? The way that we do that is by healing from our wounds and then showing up in a healthy way and showing our kids what healthy relationships look like. But we can't do that if we never choose to enter into a relationship ourselves. Right? How are you going to teach your kids how to navigate marriage when we're not even exemplifying it for them? Now? Kids can grow up and they can grab some wisdom from our lives. And. But I want my little girl, instead of her seeing what not to do by watching me, I want her to learn what to do by watching me. And so we got. We got the ability to do that. And so obviously, I would love to normalize the family establishment in society all over again, but I can't do that. But we can all do that together. But it's going to take time, and it's going to take action. It's going to take consistency of us showing up within ourselves. Okay, Lord, search my heart. What's going on in me? What are some areas in my life that I need, that I need to heal? Right? And having a growth mindset. This is so interesting is that, you know, I run into a lot of people that say that, man, I do have a growth mindset. But then they don't have a growth mindset when it comes to the opposite sex because they've been hurt by the opposite sex. So they have a growth mindset to. To grow. But when it comes down to man, all women are the same and all men are the same. Now, they don't have a growth mindset. Now, they don't want to get out of that place. They would rather play it safe. They would rather create certainty in their life that they're not going to get hurt again by saying, man, all men are the same and all women are the same. And therefore, I don't even really have to try because I already know that it's not going to work out anyways. And so you create your own Certainty. But that's not a growth mindset. That's a fixed mindset and a fixed belief that is not yielding you the result that you want in your life. And it's not going to yield the result that you want in your kid's life. Like, we are the number one example for our kids, whether we like that or not. Okay? Like, you don't have to like what I'm saying for it to be true. It is the truth. Our kids are watching us. They're watching us. They're watching who we pick, they're watching how we pick. They're watching how we communicate. They're watching what we communicate. They're watching how we move, and they're watching what we move towards every single day that we wake up. They're watching every single act that we do, every tonality that you catch. This is how our kids end up. Like creating these defense mechanisms to create their own security and their own safety bubble. It's created by us, not by society. It can be so easy as a parent to blame society. Take accountability for your own household. I think it's time for men and women of God to start bringing order to their household and saying, no, I'm going to live with intention and I'm going to show my child how to live with intention by displaying it, not by just telling them what to do. So all that to say, do you think it's fine that broken families are so normalized in today's society? Society, yes, I do. But I think tomorrow's society can be shifted by the way that we show up today. And so I want us to normalize marriage and healthy households in the next three centuries or the next three decades. And the only way that we're going to do that is by not worrying about today's society, but worrying about today's actions that I want to take. Okay, the next question, by the way, if you got questions, make sure you drop them in the chat, okay? Okay. This is a live Q and A. So I want to make sure that I help you guys that are here on here live as well. Okay. The next question that I got sent in is, do you believe all long lasting relationships go through a rough patch? Absolutely. Absolutely. Like, here's, here's the thing. All of life is like a heartbeat. The moment that you're dead, you flatline it, just coast. But when you're alive, it goes up, down, up, down, up, down. Moments when we go down, that is not a symbol of death. That is a symbol of life. Okay, but here's the problem. And Tony Robbins says this, it's so true. He says the biggest problem that we have today is that we think we shouldn't have any problems. And so the biggest problem I feel also in obviously in relationships is that people feel like they shouldn't have those problems. Now this is also where we need to be smart and not just run into problems. To run into problems. Like if you are choosing people in your life that are completely not aligned, then you're literally inviting more problems than need to be there. Right? So for example, just very practically when it comes to religion and spirituality, if you are Christian and, and you choose to continue to entertain a relationship with an atheist or somebody who does not believe in God, do not be surprised if you end up getting married to that individual. If you're going through hell. Okay. Do not be surprised. You chose to take on a huge battle based off of your decisions from earlier. Okay. And so we can get very strategic about which heel or hill do I want to die on. What is a battle that I actually want to face? Because you're going to have rough patches. And this is why it's also good to see whenever you're vetting individuals, how do they handle problems? When stuff starts going wrong in their life, how do they handle it? Do they immediately start blaming other individuals? Do they immediately start blaming their families, society, government, whatever it is, do they start blaming their co parent for all their problems? Do they start blaming everybody? And never take self account accountability because guess what, if you're dating an individual that does that and you choose to marry that individual, you chose to deal with the problems that come with that individual. Which means the next time you guys get into an argument they might just blame you instead of taking ownership of it. So it's, it's not about. Or is it normal to have problems? Yes, it's normal to have problems. But choose your problems, choose your problems while you're dating you. These are things that we can notice. There's a, there's something that I tell the, the people in my, in my, I, I, I don't even like calling them clients anymore. It's like the family in my coaching group, man, because it's really developed to be that and it's amazing and beautiful and God's doing something incredible in there. But when it, when it comes down to getting somebody that you're going to fall in love with