In this interview, host Scott Levin talks with certified divorce coach and Split FYI co‑founder Leila Akin Ali about what a divorce coach does and why the service can be transformative for people navigating separation. Leila explains that while lawyers, mediators, and therapists address legal, procedural, and deep‑emotional needs, a coach fills the gap by providing present‑focused skill‑building, emotional regulation, and practical guidance. She uses analogies to a doula (supporting emotional experience during pregnancy) and a sports coach (teaching skills, positive self‑talk, and incremental wins) to illustrate the coach’s role. Core competencies highlighted include communication (with ex‑partners, lawyers, mediators, and support networks), boundary‑setting, decision‑making, and managing overwhelming advice. Leila stresses the importance of acknowledging feelings without being consumed by them, breaking the process into manageable steps, and having an objective, compassionate ally who can keep clients on track. The conversation also introduces the Split FYI community, a growing platform that offers resources, peer support, and access to certified coaches for those going through divorce.
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Hey, everybody. This is Scott Levin, Chief Peacekeeper, and I'm here today with a good friend of mine, Leila Akin Ali. How you doing, Leila?
I'm good. How are you, Scott?
I'm doing fantastic. So we're here today because my guest is one of the best or leading certified divorce coaches in Southern California. She's also a co-founder of Split FYI. Which is a really intriguing and growing community, really focused on divorce and helping people through the process. So we're going to talk about that a little bit. But the main topic that I kind of wanted to start with, friend, is people always ask me, coaching, divorce coach, what is it? Do I need it? How can it help me? Help me sell the values that you bring, because I've seen the work that's produced from coaching, and it's hugely powerful on the clients that receive it that are going through divorce. They're able to focus, better themselves, forgive at times, move forward. You know, more effectively. So, I mean, those are just some of my thoughts. Tell me what you think.
Yeah, I mean, I second all of everything you just said, because I think that it is something that people don't understand the importance of, because it's the last thing you're going to be thinking of when you're going through something like divorce or separation, right? The first thing people always think of, and we had that conversation last time, is lawyer, lawyer up, lawyer up, mediator, therapist. Right. So, and I am not undermining any of those 3 very important aspects of divorce and separation. A coach. So I look at it as this. There's a couple of things. I remember when I was going through my own divorce, at the time I was pregnant. So why I correlate this with a doula is because I was pregnant. So I remember going through pregnancy. It's My first time, I don't know what I'm doing, I don't know how to get through. Your emotions, you second-guess yourself as a parent, as a mom. Can I do the right thing? Am I going to do the right thing? And a doula really like sets you at ease, understands all those emotions, doesn't make you feel bad about them, doesn't make you feel crazy, and kind of helps you through the process, right? And that's on an emotional level, and that's also an understanding Of, you know, what you're going through is real, what you're feeling is so real, so we don't want to push it under the carpet. We're going to address it, but we're going to help you feel better about your role as a parent, and that's what a doula does. So it's a combination. And then I was also a pretty sporty person, so I remember having coaches in my life, right? So I played lacrosse and I played basketball. Those are my 2 sports, and I remember When I started playing basketball, I always felt like my skill set wasn't 100%. All the guys in the neighborhood were like super good. I was trying to keep up with them, including my brother, and it wasn't working. And I remember, you know, that coach is there to make you feel good, okay, about wherever you're at. They meet you where you're at and they try to give you the skill sets to get to the next level, right? Help you remember to practice, help you remember to think positively, because we always self-deprecate or beat ourselves up about Crap, I should have scored that. Crap, I should have done that 3-pointer. Why can't I get this? You know, our self-talk is pretty negative when we're going through those things. So it's like a coach kind of steers you in the right positive direction. And for me, that was always what a coach was. And so everybody knows what a sports coach is, right? Right? Everybody gets it.
Absolutely.
Right? And we know what a sports coach can do because it's kind of tangible. So you can see that your skill sets are getting better. All of a sudden you're making those 3-pointers. All of a sudden you're scoring higher in a game. And all of a sudden your team's winning. So then people get what a coach's role is in sports, but they can't understand it because it's not so tangible when you're going through something super difficult, right? Like every little win is a win. I mean, I know we had this conversation last time. It's like, let's take down communication. One of the hardest things in divorce is communication, right?
Yeah. Okay.
And I wish I had somebody along the way cheerleading me on and saying, hey, wait a minute, look at how you used to write your emails and look at how you're writing them now. And then like at the end of the whole like 10-year saga, wow, look how good you got at that, right? It's kind of like I had to do it for myself, but it was pretty hard and it was long, right? Whereas if you had somebody going, wait a minute, do you just see how you handled that? Because we don't even realize that we handled it in a proper way, or encourages you to just maybe say it a little differently or think a little bit differently when you're approaching adversity or something that's really tough.
