#208: When They Say 'I Can't Do This Anymore': A Survival Guide for Your Breaking Heart

It's one of the hardest things to hear. I can't do this anymore. Those words can leave you feeling lost, panicked, and unsure of what to do next. This is the part where your mind starts to race with questions. What went wrong? How do I fix it? And is this really the beginning of the end? Welcome to Love Check Live, a podcast for those who feel like they're standing at a relationship crossroads, navigating conflict and longing to bridge the growing emotional gap. I'm Stacy Bartley, a relationship mentor, and alongside me is my co host and lover, Tom, and our daughter, Brooke. We're here to help you find clarity in the chaos, and here's what I want you to know. This moment, as painful as it feels, also holds immense potential. This isn't about quick fixes or chasing after someone who feels distant. It's about stopping the insanity and instead begin reclaiming a sense of peace, confidence, and knowing so. So that you, too, can create a purposeful path forward. Today, we're unpacking the fears we must all face on this journey. Not with the desperate strategies of trickery, but using understanding and practical tools that can help you turn this crisis into a catalyst for growth. Let me ask you. What if this moment isn't an ending, but an invitation to do something far, far greater than that? I invite you to stay with me as we explore why the space you didn't want might be exactly what you and your relationship truly need.

Hey.

Thank you for coming. Welcome to the love shack.

We're going to start this conversation today by doing a reality check. Like, what really brings people here to this conversation? Most of us come to moments like this hoping for a magic solution to get our partner back. But this isn't about quick fixes. It's about transformation. Yours and possibly your relationships, too. And there's nothing that drives me more crazy and more mad. People wanting to get your attention because they know that you are spiraling in fear and unrest right now, and they take advantage of that. Your attention first, and then your money. And they have nothing but trickery. Oh, just do this. Oh, just say that. This one's guaranteed to take you to the promised land. And I'm here to tell you right now, the voice of reason, there can be no truth in that, because the reality is not you, not me, not Tom, not Brooke, not your partner. Nobody knows how this is going to play out over the long haul. And yet when you're spiraling and desperate for answers, it's almost like we'll buy into anything. Because why we're in a place of panic. And in places of panic, we are easily manipulatable. So this episode is dedicated to all of you who are in a space and a place of panic. And I want to help you see through the panic of it all. And so the first thing that I'm going to ask you to do in this episode is just like, give yourself a chance to gain your breath. Like, take a big breath with me right now and close your eyes and count to five. Because if you do, you're going to start to slow your heart rate down. Your mind will follow suit as you find yourself in a place of groundedness instead of the common place that we approach this conversation where somebody says, hey, I've got the best thing for you. This one's guaranteed to work. Let me tell you why. And I just want you to notice the difference in those two experiences. So slow down, breathe. There's plenty of time to figure this out. And as you do, let's talk about why we panic. The thing is fear. It's the way we think about separation as well as the examples we've heard or witnessed from others. Like, let's be honest, there's not a lot of great ones out there. Shit tends to get very dramatic and really chaotic and exceptionally irrational when we're in states of panic as a human being. So I want to talk about some psychological drivers of our fears so that we can start to see through them. Because there's nothing more empowering than confronting the fears that we feel like we are so unequipped to manage. If we can't face the fear, if we don't know how to manage the fear, well, then fear is going to take over and have its way with us. And so that is the reason and the motivation I wanted to share this episode with you. So let's talk about the first level fear. Perception of threat, danger and pain. There's nothing a human being likes to do more than avoid pain, danger and threat. Fear arises when the brain perceives a potential threat to our sense of safety, survival and our sense of emotional and physical well being. Well, that all starts to make sense. Then when somebody says, I just can't do this anymore, we start to spin in, well, what about the kids and what about the money and what about the house and what about my career and who's going to make the breakfast and who's going to make my coffee and what happens? And we start to spiral in whatever trigger that might be because there is a perceived threat of danger and pain.

I think it brings Up a fear of abandonment as well. You know, like, if you can't do this anymore, then what does that mean about me? Am I bad? Am I wrong? And who am I without you? I would say with probably 100% certainty that this is the most painful place in a relationship when your partner tells you that they just can't do it anymore.

Yeah, well, we immediately go to the most massive, significant horror picture you've ever created in your imagination.

We got a comment on TikTok that made me actually tear up yesterday on one of our videos about space. Because as you all know who are listening, we talk about space and separation in a very different way than most people do, which is what Mom 2 just addressed. And the lady who commented said, wow. Because we were in the clip, we were talking about how most of the time it doesn't really have anything to do with you when your partner asks for space. And it has everything to do with how emotionally exhausted and out of gash your partner is feeling. It really has a lot more to do with that. And the person who commented said, wow. When you think about it in this way, it almost makes you say, I'm proud of my partner for requesting the space that they. They need.