for the rest of your life, I wish this is how somebody would have told it to me. He said, hey, imagine if you're running a business and you're looking to hire a CEO. If you're hiring a CEO compared to a bag boy, the interview process is a lot more extensive and it's a lot more intense and there's a lot more requirements. Why? Because you are taking on the most powerful position of my company. Of my company. Is the same thing in relationships. When we're picking a spouse, you're picking the CEO of your relationship, you're picking someone of that high caliber. And so we go on dates and we have low level requirements. Like, are they funny? Do they make me laugh? Right. Which these things are important. But if that's all you're looking for, it's very low level. It's like if you hired a CEO and you're just. Or CEO and all your requirements are, well, do you get to work on time? Yes. Well, I don't really care about that. Do you know P. Ls? Are you able to communicate and influence, you know, your colleagues? How. How are you? How do you handle stressful situations? Do you shut down? What's the most stressful situation you've been in? How did you overcome it? Like, there's a lot more questions, more character that we need to ask so that we can actually establish a relationship where when we do go long term, it's not a whole bunch of problems all the time. And when there is problems, you actually have someone to fight with, not to fight. It's different. It's different. So if. If we're going to have this expectation and based off of this question, I don't know who sent it because these are all anonymous, right? Whoever sent me this question, it seems like you have a belief that relationships should not have a rough patch and therefore you probably exit relationships very frequently. And you're putting standards on people that they'll never be able to live up to. I just want you to, like, really think about this. A lasting relationship means that there's two live humans for a long time partnered together. Two humans that are alive for a long time partnered together. A lasting relationship. Every human has problems. Every human gets stressed out. If you sent me this question, I want to ask you something. Do you ever come home and you have an off day and then do you deal with it? Because a lot of us, we have off days and instead of going out and processing our emotions and getting ourselves regulated again, we just kind of suppress it a little bit. Like, no, it's fine. I just had a bad day. I just had a day. I just need to go get my nails done. Or I just need to go to the gym. And sometimes those things work. But sometimes there's bigger issues that happen in life. Sometimes there's bigger issues like where is this country going? Because based off of that, I need to determine where our family needs to stand right now, what we need to create right now so that we are good. Get my house in order. Right. Then you got these problems. So whenever somebody's dealing with stress, how do they handle stress? Because if they shut down in stressful situations, even in a long lasting relationship, you're going to have more problems and you're going to have problems that they don't. You're, you're not, you're not aligned in how you're going to work those things out. But if you have someone who knows how to regulate themselves, you have another individual who knows how to self like soothe and regulate themselves. And then you have two individuals who, when they see a problem, they get frustrated for a while. But then they, their identity kicks in and it says, no, no, no, no, no, I'm not going to be taken out by this. I'm actually going to lean into it. I, I'm gonna choose to operate out of the opposite spirit. So this problem is making me want to shut down, but instead I'm going to lean into it. Opposite spirit. When you have two individuals like that, your problems, you guys get to face them together. And this is why we can practice this in our single season. This is something that I try and practice quite often, if I'm being honest, even just with my family, with my mother and with my dad. Right. I love practicing with this with them. Why? Because that's a lasting relationship too. That's a long lasting relationship. It's a relationship. It's a father son relationship. It's a mother son relationship. And so the more empathetic that I can become today, the more empathetic I will be tomorrow. It doesn't just happen by accident. You, you aren't just a dick to somebody and then you're loving to somebody else. Eventually that side of your character will overflow flow onto that other individual. And so this is where we get to do the work on ourselves. Not by just focusing on ourselves like this toxic society is telling you to, but to ask yourself, how do I want to show up? How would I want a partner to respond to me? How would I want a partner to work through these problems with me? How would I want a partner to listen to me? And then you practice the things that you want. Because when you practice the things that you want, you Become that partner. And who you are is what you attract. If you're in business and you got crappy clients, it's because you might be a crappy business owner. Just saying if you got clients that are crippled with scarcity, then you might be somebody who's crippled with scarcity because you attract what you are. And so become the greatest version of yourself. Become the greatest listener, become the greatest communicator, become the greatest influencer, become the most disciplined, become the most emotionally fit that you can be. Become just have that adapt to that growth mindset where you're always looking for new challenges. If you choose to challenge yourself, you're always going to grow. But if you don't, what's going to happen is then life will happen. Start challenging you, and you don't know what it's like to face challenges because. Because you haven't chosen to do it. So now we got a problem. Now we're frustrated. Now we believe that life isn't fair. Now we believe that our life is over. Now we don't know what we're going to do. Now we're praying for God to take our problems away instead of for God to give us strength and courage and boldness and wisdom to overcome those problems and bring solutions to them. It's a different dynamic. So, yes, I do believe that relationships, all of them, all lasting relationships, go through a rough patch. But it's just, you get to choose what patch that's going to be, and you choose that in the beginning whenever you're dating. So if you're, if you're