Life Coach Sarah Curnoles discusses the concept of "resistance" - the tendency to hang onto the past and avoid facing the pain of a relationship ending. She shares her own experience with resistance, and explains how it prevents people from looking towards the future and creating a new, better life for themselves. Sarah encourages listeners to get clear on what they truly want in their future, rather than focusing on how to recreate the past relationship. She offers a free coaching consultation to help people work through the resistance and start building the life they desire. This episode provides practical advice and support for healing from a breakup and embracing the possibilities of the future.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Have you gone through a breakup and you're tired of feeling low lonely or lost? I've got a pep talk for you. I'm Sarah Curnoles, your breakup bestie. I'm a certified life coach with years of coaching experience, helping people just like you turn your breakup into the best thing that ever happened to them. Each week, tune in to get a pep talk, to heal your heart. Let go of the past, reclaim your power and get back into your main character energy. Your breakup may have shattered your world as you know it, but together let's build a new better world. Let's go.
(00:44)
Hi there friends. Sarah Curnoles here, your breakup bestie. And this week's episode is for anybody out there who has ever found themselves saying, I know I should be over my ex by now, but you are still crying over it. You're still stalking their Instagram and you're still replaying every single conversation. Yeah, this one is for you because, oh, have I been there? And if I knew then what I know now, how much time and wasted tears I could have saved myself. And so this is me offering to you what I wish I had had so that I can hopefully save you a little bit of time. So this episode is all about dealing with the phase of a breakup where we're in resistance, and I'm going to talk all about what the heck does that mean? How to know if you're in resistance and how to get out of it.
(01:52)
And that's what we're going to dig into today because I really want you to understand this situation so that you do not have to stay there any longer than you have already perhaps been there. So this really came out of a little bit of my own story because like I said, I spent a lot of time in resistance to this. The reality of it was time to move on, but also it just came up recently with one of my clients that I've been working with. And so I really wanted to share what's working and how to spot this for yourself. So for me, I was the person, I feel like I've been pretty open about this and sharing my story, but I was always the person that was just hanging on so much longer after the relationship ended hoping that things would change or that if I got the right amount of self-help work under my belt that I could change enough that my ex would take back and we could get back together and everything would be fine again.
(03:02)
And I spent so much time romanticizing the relationship of how great it was and just wishing that I could be out of all that emotional pain of the crying and the loneliness and the wishing that this wasn't the life I was living. I remember I went through one breakup and I was in misery probably for six weeks, and my routine was drag myself out of bed, go for a long walk while listening to an audio book where I was trying my best to change my mood so that I could go to work. And it kind of worked. It mostly didn't because eventually a friend took me out to lunch and he said, Sarah, when are you going to stop? When are you going to wake up and realize this wasn't a great relationship for you and that you deserve so much better? And even though I really hated that he said that to me at the time, I could also really appreciate that he was saying it because he really cared about me and he could see how much pain I was in for so long and that I wasn't even willing to let go.
(04:17)
I was just hanging onto the pain because I was just really hoping that it was temporary and that the relationship was going to come back and that we could work everything out. And I'm not saying that that was even the thing that snapped me out of my state of hanging onto my ex, but it was the beginning of me realizing what I was doing wasn't working and that maybe I just needed to start coming to terms with the fact that the relationship was over, that I was really looking at my past with these rose colored glasses and that maybe I needed to open myself up to the possibility of healing because honestly, I think I was, I was scared of the healing process. I was so scared if I let myself feel the grief that the relationship was over, that the grief was never going to end and that I would just be endlessly sad and that it was like admitting I really was as hopeless as I felt that I was.
(05:34)
And I was just really scared of what that process was going to be because even though I was sad, I still was hanging onto this hope that if the relationship got back together, then I could be okay. And I was really only seeing that as the only possibility of being okay was if we got back together, that would be how I got to. Okay. And I wasn't looking at all the other possibilities that life has to offer, that there are other ways that we can be okay even when we go through a period that's really, really hard and challenging. And I think it took me a long, long time to get to the point where I realized I wasn't allowing myself to look for the hope in the future. I was only looking for hope in my past of this past relationship is where my hope for happiness is. And I didn't know how to create that for my future. So I wasn't even looking to the possibility of something else being able to do that for me. And I think this is really common. I see this happening a lot with people who sort of jump from relationship to relationship thinking that the relationship is what creates your happiness and creates your hope that you can have the future that you've been dreaming of.
(07:01)
And I'm going to talk more about why that's faulty. But I do want to share a little bit of my client story before I go too far into that because my client has been working with me for several months and shows up every week with the same question of, I just want to get over my ex and I'm not yet. And I realized that something that there has been some resistance to is something I used to have resistance to. And there was a lot of resistance around talking about what my client actually wants for their life and what they actually want to create in the future. And what I realized is happening for my client and what I realized is happening for me is that we are so scared to dream about creating a future for ourselves and to actually claim what we want. And when I say that, I mean owning what you really want. And we are so afraid to do that because we don't know how to create that, and we are so afraid of being disappointed if we don't get it, that we're not even willing to entertain the possibility to say that I want that thing.