So true. And as we move through these fears, I just want you to see them as they crop up. And one of them is what Brookie's just pointed out, like a fear of abandonment, rejection, not feeding in, not being accepted. So. So these feel very real. And that's why fear can be such a heck of a place to take on, because they feel so real. It's as if we buy into the fear more and more and more the more the fear has its way with us. And so I like to think of fear and I teach this in my work, like gravity to the physical body. You're like, whoa, Stace, you just took a huge leap here. Yeah, I did, but not really. Because I know that in order to develop a physical body, I'm going to have to have some resistance called gravity or I'm not going to get any of the benefits of gaining strength and resiliency and capability and mobility and all the things. And the same is true with our emotional sense of well being if I'm not willing to confront and push with fear. And we were to consider fear like gravity, it is the thing we are going to have to work through in order to find a place of foundation and footing. Or it seems like it takes too much effort or too much energy. Well, then just like physically, we'll find ourselves finally on the couch, not able to move at all. We have literally lost our abilities to do that. We all know what a fight back that is when I finally go, okay, this is it, I'm gonna do this thing. And that's such a moment of victory. And so it is here with our fears. Like fear is the substance that we push against in order to become who it is we have the capacity to be. And the perception which seems so real of threat, danger and pain sets in along with a sense of loss of control. A lack of control over a situation can heighten our fears and uncertainty and it makes it difficult to predict the outcomes. That's the thing about control, is I can no longer predict the outcomes and uncertainty makes it difficult to predict. So I need to fix that. If I'm a person who operates from a place of control. And to a large extent all of us do, let's be honest, because we do love to know the ending before the beginning starts. And so ironically, the more we pursue the control, the more our executive functioning, the part of our brain that actually makes good decisions, turns off. And so isn't that ironic? Like the more I get mired up in fear and think I need to control and the more panic and anxiety ridden I get about that, the less able I am to make a, a very good decision based in considering all the angles, all the places, spaces, conversation, all the things that I need to do and consider. Not about your partner, but about yourself. Which is where we get a little off kilter here. We're trying to figure out what everything means about what my partner is doing and saying. Instead of figuring out what it is that I need to know about me and what works for me and what doesn't work for me. And so I start spinning, I feel threatene, I feel out of control. I have a tremendous fear of the unknown. And the brain is wired to seek predictability and patterns. So when faced with uncertainty or ambiguity, fear creates anxiety for you to make a decision and for you to figure it out right now. And the faster you can get there to that decision, the better. Come on, hop hop, let's go get it done. Let's figure it out. To which then we start forcing ourselves to make a decision. And this is where we really get into some fear, some distortions. Because my brain will say, well it's going to happen anyway, just ask them to leave. You're sitting there waiting for the other shoe to drop. You're just so sure it's going to because your parents or your friend has just Gone through a similar thing, you know, the end of the story. So let's just cut to the chase, pack your and get out. We'll say things like that. Or I might say, oh, my God, I'm. I've got to do whatever I got to do to make you stay, right? I'll throw myself on broken glass. I'll. I'll cut myself and 27 different ways. Please just don't leave me. Let's just tell me you're gonna stay. Tell me this isn't the end. Please tell me. And we. We start asking for these false reassurances that really nobody can give. And so when we can't get answers that we are desperately, like, spiraling to have, we start making some really great shit up. So we. We gotta come up with an answer to calm my brain. So I think, and so I just start making up all kinds of things. And this is where we start stepping into, like, magical thinking and, and like, catastrophizing things and making up the most awful, horrible horror pictures that you could possibly imagine. You know, my. My saying is, get your popcorn, get your coke. You know, this one's going to really kick your ass, because we are now just really mired in the idea that this is what's going to happen.

I am anxious, which I talk about often in this podcast, because I like people to know that they're not alone. But when we are in these places of kind of chaos and confusion and pain in our relationships, there's a lot of pressure on us to do everything right. Because if you think about it, you spend most of your time thinking and theorizing and analyzing, and you have very little time where you're actually in contact with your partner because you're taking space from each other. My point is for saying that is that when we are anxious or reactive or catastrophizing, we get all these really bad ideas in our heads. And so it makes it very hard when we actually are interacting with our partners to act in a way that we want to, or we would hope to, or we would wish that we do, because we've spent all this time preparing for the worst. If they do something that makes us think, oh, God, we're going down my worst nightmare stuff path, then we react in a crazy way. There's no guidebook for taking space. That's what we created with the roadmap. That's our answer to it. But when we're in these situations that there's pressure on us from every different direction, and everyone is hoping that it's going to turn out okay, and we're putting all of our eggs in one basket, and, you know, just. It's like the most intense pressure situation that you could ever imagine, mixed with all of the reactiveness, anxiousness, and shit that's going on in our head. How could we expect it to go well? And then it goes even worse than. Than that.