looking for someone that's not going to give you any rough patches, then good luck, you're going to end up by yourself. Because even you guys, like, let's think about it practically, like, for real, let's think about this super practical. You give yourself your own rough patches every single day. I give myself my own rough patches every single day. And you're expecting to enter into a commitment, into a partnership with somebody else and them not give you some sort of rough patch. When you give yourself rough patches every single day. Come on now. It's delusional. It's delusional. This expectation is going to lead, lead this individual. If you, if you don't break that belief, it's going to lead you to actually just hurt a bunch of people and, and hurt yourself in the process. And waste a lot of time. Don't waste time. Get rid of that expectation. I was just, I was having a coaching call with another client the other day, and I Told her. I was like, I think what you need to work on in this season of your life is trading your expectations for appreciation. Trading your expectations for appreciations will change the experience of your life altogether. Like, really, really think about this. If. If you have friends and you don't expect it, if you don't expect them to text you, the moment that they do, you'll appreciate it. But if you're expecting them to reach out to you, when they don't, you get pissed off. You set yourself up for failure, and then now what's the story you start creating in your own head? Man, they don't even care about me. They don't even love me. I'm the only one that's trying. Why would I even reach out to them again? They're failing fake. They're not real friends. D d d d d this is why I just got to focus on myself, right? And then, boom, you're done. You're toast. You completely ruined potentially an incredible friendship just because you had an expectation instead of trading it for appreciation. We can do the exact same thing in relationships. Instead of expecting somebody to pick up your clothes, how about you appreciated if they did? Instead of expecting somebody to pay for your dinner, how about you appreciate the fact that they did? Instead of expecting somebody to listen to you, how about you appreciate the fact that they did? If you expect nothing but appreciate everything, you're never let down. But you're always in a constant state of gratitude. Why? Because, man, thank you so much. You didn't have to do that today, man. Today was beautiful. My mom came over here with my cousin, and they just wanted to, like, detail clean my house. My mom was so sweet. She said, son, it's not that you can't clean your house. It's just you need a woman's touch. And I was like, mom, you're right. I do need a woman's touch. Because I get it. I miss a lot of little crevices and this and this. And I'm so on the go that I can't really see that, right? And so she came here. Now, had I been expecting her to clean my house, I would be like, wow, I can't believe she hasn't even offered to clean my house. Like, there's certain areas that need touch ups, and she's not even. I thought she was supposed to be my mom. I thought she was supposed to try and take care of me. I thought she loved me. That's what an expectation does to a relationship. But I expected nothing. So when she did it like today as she was leaving, I told her, I was like, man, mom, I love you so much and I appreciate you. I appreciate you so much. And it was so funny because she almost like paused because I was saying it to her and to my cousin. She almost paused, like she was kind of like caught off guard. She was like, she was like, do you really? I was like, yes, mom, of course I appreciate you. And I appreciate you like my. To my cousin, right? And in that moment, I could just tell that their hearts were just filled a little bit more with love. It's because I appreciate it. I didn't expect. And by the way, you guys can see my dog Jacks over here. Say hi. That's my wiener dog, Jax, right there. Don't mess with them, man. Don't mess with wiener dogs. I don't care what, what you think, okay? Wiener dogs are savages, all right? They're a little beast. So, yes, you're definitely going to have rough patches in a long lasting relationship, but trade your expectations for appreciation. I think you're going to have a pretty good outcome in life regardless of what it is that you're going through. Think about it this way, okay? Because everyone that's here, more than likely you've been through a divorce or you're going through a divorce, or you just really wanting to better yourself in a healing process and in relationships in general. Think about it this way. If you're going through a heartbreak and you're expecting your ex to reach out and apologize, think about how crippling that is to you. Just sitting there, waiting, waiting. Well, when are they going to take accountability? Expectation. Well, when are they going to tell me that they messed up? Expectation. Well, when are they going to regret missing me or losing me? Expectation. If you can trade all those and not expect any of that, then if they, if, if literally Jesus happens to return and your ex reaches out to you and says, I'm sorry, guess what you're gonna do, man. Hey, thank you so much. I appreciate that. No harm, no foul, whatever. Move on from it. But if you're expecting it, you're just. You're ruining your own day. That's all that's happening. Our expectations ruin our own day. They don't affect anybody else's lives. Like, there was someone in my life who. All they had was expectations placed on, on me and a variety of people like, well, why don't you guys message me? Why don't you invite me? Which we would invite that individual. Well, why don't you this for me well, why don't you this for me? Well, why don't you this for me? Oh, my God, dude. Nobody can live up to that. Nobody can live up to that. And then that person ended up deteriorating the connection that she had with those individuals because all she, all they had was expectations and zero, zero appreciation in this season of singleness, in the season of healing, of recovery, Right? Trade your expectations for appreciation. This is why this is so massive, because we are literally the patterns that we practice daily. That's it. I don't care what anybody tells you, okay? If there's Christians on here, I might offend you here in, in, in a moment, but please don't take offense to this, okay? Because this is coming out of a place of love, and it's just true. You are not who God says that you are every single