A parent's identity shouldn't rest entirely on being a parent or spouse. When a friend lost herself in divorce after defining herself only as a mother and wife, it echoed the speaker's own struggle tying his worth to his business. We see our children as inherently perfect without them earning it. We deserve the same unconditional view of ourselves.
Hello, good morning. Just about morning, just still morning here. Um, so today I want to talk to you about seeing the truth. Um, I was talking to a, a friend of mine, a new friend of mine, um, who went through a really tricky divorce some years ago, and, uh, for what Um, what really helped her was to see, see the truth of who she truly was. Now, that sounds perhaps a little bit vague, a little bit abstract, so I want to put some more flesh around the, the bones of that and make this, make this real for you. So she had been stuck in a marriage, um, where she felt unloved, where she felt unvalued, um, where she felt that her, uh, her only role was that of a, a mum and a wife. And her husband totally, uh, invalidated her as a, as a, as a person, as as a human being in her, in her own right. So she was totally lost in that role of, of mother and wife, and, and who she truly was and the true spirit of what, who she was as an individual had got lost. And this, this kind of— clearly I'm not a, a a mum, and I've never been in that, never been in that situation, but I felt exactly the same. Um, I felt that like I have lost my true identity, lost who I am. So my story was about a sensitive kid that was bullied a lot and didn't think he was good enough, tried to Prove himself through business success, and then my whole worth, my whole self-worth became tied up in in in the fact that I was running a small business, and I lost my identity in exactly the same way as this this this this friend of mine had lost her identity. So. She wasn't her anymore. She was the— she was solely a mum or a wife, and I was solely a business owner, managing director, whatever you want to call it, small business. That was me. And If our whole identity is wrapped up in something that we do, then when things don't go to plan in that— so when the marriage is breaking up— we lose— we're in danger of losing our identity. But here's the thing, okay? The truth of who we are is not what we do. We are not born doing any of these things, so that isn't who we that isn't who we are. We're born that perfect. We're we're born that perfect diamond. That's who we truly are. We're a we're a diamond. We are something far greater than anything that we do in in life. We're perfect. We're born perfect, and we are always perfect. underneath a whole pile of thoughts and beliefs and identities tied up in something that we do in life. You know, we see— we, we struggle to see this for ourselves, but we see it in our kids. We see their perfection. We see their perfection just as they are. They don't need to do anything. We have unconditional love for our, for our child despite the fact that they're not doing anything apart from, you know, eating, sleeping, and pooing their nappy. You know, they don't need to do anything to be perfect. They're perfect in our eyes. What if we could see our own perfection just like that? Without the need to do anything. Okay, perhaps a little bit deep today, but I'm hoping that's working for you. Thanks a lot. Bye-bye.
Weathering Storms With Joanne Morales, Jennifer Hartwig and Rebecca Dominguez