It's this principle, Brookie, that you're touching on, which is where I was going anyway, ironically, because we show up as good as we feel. So if I've spent all of this time thinking about and making decisions and analyzing and overthinking things, and I'm ramping up, my executive functioning is now gone away. Right. I'm just trying to cope, right? Having trouble breathing, sleeping, you know, doing some basic things. I don't want to shower, I don't want to eat. I don't want to do any of these things. And then, you know, you get a call or a text from your partner, says, hey, let's meet for coffee or let's meet for dinner, and let's talk about how we're going to handle the budget this month, and you're going to show up as good as you feel. You're going to show up as a. A hot, panicked mess, feeling like this whole thing is going to steamroll over the edge. And it makes it really difficult for us to do what I call an emotional pushup and to just sit in the space and to breathe and to really listen and to just slow down a little bit. And I know I've shared this story, like, I don't know, probably 10 times or 15 times on the podcast, but it comes up for me every time we have this conversation about the cowboy and the Indian, where, you know, the cowboy's trying to shoot a buffalo, and he's got a gun, but he can't bring it down, and he's so frustrated because he can shoot it. But then the buffalo always outruns him. He looks at the Indian with his bow and arrow, and he's got food and clothing and all the wonderful stuff that this cowboy wants. He finally musters up the courage to talk to the Indian and says, come on, tell me how it is you bring down the mighty buffalo with your little bow and arrow. And the Indian says, oh, it's really easy. We scare them and they run over the edge, and then we can gather up all the buffalo we need. And I just. That is so indicative to this place right here where we're all running in fear and we run over the edge and that's not what we need to do. We need to stop and slow down and breathe and recognize we don't have to make any decisions right now. In our rush to get to the end, right, in our rush to figure it out, to answer and solve the equation that our brain is trying to do, we're going to come to faulty conclusions because we're spinning too fast. It would behoove you to slow down, breathe, look, understand, sort through some things and from there make a decision not today, but a month or two from now.

Well, I mean, here's the thing. What you just described with great love and respect when you're in this place that we're describing and we can describe it to you because we've experienced it and we worked with many, many people that share this is what they're going. So this is not theory, just to have a sliver of objectivity. Do you think you really have the capacity and the skill set to show up in a different manner when you're a frickin hottest mess ever in your life? I mean, that's almost comical with no disrespect here. So that's why we're so passionate about. Look, you cannot do what you're so wanting to do because it is going to blow it up.

Even I was going to say there's. You can look at it two ways. There's a hope that your relationship will survive this space, okay? So hold on to that and let's try to make it as good as we possibly can and behave at the highest level we possibly can so that we can not only survive this, but then we can build something stronger going forward. Or we could look at that and say, well, there's only a shred of hope, so let's burn it all to the ground. You know, just like dad said, you being able to have these skills and rise to the occasion that you're being called to is hard just on a regular day, like just a normal day. It's hard to do an emotional push up and pause when your partner is triggering you and not say the thing that you want to say. That's hard just for anybody. But to also add that they've asked for space and you're feeling uncertain about the future of your relationship and you're crying and you're wanting to text them, but you don't know if you should add in all that on top of it. That is asking a lot of you. So I just want you to hear it's not bad. That you feel this is hard. It's not bad that you are like, I don't know what to do, or that you're spiraling or obsessing or breaking down every second, or what I am telling you is you cannot expect to be able to do this on your own. You're going to fail. That's just the truth. So whether it's us or someone else or getting a counselor, I don't know. You need someone to help you. We're saying this to help you save the future of your relationship. It's impossible for you to just magically gather these skills and implement them perfectly without mentoring. That's just the truth. And why not make this period of time, like have hope that it can go better and that you'll have a place where you can ask questions or say, I messed up, what do I do now? Than just trying it on your own and then sending 20 texts and then being like, oh God, I shouldn't have done that. But having no one to talk to about it, that's a failing strategy and it's just setting yourself up for so much more pain and suffering.

So true. So remember, your brain creates scenarios to answer the questions that we don't understand. And then it amplifies your fears even when the threat isn't immediately present or realistic, causing an overactive imagination and an over reactive behavior. So then it creates a negative experience. And a negative experience is something that we are afraid will repeat. Maybe you have been through something like this before and it was such a disaster and I just can't do another one of these. And so I start ruminating on that where maybe it brings up things from childhood, my family of origin, not only just my past relationships, but God, my parents were a hot mess. I mean, and God, I don't want to do that. I can go the other way. And you say, oh, I know how this goes because of the experiences that you've lived through. So fear can come up from past experiences, especially traumatic or negative events. We've all been a part or witnessed people who profess to love us and then hurt others. And so this leaves us in the place of being so certain of outcomes because of other people's conversations, whether they've been experienced personally by you or they've been witnessed by you or you've heard of them. And we can come to these conclusions in a nanosecond. And then there are the fears that come by way of social and cultural influences. Because fear can be learned from observing and listening from others. Whether that comes from the way my parents handled fear or the way that I was taught to handle fear. And even from cultural narratives that we find if they leave you, you're not enough to keep them. I can't even tell you how many times we see and how much pushback we get on social media about, you know, come on, just give it up. If somebody's asked for space, they're really gone. You know, just end the relationship. And people can get pretty pushy and adamant about that. And we will continue to stand and do stand as a force to say you're absolutely wrong and you are reacting to this fear right here. That's called a social and a cultural narrative that you have bought into hook, line and sinker. Because if they leave you, if they ask for space and separation, it doesn't mean they're going to leave you. It means that the way this relationship has gone, I can't do any more. And unless we can figure out how to do it differently, I can't sustain this. Wouldn't that be like if somebody asked me to do 125 pushups and I get to push up number 25 and I say I can't, I can't do this, I can't sustain this. There's no way I can do 125 pushups. I've made it to 25 and I'm dead. We run out of emotional gas or we run out of a capacity to do what it is we thought on the beginning.