day. You are not who your parents say that you are every single day. You are the patterns that you habitually practice every single day. That's a fact. That's a fact. You want to become who God says that you are. Practice listening to who he says you are. Practice your doing and showing up as that individual every single day. Then you will be the person that God says that you are. This takes practice. It takes practicing our patterns because that is what will create our future. It is what we practice today. Most people want an incredible life, and they're zeroed in on it, saying, man, in 10 years, when you should be focused on today, what can I do today? Man, in 10 years, I'm going to launch my dream career. Man, in 10 years, I'm going to start this business. It's going to take me about 10 years to get there. Why don't you start today? Why don't you design a logo today? Why don't you go out and just buy a domain today? What are you waiting for? If you see it as 10 years from now, then you will move accordingly to a goal that is 10 years from now. But if you see it as all I have is today, you will move accordingly to all I have is today. You move differently. You got a different level of urgency. So I really want to, like, encourage you in this season, have the urgency of today. I'm going to choose to trade my expectations for appreciation and watch how many relationships are probably restored in your life because they were ruined. Not for any other reason than our own expectation of that other individual. Now, this doesn't mean don't have expectations, don't have boundaries, okay? I want you to really listen to me, but you can cripple yourself with that. If all you're doing is expecting someone to do xyz, you're so focused on another individual that you're not even focused on. How can I show up selfless, selflessly for this individual? For my friends, I love showing up. For my friends selflessly and, and for family members. I'll shoot text messages, tell them how much I love them, how much I care about them, why I love them, why I care about them, what I think is special about them. I'll shoot messages out like that randomly. To me, that's me being selfless. Why? Because I don't expect anything in return, right? My brother is the worst texter in the world. He's worse than me, right? And I do this to him often and I rarely get a text back. I don't know if he feels awkward, right? Because men aren't supposed to talk like that or something. But I don't get anything back. I don't care. Imagine if I was sending a text, a loving message to my brother, expecting it to be returned to me. I had, I had a lady tell me the other day how she doesn't do that anymore. It was so sad. She said, yeah, I just don't do that anymore. She was like. Because what I've noticed is whenever I send it, I don't like, they don't have a response of like, man, thank you so much. I really appreciate. So it doesn't really mean much to them. So if it doesn't mean much to them, then I'm just not going to give that to them anymore. Right? So now I'm very careful on who I give that to. And I'm like, man, what a sad way to live. It kind of sucks a little bit, man. It kind of sucks that other humans control who you are. Other humans control your capacity and willingness to love. You're a slave to them. You're a slave to your expectations, you're a slave to other humans. And as long as we are slaves, we will never be happy. We will never experience true freedom. And this is one way that you can literally start breaking off these chains. Okay? The Bible says that we are no longer slaves. Stop being a slave. A good way to stop being a slave is to remove expectations off of individuals and just be appreciate. Learn to appreciate. So this is key, man. This is really, really good for that question. So do you believe all long lasting relationships go through a rough patch? Absolutely. But if you practice a pattern today of trading your expectations for appreciation, I have a feeling you're going to Go through a lot less rough patches. And the rough patches that you go through, you guys are going to grow through them together instead of fighting each other in the middle of them because you're expecting them to show up a certain way instead of appreciate them for who they are. And again, if we don't practice that today, it's not going to magically happen in the relationship. Other question is also, if you guys got questions, drop them in the comments. Okay? Drop them in the comments. I'm here to help you guys. First, YouTube Live, too. I'm also live on Facebook, but Facebook is like my personal page, so it's probably going to be a little different for all of them. They're gonna be like, what the heck? Okay, awesome. Yeah. Drop your questions if you got a question. So other question that I have is, do you have times where you break down and find yourself asking, why can't you have the family you made with the person you loved? If I'm being honest, 100 completely honest. Absolutely not. I don't. I don't. I had those breakdowns probably for the first half of the year after she had left. But this is why it's so important to find the blessing in what you're going through today and to learn how to reduce the desire of your ex. Because when you do that, what ends up happening is you start seeing everything that was actually holding you back. You start seeing all the misalignments. You start seeing the red flags that you just kind of said, ah, okay, I'll just kind of let them slide. And you start seeing that individual not for who you thought they were before who they actually are. And when you do that, when I did that. Right, because this question was directed to me when I did that. I was giving thanks to the Lord for what ended up happening. Because I wouldn't have chosen to leave, so she had to go. She had to make that decision for me because I wouldn't have made that decision. And so, no, I don't catch myself ever crying about, man, why can't I have a family with a person that I loved? I think the key word there is loved, right? Like, I loved. I loved that individual in a romantic way. I still have love for that person. I still have care for that person. Person, Right. And I. I hope nothing for the best for that person because that's my daughter's mom at the end of the day. Right? But no, like, I don't. I don't regret that. Because here's the thing. There's. There's a Lot of. There's a lot of people out there right now who, when you guys were together, it probably was worse. It was probably worse. There's probably a lot more fighting. There