Totally. No, and I think exactly what you said is that we all see it in sports, youth sports, the way you get better going to classes, going to coaching. But, you know, as you get older, there's coaching in life. And this is one example of that coaching because, you know, shoot, we were just talking before we— Layla and I were just talking before we started recording about, you know, I was driving my kids and my kids were, you know, saying something like, you know, kind of like struggling with something this morning. And I'm thinking, well, help me, I'm struggling with the exact same thing. And I'm 35 years older than you. So we can— you don't have to carry that along. And during the divorce process, those things, if you don't address them and try to get positivity flowing, they can really drag you down into the fight, which is not where you want to be.
It's also— and it's not just the fight that it drags you into. It's the insecurities, and you're really stuck. Really hard to make the best decisions for yourself, really, when you're coming from a place of fear, of anger, of frustration. You're just not thinking clearly. And this is the time that you need to make the best decisions for yourself. Now, a lawyer, a mediator, all of them super essential. Therapist totally helps with the emotional side, you know, figuring out Maybe why it is that you're attracting certain things, why it is that— what is it that is triggering you? What is it in your past you correlate with it? You know, that is essential as well. But with a coach, it's not about that. It's not— let's not go back into your past. Let's just think about it from now, what you need, what skills you need. And I honestly say communication is the number one skill, right? If I'm going to break it down, because it goes into different levels.
Totally.
It's not just communicating with your ex. It's communicating with your lawyer, your mediator. It's communicating with the people around you. You know, it's also setting the boundaries because everybody comes in and wants to give their unsolicited advice. Everybody wants to tell you what to do. You know, everybody is coming at you all at once, and it's so overwhelming that you— how do you decipher what you want and stay on track so that you do what you need to do and do what's best for your children, right? Like, number one, it's like, okay, wait a minute, if you've got children in this case, then How are you being the best for them?
You have to be the quarterback. You have to be the coach. You have to be in control. Right. And it's hard to be in control because it's easier to just give it up. Like, oh, I can't fill out that form. It looks scary.
Right.
You know, I can't, you know, I can't do that. I can't get on my bank, you know, my finances. I've never— I don't, I don't know. I'm going to just pay someone to do it.
Well, there's, there's a lot of, I want to bury my head in the sand. I want it to go away. I mean, I think I used that phrase so many times. It's like, I just want to go into a cave and then make it all go away, you know? Of course, I wish there was a magic wand that everything could go away— the pain, the hurt, the grief. But to be honest with you, if you don't feel those feels and if you don't learn from them, they're going to show up again somehow, some way. They really are. And it's the hardest. I know it's hard to do all at once, so that's why it's really important also as I'm coaching somebody, and this is what coaches do, it allows you to kind of break it up. It allows you, gives you permission to be like, okay, let me work on this when I can. Not that it's all-consuming and it's all my whole life is being taken over by this. No, just like, you know, any kind of thing that you're bettering yourself with, you can't be doing it 24 hours. You know, you've got to give yourself that break. You've got to give yourself that, that time, allocate that time. And also having somebody there to kind of remind you That you're doing okay and you actually don't.
That's the coaching.
Yeah, the coaching, right? It's essential that you have somebody there. If it's not a coach, it's somebody who's objective enough to be that person for you that's not in the ring with you, right? Right. And that is really what's important because as much as I care for all the people that I coach, I care for them a great deal. I feel for them. Like, I get it. I know what they're feeling. I know exactly what they're thinking because I thought all those, I felt all those. So that gives me that piece of compassion and understanding and, you know, empathy. But I'm not going to go in the ring with them because that will defeat the purpose, right?
Right.
I've got to give them those skill sets. Sometimes it's hard. Sometimes I'm a tough— like, coaches are tough sometimes, right? I'm not going to sit there and, oh, only hold their hand and be there for them. Of course, I'll allow that space for them to cry, for them to process. It's important that they do that. But all right, how do we get to that level where you're not feeling those, or you're not overwhelmed and taken over by an ex's email or a lawyer email or something a mediator might have said that you interpreted it in a very different way? I mean, how many times— and we did talk about this last week.
Yeah, no, that's huge.
Oh, the mediator is on the other person's side, my ex's side. How are you feeling that? How is that possible? Are you being triggered by something that the mediator is saying that makes you feel that he's on the other person's side or she's on the other person's side? Right?
Yeah.
It's getting them out of this headspace that they're putting on a lot of their triggers in there, their own thought process, and getting to the reality of the situation at hand.
It's huge. Well, thank you so much for the brief introduction. I'm sure we could go on and on, but I just want to— so, uh, you know, I'm going to put in the description, I'm going to introduce the Split FYI community, and I'll put in the links there. And everyone check that out because it's really pretty amazing. And thank you so much, Leila, for coming on.
You're welcome.
And, you know, um, I'll also, uh, you know, put links in so people can find you directly.
Fantastic. Yeah, again, please, we got a lot to talk about.