I think it's pretty accurate and pretty fair to say that if nothing were to change from whatever compression of situations, experiences, or a catalytic moment, moment we like to say that has caused one of the persons in a relationship to ask for space. If nothing were to change from that particular experience between the two people. Probably pretty fair to say that. Yeah, it's not gonna. Because I mean, you wouldn't be in this situation if all things were going well, right? I mean, so if you're not have the ability to objectively say, yes, things do need to change, the person has simply run out of gas. We know this from talking to many, many people. Look, it goes to life saving measures, we're gonna default to like, I just, I can't do this anym. We need to take action for our own well being. And if things don't ever get any better than this, I think I'm done. Well, so that's why this is all about creating a 2.0, you know, this is not to create more of what you just had. So this is A massive wake up call that something has to change. Or actually some things, many things have to change.

I would also like to say to the listener that even though having your partner say that to you is probably the hardest thing you can here, wouldn't you rather have the emotional safety in your relationship where saying that is possible, rather than the opposite? Because the opposite is them waiting until it's D day and then they give you divorce papers, or they have an affair, or they just leave you in secret because it wasn't available for them to be able to admit that they were struggling, which is what happens in a lot of relationships. And people don't understand that the mechanism of that happening is emotional safety. So it even takes emotional safety to talk about when things are not good in your relationship.

Absolutely. You know, that causes me to think about so many of the narratives that we buy into that we think are so spot on in our culture and things that quite frankly are posted in comments and on social media. And man, that's why social media can get you like reeling so fast. And I wasn't intending to put this on the podcast, but if social media is not helping, even though it's the way you probably found our podcast or led to our work, if you need to take a break from that, please do so. Because there's so many statements or comments that then can reel your fear that cause you to think, I got to come up with an answer, I got to do it faster. I'm out of control, I. I'm threatened, right? Or. Or you start buying into some of the false hopes. You know, textbooks, text them this one message and they'll stay with you forever. Just do this one thing and they'll love you like nobody's business. You'll have the greatest sex ever. It's all this taking advantage of where you are because your executive functioning is completely offline. And a few of the other statements that are so classic in this space, in our culture is if they leave you, you did something wrong, or they did something wrong, diagnose them and let's get to the bottom of it. Or if they leave you, you're not worthy of love. That one breaks my heart. Because you are already worthy. There is no relationship or no person on planet earth that is going to make you more worthy than you already are in this moment. That's an illusion that we buy into that we're taught that we're told that we're sold. And there could be nothing that is farther from the truth or the reason that people need to Separate is because of an emotion within themselves that happen when you're around that it is all your fault. You are to blame for this. And that is not true either. Like, each of us have an emotional experience and a narrative that coincides with that. And the reason why they're struggling is because they can't rectify the emotions within themselves and communicate or share them in a way that we can have a conversation about it. And that's why so many couples say communication is their biggest problem. Then there's the one that Brookie's touched on. Fear of loss or failure or rejection. So many of us have a fear of abandonment. But here's the irony that I want to point out. Every time I roll over and I don't think about or consider what I need or what works for me or what doesn't work for me, and that I have the ability to just have a voice about it who is doing the abandoning. I abandon myself to be in with you and out with myself. And every time I do that as a human being, I'm going to be a hot mess. And then I'm going to accuse you, as you say, this doesn't work for you, of abandoning me when you know what? That happened a long time ago. That happened a long time ago when I rolled over and negated and invalidated myself because I didn't give myself the airtime that I needed to say what worked and what didn't work for me, that abandonment happened.

It reminds me of the saying, don't set yourself on fire to keep everybody else warm.