was probably a lot more yelling, a lot more violence in some cases. Right? And so I don't think so. I think if you're going through this right now, you need to give yourself some space. Not some time. You give yourself some space to heal, to. To really grieve, really grieve these things. And what do I mean between like, with the difference of space and time? Let me elaborate on that. Time is just saying I'm going to go through the motions and I'm going to allow myself. Allow myself to literally just go ahead and be miserable. And I'm just going to be miserable and miserable, and I'm never going to try and get to the root of what makes me miserable, which is the story that you're telling yourself at the end of the day is what making. What's making you miserable. And so if you never do that, then what's do. What you're doing is you're allowing time to try and heal you. So you're just letting time grieve you. You're allowing time to help you grieve. But if you create space for you, then that may. Then that means that whenever you feel something like boom, it comes up, you tell yourself, I'm going to give myself some space right now to really process this. And this is something that works phenomenally in any scenario. So take this tool and apply it in your lives. If you're really struggling with this, I want you to sit down and start writing. Start writing. Man, I just feel defeated because I feel. Because of blank or I just feel sad because of blank. And then just start writing. Why is it that you feel sad? Why is it that you feel hurt? Why is it that you feel abandoned? Why is it that you're experiencing the emotion that you're experiencing? And as you're writing those things, give yourself the space to release those emotions. The more you release those emotions, the stronger you get. But most people just let time do it. So they never release the emotion and they never address what's creating the emotion. We got a lot of people that are great at releasing the emotion, but they never address what's creating the emotion. So then they just experience the same emotion over and over and over and over and over and over again for two, three, sometimes even five years. That's a miserable life to live. That's not what. That's not the kind of life I want to live. And if you're here right now, it's because that's not the kind of life you want to live. So do the work. Give yourself space, not time. Time isn't going to heal you. Space where you can do some work is going to heal you. You need the right tools to be able to do that. Okay. There's a lot of people that come to me and they say, man, I've just really been journaling, but I just don't feel like it's really helping me. I hear that that's what you're supposed to do. Like, it's because you don't know how to journal with intention to what you're facing. There's a big difference. There's a big difference. It's like if I gave you a tool and I didn't tell you everything that that one tool could do. Like, just because I gave you a tool doesn't mean you can go build a house. You need somebody to teach you how to build the house that you want. You need somebody that can tell you, hey, these are the tools. This is how you construct what you want with it. That's what a coach does. That's what I do. That's what I do with my family in the. In the Conquerors coaching group, right? I give them the tools and then I help them apply them in their life to build the life that they want, the house that they want. So I think at the end of the day, you need to give yourself some time to really grieve and some space, really to grieve. But no, I never catch myself breaking down and. And asking myself, why can't I have. I actually. I actually catch myself more often than not thanking God that that happened. Literally, like, sitting here in my house, man, I thank God for the divorce because she didn't want this. My ex wife didn't want this. She did not want to build on this land with me. She did. Like, for me, this was legacy. First land my parents ever purchased when we came here from Mexico. This is the first piece of land that me and my brother, like, ever played on that was ours, right? I just remember memories, countless of memories with my cousins in the backyards playing, playing baseball, playing football, riding go karts, like, doing all this stuff out here. And I'm like, dude, I want this to be legacy. I want this to be a staple. That, that. This is a. A. Our fingerprint, the Ortega fingerprint of when we came to America. Boom. This is when it started. And then I want to see where it goes, right? And so my parents had a manufactured home here, and now I've gotten the opportunity to have this home built here. And I can't wait to see what happens on this land later on in life, whenever it's handed down to my kids and my brother's kids and things of that nature. It's legacy. It meant something to me. My ex did not want that. She had no interest in that. She wanted to be in a neighborhood. She wanted to go pursue her own thing. She wanted to do all those things. And so there was so much food fighting over that, no alignment, that now just being in this house alone makes me. Instead of sitting there crying about, why don't I have a family with the person that I used to love? I end up thanking God that I don't have that relationship anymore. I'm thankful for the moments that it gave me. I'm thank you for the lessons that it gave me. I'm thinking for the thankful, for the laughs, for the memories. Like, there's a priming exercise that I do, and I revisit some of those moments sometimes that brought joy to my life. Why? Because those were. Those are human moments, man, that genuinely brought joy to my life. Just like you with your ex. You probably had moments that brought so much joy to your life, and now just because you're hurt, you want to cancel all that out? No, forget that, man. Take the good, spit out the bad. It's like eating. You get all the nutrition and you crap out all the crap, right? Do the same thing. Take what's good for you and let go of what's not good for you. It's like a. Like a breath. I should probably use that example more than crap because it's a little bit. Probably a little bit more YouTube friendly. It's like a breath, right? You breathe in and you take in what you need. And when you breathe out, because if you don't breathe out, you end up dying. When you breathe out, you release what you don't need. It's the same thing in these relationships and in life. Take in what you can get out of it. Release what you don't need out of it. Because if you only take and you take and you take and. And you take and you take and you never release. You'll die. That's how you choke yourself out. So don't do that. So, no, I don't break down asking myself that. So. Okay, I got a question here from Angie, and I want to answer it because I think this Is pretty good. Let's see here. How can you cope when your ex is buying your kids with materialists things such as toys? I know I have no control of what he does, but this is affecting the way my kids are acting towards me and Angie. First of all, Angie, I just want to say thank you so much for being transparent and for being courageous and, and opening up like this. It's people like you and that, that, that we need in this world. People that are willing to ask hard questions and to look inward. Right. So how can you cope when your ex is buying your kids with materialistic things such as toys? Man, here's the thing. Like, kids are gonna like toys and stuff, but at the end of the day, they want presence. They want presence. And so what I would do, again, again, this is a very simple problem where I'm focusing on what I can't control. It's like you just said right now, you said, I ha. I know I have no control of what he does, but this is affecting the way my kids are acting towards me. I don't think that what he's doing is really affecting so much how they're acting towards you. I think it just might be the dynamic in the household. Right. And I would just ask your kids, I would talk to your kid, depending on their age, and I would just focus on how can I show up for them, how can I, how do I want to show up for my kids? I'm telling you, if you know how to make your kids laugh, if you know how to raise their energy up and you can be intentional, intentional with that. If you know how to create laughter and moments and memories, like that's gonna do it for them. That's gonna do it. I've never met a kid that I can make laugh that hates me or that doesn't like me or that treats me a certain way. It's. It's about being able to show up the way that I want to show up for them. Right? So your ex, think about how sad it is. Like, let's just not to talk smack about your ex, but just factually speaking, how sad is it that I need to buy things for my kids to like me? What happens when you can't. What's going to happen when you can't buy things anymore? And so the reason why this is the reason why you're asking for us a way to cope is because it's affecting you. And the reason why it's affecting you is because you're focusing on what you can't control. So instead, change your focus to what you can control. I don't think you need to cope with this. Not everything, like, I'm sorry and I might be wrong for this, but I personally don't believe I am okay in my own life and people's lives that I've seen. I don't think you need to cope from that. I don't think there's a reason for you to figure out a way to cope with man. My, my co parent is buying them things. I think your. Your way of coping is okay. You know what? How do I want to show up as a mom? Not how am I showing up? Not how do I think I'll show up. How do I want to show up as a mom? Do I want to show up funny? Do I want to show up fun? Do I want to show up energetic? Do I want to show up spontaneous? Am I bringing variety to their life? You see what I'm saying? Whenever we do that and you get obsessed and focused with that, you become empowered. Why? Because now you get ideas of things that you can do. You get ideas of experiences that you can create with them. It's all about an experience. I want you to think about this. Okay? Okay, take. Take a second and reflect on this for a moment. Everything that you remember in life, it's because there it was, highly emotionally charged. Everything. This is why, all of you listening right now. You know exactly where you were when 9, 11 happened. You know exactly where you were. You also know exactly where you were when you got that call text or had that conversation with your ex. You know exactly where because it was so emotionally, like, highly charged. Now think back to like incredible moments in your life. The reason why you remember those moments is because there was so much positive emotion generated in that moment. Period. Period. The problem in this, Angie, is not your ex is buying them with toys. The problem in this for you is that you're focused on that. More than focused on what can I control? And your solution is, what can I control? How can I show up? How do I want to show up? Like, I do this practically with my little girl, okay? Whenever I go pick up my little girl at school as I'm driving, I used to do this. Now I don't have to as much because now I'm just organically showing up as that father. Now again, because it's a pattern that I practice, so now I produce it organically. So what I would do is I would be like, man, how do I want to show up when I pick her up? Like, do I just want to be like, hey, goose, how's your day at school? Like every other boring parent in this world. Or do I want to show up and produce energy? Like, do I just want to smack her in the soul with high energy and immediately bring her into my level instead of me sinking to her level of energy? And that's what I did. So what would I do? I would pick her favorite songs from her ridiculous Disney movies, right? Like, turning Red is one of them. Where it's like, you want it, I got it. You want it, I got right. And she loved that song. So what would I do as soon as I picked her up, put that song on, blast it in the truck, fist pumping. Didn't care if parents were watching. Didn't care if the car next to me was watching. Why? Because I was on a mission to raise her energy level. Because I knew if I could produce good energy in her, good emotions in her, that creates moments, that creates bonding moments. That creates an experience. And that's all kids want is an experience. They want a parent that's present more than they want a parent that buys presents. Okay? And so I want you to focus on that the way that I want you to cope with that, Angie. And you're in the coaching group, so, like, let's follow up on this with the group. Like, get a real strategy. How do I want to show up, man? I'm sick and tired of living the way that I'm living. I'm sick and tired of having this relationship with my kids the way that I'm having it. What do I want to do about it now? It's not going to happen by coping and sitting down journaling on why my ex is doing this for them and I'm not. That's. It's not going to do it for you. If a therapist tells you