I'm also thinking of a precious client of I that I just adore. They are an amazing couple. They have been together a very long time, have gone through, through quite a bit. And one of their greatest challenges is they come from patterns of addiction. In this pattern of addiction, the partner was just saying to me recently, you know, I got so caught up in her being honest and truthful in every way, shape or form with me. And I was hyper vigilant about making sure and ensuring that she was. And you know, what I was doing on the backside, I was using. And I just think those are the places and spaces where we roll over on ourselves and then we're trying to control and manage our. Our partner in order to help us feel better to no avail. And that is such a common thing that happens in our emotional relationships because of these fears that we're talking about. So you commonly, you know, more times than not, the fear of loss, failure, and rejection are things that you're doing to yourself. They're not things that your partner is doing to you. So now I'm a really hot mess. I. I have a fear of threat. I've lost all control. I don't know the end of the story. I can't predict it. There's nothing that tells me. And I have all of these experiences that tell me it doesn't do anything but go to hell in a handbasket. And I have all of this cultural narrative around why it's going to be the worst thing that I've ever experienced in my whole friggin life. And now I have rejection and now I have abandonment issues and like, holy, now I'm really a hot mess and I am not okay by myself. I start to think I can't do this on my own. I have no purpose anymore. I don't know what to do without you anymore. And this is the place where I go. Okay, time out, time out. Slow down. Remember what I said just a few minutes ago. You are just as worthy today as the day that you met your partner. None of that has changed. None of it. The way I'm looking at this is all distorted because I'm reeling in fear. And that's what's happening. You're like the muddy buffalo. You're scared and you're about to run over the edge. And what again I'm going to invite you to do is breathe and recognize and realize that you have everything you need to do what you need to do in this place and space right now. And it's time for you. The invitation of space and separation is the invitation for you to come back to this place within yourself. It is not about your partner. It's not about chasing them. It's not about coercing them into doing or stopping anything. It's about you coming to a new place of understanding and acceptance and expression of yourself. And when this happens, you're going to feel so much peace and you're going to feel so much better and there are going to be so many things that you can discover about yourself in spite of. I can hear the screaming in my head as I speak these words because I was once where you are. That's bullshit. It can't be that you don't understand my circumstance or my situation. And I say with all great love and respect, no, you just don't understand this place in this spaceship. So we start to step into. I'm going to share with you seven common distorted beliefs that are caused by fear that lead us to radical behavior so that you can spot them and see them in yourself. You see the fear. You can relate to that. Been there myself, no judgment. This shit's real. I was about locked up because of my fear and my desperation at one point in time in my life. Probably should have been. So you know, I come at you here as a person who has walked this trail with you. We start to deal with our fear in these seven common distorted places. The first one assumptions. I'm jumping to conclusions without any evidence. I just know this is going to happen so I'm just going to go ahead and behave like it has and let the hit the fan. Okay, not a great strategy, not a good idea. Please don't do that. Or how about this one? All or nothing thinking. We hold ourselves or others to impossible standards and then conclude that we are a total failure as a person. Or it has to be like this or that. There are no other options that are good enough or that will work. And what you're negating is we're human, we're going to make messes and between this and that there's a thousand other options.

Well I like to say rather than either or, there's an and and a N D, there's an and.

Yep. And so we get ourselves all caught up and no, it has to be this or it has to be that. No, not true. You just probably are not aware of or thinking of all the possibilities between those two polar opposites. And that's where outside perspective can help you greatly. And a classic blaming. We all go blaming, we're going to talk about blaming. But what is blaming really? It's assigning all responsibility for our difficulties, my pain, my suffering, my fears on someone or something else instead of looking at it for myself. That's why it's such a common thing like I don't want to look at myself. I don't want to see how I'm abandoning myself or rejecting myself or rolling over on myself or to myself. I don't want to look at. Yeah, I'm calling you an but I'm probably an asshole because you're an asshole and you're more of an asshole because I'm an asshole. Just like the story I was sharing with you about my precious client right here in his own consciousness. He is lying up a shitstorm and you know what? He's hyper focused on his partner not doing the same. So blaming simply assigns all the responsibility for my own difficulties, my own pain, my own fear onto someone else or something else outside of myself so that I don't have to look at it and own it myself. That's all that's happening there.

I wanted to talk about blaming really quick because it always reminds me of our client who, when she came to us, she believed everything was her partner's fault. And she had an aha moment. I'll never forget it, during one of our group sessions where she said, oh, my God, I've been blaming this on my partner's problems this whole time. And now I realize the entire time it was me. It was my issues that have been creating these issues. And now they're married. I love that story.

And she was sitting on her porch. Yes, I can. I can take myself right back there, too.

Yes. It just. It just shows how common it is for us to blame. And really it's because we don't want to turn and face ourselves, you know?