to do that, oh, my God, do not listen to them. Instead, focus on, what can I control? What can I control? How do I want to show up? What experience do I want to create? You are the creator of the experiences in your life. Not your ex. Not your ex. It's time to start living life on your terms. Start having fun with your kids on your terms. The reason, probably honestly why this is affecting yalls relationship, just being brutally honest out of a place of love. The reason why this is probably affecting your relationship between you and your kids is because, just like coach Veronica said, if you keep focusing on him, you'll become angry and resentful and rob yourselves, rob yourself of the mom you want to be that is very true. What's happening is you're so focused on what he's doing that you have no energy to show up as the mom you want to show up as. All your energy is going there, all your thoughts are going there. All your focus is going there. Is. This is, like, people that are broke. This is why they're broke. All their energy is focused on why they're broke, on things they can't control. Will the government this? Will the economy this? Well, there is no opportunity when they could be focused on how do I create my own opportunity? And then they start getting ahead. This is how life works, everybody. This is like the hack to life is channeling your focus. What can I control? And then become obsessed with it. Angie, I want to challenge you and empower you to become obsessed with becoming the mother that you always wanted. In this season, in the next 30 days, focus on showing up as the mother that you always wanted. Listen, like the mom that you always wanted to play like the mom that you always wanted be goofy, silly, and crazy. Like the mom that you ever always wanted be sporadic. Kids need variety. They need a change, right? Like, the other day, my daughter was sick, so I wasn't going to take her to school because she was sick. And instead of doing what I would always do, which is, hey, baby, go to bed early. You need to sleep in so that you can rest all this stuff. I knew she was going to sleep in. So you know what I said? I said, hey, baby, you want to go have a Super Mario, like, Smash Brothers tournament? She was like, yeah. And so she went. She got on her little Yoshi Yoshi onesie that I got her for Christmas. She went. She put it on, and we started going ham. Literally, we started going ham on Super Smash Brothers. Laughing, dying, laughing. You guys saw on Instagram where I posted it. I was actually, like, talking crap to her. And we were just having so much fun. The next day, whenever I went to take her to her mom, because I let her sleep in until, like, noon, and I took her to her mom when school would have, like, ended. Whenever that. Whenever that happened, I was like, hey, Goose, did you have fun? Did you have fun last night? She was like, yeah, papa. I love that. When can we do that again? It was a moment. I created a moment. So create moments with your kids, Angie. That's what they want. And you got everything inside of you to do that. The only reason why you're not doing it like you're wanting to right now is just because your focus has been off that's it. It's not because you're a bad mom. It's not because you're fucking failing as a mom. My focus has just been off. Let me readjust my focus today and obsess with this and then watch what happens. Tracy said my kids are always coming to me that they can't speak to their dad on what's bothering them. What's the best way to approach this? I went no contact. So it's very challenging, man. There's a lot, there's a lot in there. I would need a lot more context. Yeah, I would say again, focus. Like we always come back to the same thing. And it's very, very simple, Tracy. You need to focus on what you can control. And sometimes instead of trying to help your kids, you need to hug your kids. There's a moment, there's a moment to help, but then there's moments just to love. There's to love. And if they feel like they can't open up to him and they can't speak like to them about what's actually bothering them, then just obviously it sounds like they have such a relationship with you where they can come to you and open up and then that's okay. That's okay. I know that it's hurtful because we wish that the other co parent would show up the way we want them to show up, but we can't control that. But even in their, even in your kids greatest pain, there's an incredible blessing. And they might not find that blessing because they're kids until they're older, until they're adults, but think about how grateful they're going to be to have a mother like you. Knowing that, man, I could never talk to dad, but I could always talk to mom. Continue focusing on that, Tracy. Keep showing up incredibly like that and loving your kids and I promise you your kids are going to turn out fine. Because they're going to turn out fine. There's actually this. I, I'm going to do a whole video on this and I'm going to have coach Veronica with me on it. And I haven't talked to her about it yet, but there's some scary statistics about single mother homes. Like I'm talking about extremely high percentage of kids that come from a single mother household end up being rapists, criminals, suicidal, homeless, like these things, right? And it's insane. Like the statistics, the stats are insane. And I saw someone sharing that and I was like, dude, that sucks because obviously it's true. If there's data to back it up. But that's so disempowering to single mothers. Like, that doesn't. That makes you feel terrible that you're a single mom. You're like, wow, so, so are we screwed now? Like, we, we don't have much of a chance. And I don't think that's the case because there's another study, there's a nutty, another study that's done and I want to hit on these like very, very big whenever I do this, this live with coach Veronica that talks about how they did a study and they showed that kids that were overly loved. You know how you see those overly loving parents and you're like, hey, you're gonna spoil your kids. You're gonna ruin them. You're gonna this and that. Well, they proved that the, the mothers that actually do that to their kids produce the most successful individuals. They literally followed up with kids in their 30s and what they noticed was the ones that were being overly loved were the ones that were the most successful. And so I don't think that the problem is a single mother household. I think it's what we do do when it becomes a single mother's household. And