So true. You know what the opposite of blaming is? Personalizing it. It's the opposite of blaming assuming more responsibility for negative events than we actually have. It's all my fault. I should have known better. Or you're doing this to hurt me. You're doing this intentionally because I didn't do this, this, this, this, and this. So now I'm taking all the responsibility for what's happening, or I'm making it all about me when it isn't so. It's just the opposite of blaming everyone and everything else. And now I'm internalizing. It is all coming the other direction. And I have to take it all so personal. And catastrophizing is, you know, something that we all do. And as we start reeling in those fears, catastrophizing is something that's very, very easy to step into. And then we all come from these places. Well, you should do this and you have to do that. You must do that. And you're a crazy idiot if you want them to come back. And they did this and this and this. I'm so stupid. I should have seen it. I'm so silly. I can't believe none of that is true. That is you just trying to come to conclusions about the experience that you're having. And to love someone deeply is never a catastrophe. Never silly, never stupid. It was something you didn't know. You had no idea that this was going to take you to this point. None of us do. I want you to know that none of us know the end of a relationship or the beginning of a relationship or the in between spaces. You know, we just get inspired because of an emotion that we have and a connection that we have with Another beautiful human being that says, you want to see what's going on here, you want to check it out, you want to give it a run, you want to give it a ride? None of us have any promises, none of us have any guarantees. We have to navigate this journey as we go. And so I would suggest to you that loving someone deeply is not only the most incredible experience that you'll ever have, it's a wonderful magic carpet ride. It's also the most courageous thing we ever do as a human being because we don't know. It's very courageous for us to risk. And then we start questioning all of that. I should have never done this. I'll never love again. I'll never trust again. No, no, no, don't do that to yourself. You have the capacity to love and to trust again and again and again. And in fact, the more you do it and the more skills and principles you learn to help your rhetoric, the easier and more enjoyable it becomes because you start to realize the end game isn't to get them to stay when it doesn't work. The end game is to have more moments that matter in your life where we experience what I call. Are you toes tingling? Because if they are, that's a beautiful thing. And I would suggest to you that toes tingling is worth the risk. And you're not stupid and you're not foolish and you're not a sucker for embarking on these conversations with love. And then the last distortion I'm going to talk about because there's many, but these are the common seven. Generalizing everything. Making global statements about difficult experiences, using words like always or never. Those are places and spaces that we commonly deal with fear. So, gosh, what are we left with? And this is where I'd like to cue a drum roll and say, well, you're probably left with a good old fashioned shit show, lots of drama. And so this is why we commonly have the experiences and the stories that we hear from others around this very challenging space. Because we will not understand and look at this from different perspectives. We will only stay mired in the fear of it all. And then that leads us to coping with it in those distorted thinking that we have and then our behavior, the words we say, the things we do will follow suit. So what are some common tools that we can give you by making it this far in the podcast? Hopefully that helps you see maybe what is playing out actually for you as it does for just know you're not alone. Millions and millions of others. We need to quiet and Manage our fears by three very specific things. It only takes three, and it's universal. The first is I need an experience. I need an experience that's different than the one that I have. That means I need to practice staying present and do our best to not time travel forwards or back. The reality is the past doesn't matter anymore. It's gone. But a memory, it can only showcase to me what doesn't work. So that will help me understand what will work or potentially try in the future to improve or better my experience in the future. It's not here yet, so don't go there. You don't know. And in our fear to predict the ending, resist the temptation to figure it out before you're there. It's important that you stay present in this present moment and do your best to not time travel. You don't know what tomorrow will bring, so be present in today and engage in something that will slow you down. You need to focus your mind and you need to engage your senses. And this is why things like closing your eyes and breathing, going for a walk in nature, taking a hot bath, touching your skin, slowing down and thinking about this moment so that it doesn't get away from you and you start to time travel, you need an experience of that. The second thing that you need to do is you need to explore. You need to explore your thoughts and your feelings by writing them down. Your fears will have its way with you until you face off with them and create some clarity and release. That I remember as many of us have being a child and so certain that there were terrible things under my bed. Scary, spooky things under my bed. And until my mom came in with the flashlight and said, come on, let's go see together what's under the bed. Was it that I had the opportunity to face and confront my fears and get clear about what was actually under my bed? It wasn't all those things I was making up as true. And then I could climb back into my bed and rest easy. And this is the same. I need to explore my thoughts and my feelings by writing them down. Write your fears down, look at them, face them, get clear about about them, name them. To tame them is so helpful because then you realize, okay, I see you and I'm not going to run away with them in my own mind and imagination.

And it reminds me of just our last Monday night's call we had where someone newer to our body of work says, I, I never even had the ability to, till now, to even be able to have a Vocabulary to describe what I was feeling and going through.

Through.

I mean, and most of us don't.

And we don't think of that as a skill, do we?

No, we don't.

And that's a skill that many of us didn't have the opportunity nor the support or mentorship to develop. Right. I don't have the ability to translate my thoughts and feelings into a language that I can understand. I just feel them and then I react to them and then I roll in fear. Then I do a lot of those distortions that we just talked about. And the last thing you need to do is express them. We all need a safe place of support to share our fears with trusted friends, family and community. To gain and reassure ourselves and gain new perspectives and new skills. Like, I've got to get outside of my own thinking because my own thinking is taking me to a place of unbelievable fear. And it gets me stuck and it causes me to shut down. So I've got to get outside of that in order to have success and support. And that's why expressing it, too, is so important through any means that you deem necessary. Writing, painting, coloring, talking, these things are very important for us to take what it is now that we have explored and put it into a place of expression and understanding. And so to experience a new something, to explore what is actually happening inside of you and what works and what doesn't happen. And then to be able to have the free, safe place to express that is what helps us find a solid foundation to stand on inside of ourselves. That's the truth about space. Most relationships don't end because of space. They end because no one taught us how to navigate it, what to do now, what it all meant. And we all start spiraling in our fear and our distortions. And then all that we're offered is trickery. Some little something that is promised to take you somewhere. And I buy into it because I don't know better. Because I've not ever really been taught how to navigate it. Space is your opportunity to transform things. It is your knock on the door that says, you know what? If we were to really tell the truth, there's a lot of things that have been working for me too here. You know what? There's a lot of things that I have been feeling that I've not known how to deal with too. And I can make the journey without all of these things that my partner's complaining about. That's great, Good for you. But guess what? Your partner can't. So what are you going to do? Are you going to whip them into submission? Are you going to chase them down? Or are we going to stop and say, hey, what do you need here so that we can both travel together to a better place? Space allows for this reflection and growth for both partners. It truly is a resetting and understanding unhealthy dynamics that have brought you to this moment that maybe you see and maybe you don't. That doesn't mean you're stupid and that doesn't mean mean you're not paying attention. It means we got caught up in life and now this knock on the door is telling you, hey, there's been some things that even if it worked for you, didn't work for the person that was co creating life with you. And it doesn't mean it's your fault. Indeed, it has more to do with them than it ever did with you. It's also an invitation to step into new possibilities and potential, not only in yourself, but in your relationship. And people struggle in this place because of the lack of emotional tools to manage anxiety and fear. We misinterpret space as rejection or abandonment and we have no guidance or mentorship to navigate this very challenging time effectively. So it's time to shift your perspective into something better. So instead of asking how do I fix them? I encourage you to ask how can I use this time to rediscover myself and become a better me? This shift isn't just empowering, it's transformative. I encourage you to do other shifts too, coming from reactive to responsive. Because this is going to help you stop acting out of fear and start making thoughtful, intentional choices. Or from fear to self discovery. Instead of asking what do they need? You ask what do I need? Need what is working and not working for me here? I get so caught up in being afraid they're going to leave me, I don't even ponder such preposterous things. Well, remember what we've touched on already. I show up as good as I feel. So if I'm numbed out and I'm avoiding the conversations or I don't want to talk about it, well, it's only a matter of time before that's going to catch up to you anyway.

I would say what you just described there, we often find, and it's very understandable that there's a lot of overcompensation that's done when we've been, you know, when we're the recipient of this request for space and it's like, oh, whatever, tell me whatever you need. Well, so we're just going to just abandon every need and want that we want to think we're going to be able to satisfy that. And yes, our needs and wants are important and so our husband, our spouse are significant of it, but not to the denigration of ourselves.

Yeah. It reminds me of when you're in this very tenuous place and you have this thing that you really want to ask, ask for, but you feel like if I asked for this thing, it's going to push them further away and then I'm going to lose them. Well, take a step back for a second. Is that whole situation that I described something that you really want to be a part of anyways? Do you even want to be in a relationship? I'm not saying that the answer is to just abandon them, but just take a minute and if your friend was describing that to you, would you say, yes, this is great, I'm so happy for you. You, you would probably say, what does it feel like to not even be able to ask for that simple thing from your partner for fear that it's gonna scare them away? We are fighting so hard for this sometimes shitty situation. And I'm not saying that that doesn't mean that, that you shouldn't. I'm just saying it means everyone in the relationship, you and your partner both need to skill up so that you can get out of that survival mode, you know, because that is not sustainable. And it's probably why space was required in the first place.

One of the saddest sayings that I've even said myself is I'll do anything, please don't leave. And you start to think about that and you think, anything. Yeah. Is that really true?

Talk about giving your power away.