that is focusing on what I can't control. Because when you focus on what you can't control, you have no energy left to overly love your kids out of a place of abundance. There's a big difference here. We can love out of a place of abundance or we can love out of place of scarcity. When we love out of a place of scarcity, we do more damage to our kids. That's where we're not even loving. We're just worry bodies. We're helicopter moms trying to control and dictate everything in their life. And we think that's loving, but it's not loving. It's us being scared as hell that their life is going to be messed up. It's not loving, right? Like, I love my sister in law, man. She's a phenomenal mother. Phenomenal mother. She is like not a helicopter mom. I think with the first one she really was like, to the point where it was kind of like a little like, ah, come on, chill out a little bit. Like, let me kiss my nephew, right? Type of deal. But now she's like this incredible, incredible mom who's just like, they're gonna be kids, but she loves them so well. Instead of being worrying, trying to control everything, she's just like, how can I love my kids today? And it's all over her. It literally flows out of Her, She's a phenomenal mom. And so I think the problem isn't that kids are coming out of a single mother's household. I think the problem is that mothers, single moms, are losing their focus and obsessing on the things they cannot control, and they're not focusing on what they can control. And because of that, they're depleting their children of the love that they deserve, and that's what's creating that statistic. So if you don't want to fall into that statistic and you don't want your kid to fall into that statistic, let me empower you by saying, love your kids well, by focusing on what you can control. Stop trying to go out there and create. Recreate your 20s when you're 40 years old, for God's sake. Stop it. Stop it. If you're looking to potentially find a man to start a life with, eventually you are. I'm just saying there's not a lot of great men that are out there looking for an older woman who's still trying to relive her 20s. It's pathetic, okay? I'm just saying. I'm just being honest with you, all right? Not judging at all, but it's pathetic, okay? So stop that. Instead, focus on, how can I love the crap out of my kids so that they go out and they create an incredible life? How can I turn this mess into a blessing? How can I turn this whole situation around that the Lord that the enemy tried to use for evil, and how can I allow God to use it for good? And it doesn't happen by hoping that it's going to happen. It doesn't happen by just praying and not doing anything. The Bible says that faith without works is dead. You can pray for a new job. You can pray for financial breakthrough. You can pray for emotional security. You can. You can pray, pray, pray, pray, pray. But if you never move, if you never act on it, your faith is dead. So it cancels out. It cancels out. God responds to faith. Faith has works behind it. It's saying, I believe that you're going to bless me financially, Lord, even though I'm a single mom, even though I'm a single dad, even though the recession is in the worst place it's ever been, I believe you're gonna bless me. And after I say amen, I move expecting it to happen. How so? I start a business. I launch that opportunity. I. I create my own opportunity. I start doing haircuts on Saturdays, right? I start talking to people about, hey, how Can I help you? I'm looking to make some extra cash. Is there anything you need in your house? It's action. And then guess what happens. People suddenly start saying yes. And then people start hearing your story and they start paying you more than you asked for. Why? Because you walked out in faith. And now God is blessing your works, but he's not blessing your works. He's blessing your faith. Your faith. So I think in this season. And we'll end with this. We'll end with this. Okay, I want everyone who's listening to this. If you're going through an extreme, extremely difficult season, it is because you're focused on what you cannot control. You're focused on what's missing in life, and you're focused on what could go wrong. Just for a week. Try it. Try it. When you catch yourself focused on somebody else's actions and what they're doing and what your job is doing and the economy and the news, all things you can't control. For one week. Test me on this. Watch the breakthrough that happens in your life. Redirect your focus. What can I control? What can I do with this? How do I want to show up? Regardless of anybody else's opinion, how can I show up? And you're going to start seeing that life does happen on its terms. You can't change the fact that your ex keeps buying your kids gifts. Can't change that. You can't change the fact that your ex will not allow your kids to open up to him about what they're. What's bothering them. You can't change that that's happening on its terms. But you're going to recognize that when you focus on what you can control, life happens on its terms, but it's always experienced on your terms. And I think that's the beauty in life. So thank you so much for showing up, guys. Thank you so much for coming on here for this Q A. I'm going to be doing this every single Friday for the time being until further notice, because I think this is necessary. I think it'd be really, really cool just to hang out with you guys a little bit more. So we'll be here on YouTube every Friday. So come with your questions. Come ready to ask them. Come ready to be vulnerable, courageous, and just step out. And I'm going to do my best to help you find some answers. If. And so make sure that you subscribe to the channel. Please leave a like on this video. It helps the channel a ton. Share it. If there's. If there was some valuable content in here that you believe is going to bless somebody that, you know, share this with them, man. Get the word out, because we. We all need some help in our lives, right? I got my own coaches. I got three different coaches that I work with. Right? There's no shame in saying, hey, I need help. The people who don't say, I need help are the ones that we all end up grieving unexpectedly. Okay, I know that's a little heavy, but it's the truth. The people that refuse to say, I need help, and go and get it are the people that we end up grieving unexpectedly. Okay? So don't be statistic. Be brave. Be more than a conqueror. Ask for help when you need it. Show up in this community. I'll see you guys next Friday.