Talk about giving your power away. And so we need to go from controlling to creating. We need to go from fear to self discovery. We need to go from reactive to responsive. We need to find a place of footing inside of ourselves in order to navigate this probably most difficult thing you've ever done in your whole life space. And that's why we're impassioned about it. Not only do we know what it's like to live it personally, but that we recognized and realized there wasn't a lot of support out there for people who were going through this most difficult, challenging time from a real perspective with practical tools and mentorship from people who genuinely care. There was a lot of trickery, there was a lot of bullshit. Taking advantage of your executive functioning, being offline, taking advantage of the space and the place that you're reeling in fear and you're gonna bite off on whatever somebody tells you is gonna be the case. And I say no more. That's not okay. That is absolutely not okay. We can do better than this. We should and need to do better than this. This. And so there are all kinds of transformative stories and. And if what we've talked about today resonates with you, I'm going to absolutely invite you to sign up. Your very first step to help you kind of just find a place of standing on your own is going to take advantage of our survival kit because it's free, it's a great resource, it's a great place to begin. So when you need support and you've resonated with anything that we've talked about here today, that would be the very best place for you to begin. And you can grab it by using the link in the show notes. And then if you know you're ready to take this, work deeper for yourself. The love and limbo 30 day roadmap is here to guide you. And the next round begins January 5, 2025. Let me just pause there for a moment because we only do these three, sometimes four times a year, so you have to catch them while we're facilitating them live. If you want a live version of it, which is life altering, that's all I can say. I can't promise you outcomes, but I can promise you it is life changing because it's a transformational journey. So don't miss this opportunity to find clarity and confidence. And I will say too, we limit the number of enrollees because we can only support so many people through this very difficult place and space with all that we do to mentor you through it, obviously. So if this is something that you're feeling inspired to do, that you've resonated with what we're doing, what we're saying, then I would encourage you to claim your spot again. It starts January 5, 2025. If you have any questions or comments about today's episode, we would love to hear from you. We understand that we are talking about the most difficult place and space in the human journey. And. And my hope today was that you could start to see through the fears and the distorted thinking that we commonly fall culprit to in this place and space so that you yourself might start to look at it, facing off with it, and allow us to be the people with the flashlight that says, okay, come on, we got this. It's not what you think. We're going to figure this out. We can do this together. And we've done this before, and we've done it with many people before you. So let us support you in this place and space. Face our. Follow the fun today. Well, it had to be something to help us manage our fears, right? I mean, I think that would be pretty disingenuous of me if that weren't the case. So I'm going to ask you to embark on something that is creative. Explore meaning and purpose through drawing, writing, painting, building, crafting, even if you've never done it before. Because, remember, we need experience. We need a different experience than what we're having now. We need to explore my. Myself, my thoughts, my feelings, and then I need to express it. And there's nothing like art or a project or building to help you do all three of those things. This is going to provide your emotions with an outlet, and it also offers up the spinning brain that is spiraling in fear, something to focus on. It will really help you if you'll take us up on it and our song for today. Well, I'm gonna do something I don't. I don't commonly do. In fact, I don't think I've ever done. And I'm gonna.

This is really a drum roll moment.

Here too, Brooke, because I came to the show today with a song I wasn't really feeling all that inspired about. And Brookie jumped right in and said, I've got the best song for today's episode. And I went, take it away, girl.

I am a new Swifty this year. I started loving Taylor Swift's music after kind of ignoring it for my whole life. And I was driving to my haircut on Tuesday and Tolerate it came on and. And it's just. It hit me like a ton of bricks that, wow, this would be a great song for one of our shows about space and separation. Because the way that she describes being just tolerated by your partner is so visceral. And it just reminded me of how I felt in the past when I felt like I was putting a lot of effort into the relationship. And I want to read you one part of the chorus because I think it just totally explains what I'm saying. I wait by the door like I'm just a kid Use my best colors for your portrait Lay the table with the fancy shit and watch you tolerate it if it's all in my head tell me now Tell me I've got it wrong Somehow I know my love should be celebrated but you just tolerate it so good.

You can listen to this week's song with our entire playlist by going to our website podcast page or search it up on Spotify Love Shack Live playlist.

And if you want Brooke to now choose the songs, please let us know because then Stacy will lose this.

Little.

Control issue here where you're. This is live, ladies and gentlemen. You're seeing this listener.

So yes, it's actually pretty funny because you guys, I was like, man, I should text mom too and tell her that we should use this song for this week's show. But then I was like, no, she loves picking this song song. So I feel like the universe intervened and made you not be able to pick a song so that I could use this one.

I love it. Hey, I'm all about collaboration.

We call that a Gus moment right there live. That's a beautiful thing.

Thank you so much, listener, for spending your time with us today. We hope that you found today's episode extremely helpful in helping you navigate one of the most difficult, challenging spaces and places in life. We want you to know that we care about you, we see you, we love to engage with you. So if you have any questions or share about today's episode or any of our episodes, we'd love to hear from you. You can do that by going to our website@stacybartley.com too and tell us what you know. And depending on what platform you're listening to this podcast on, you can often send us your questions or your comments right through the platform that you're using as well. So know that we love to hear from you. We enjoy that. And, and we will respond to you if you reach out. So we look forward to seeing you back here in the love shack with us again soon. Until then, take good care of yourself. Slow down, breathe. Don't make any big decisions. We got time for that. We got to figure some shit out first, don't we? And then it's going to be okay. I promise. I really promise you that the sun is going to shine again. You're going to go on. You're going to have a big, bold, beautiful life. We just have to get through this moment today.

Oh, alright. It's time to leave the love shack. But before we part ways, we want you to know our door is always open and we'll leave the porch light on. Ready to welcome you back whenever you need a dose of relationship wisdom. For more resources and tools, visit us atlove shack live.com to dive deeper into the topics we've explored and find additional support for your relationship journey. Stay connected by subscribing to our podcast. Thank you for being part of our Love Shack Live community.