(08:17)
And what's so interesting is that we are so much more willing to hang onto the suffering that we currently have of holding on to the suffering of I don't have the relationship that I want because I had it. Now it's gone and I am in this suffering and I had what I thought I wanted and I had created it for a moment and it went away. And we are in all of this agony, but we're not seeing that because we're hanging on so much to that of what we had created in the past. We are totally neglecting that we have the opportunity to create it again for our, which is ahead of us. We can't ever go backwards in life. You can only go forwards and we are scared of the possibility of being disappointed. But guess what? You're already feeling that disappointment right now in what you're currently experiencing.
(09:13)
And because you keep hanging onto it, you keep experiencing the disappointment over and over and over again. So no wonder you are so scared to create more disappointment, it's because you haven't been willing to let go of the current disappointment. You haven't been willing to actually feel your way through the disappointment and allowing that to be there so that it could just be a part of this story. And it's not the whole story, but you're holding onto it like it's everything. And so now it just feels so big that you're like, I can't possibly have anymore. Right? You're so stuck in this disappointment that there probably isn't much capacity for more disappointment, but there also isn't capacity for more love or more joy or more hope or more courage even because you are so filled up with hanging onto the past.
(10:18)
So that's why resistance can be such a big problem is that it really does prevent us from moving on in a healthy way, and it prevents us from taking any steps forward because we are so drained by hanging onto the past. You're feeling so much pain all the time that you really don't have the capacity or the ability to see anything for the future. You're just tapped out emotionally, mentally, physically. And what happens is if you constantly stay in this state, you're always living your life backwards, or at least you're looking backwards, I should say, because you're looking to the past as the good old days if, and you're using the past as proof of look that ended, and therefore it is proof that I can't ever have it again.
(11:20)
Instead of looking to the future and say, the future hasn't happened yet. The past actually is no determination of what's going to happen for my future. The only thing about the past is that that's done. It's what has already happened, but I can't possibly know what's going to happen for me in the future. It hasn't happened yet. And also for those of you that get stuck in, I don't know how I'm going to have that relationship that I truly want all know is what I had. Well, the problem is that you're not going to know how to have that relationship until you have it.
(12:06)
You know how to have the relationship you've already had and that didn't provide you with as much happiness as you think, or it didn't provide you with the long lasting commitment that you were hoping for because it ended. So you know how to have that relationship, but you don't know how to have something that you've never had until you have it. So focusing on how is actually focusing on the totally wrong question and it's going to keep you stuck where you are for a long, long time. What's actually going to help you is to get clear on the what. Before I go into that, I already got really excited. I got a little ahead of myself. I wanted to be able to help you spot the signs of resistance because I think it's really helpful. So maybe you've already heard yourself in here in my stories a little bit as it is, but I just wanted to be really clear about what resistance really is. And that's when you are stuck in opposition to the circumstance that you are facing and that you are pushing against that or you are in denial of it and you're not willing to be an acceptance of it.
(13:30)
And so this to me, I always get this image of tug of war and reality is on one side of that rope saying, let's go. Come on. This is what you're facing. This is what you're dealing with right now. And I was trying to pull you forward of, come on, come this way. It's okay. And you were going, no, no, no, no, no. You've got the other end of that rope and you're like, I'm not going there, and you're pulling against it. That's resistance. You've entered a tug of war with reality. And one of my mentors, Byron Katie, always says, you can fight against reality, but reality will always win.
(14:21)
As much as I know I get stuck in resistance sometimes I am making it. One of the things I try to bring my focus to of where am I resisting reality and where can I bring more awareness to it and become aware of what's happening so that I can soften my resistance and drop the rope. I don't have to fight it. Maybe I just drop the fight of like I'm trying to fight against reality. Maybe I just hold onto the rope and I just hold it lightly and allow it to pull me forward. And so you'll know that you're in resistance. If you're in this feeling of where you feel really, really stuck, you feel like you can't get out of your situation, you don't see the way forward where you feel too overwhelmed by the process of change that you're trying to opt out of it altogether.
(15:18)
You might also know that you're in resistance. If you spend more time looking back at the past and romanticizing it and thinking maybe even if it wasn't perfect, it was better than this. You might also be in resistance. If you notice yourself, you say one thing, but you do the opposite. You might be saying to your friends, my client was saying I really want to get over my ex, but the behavior was something really different. The behavior was really stuck on focusing on the past and thinking of how great the ex was. That's resistance saying, I want to move on. But then your actions are lining up with the opposite of that because you just keep holding onto the past instead of doing things that someone would do if they really did want to get over their ex.
(16:22)
And sometimes this comes with a bit of avoidance. If you know that you could be getting over your ex by, I don't know, cleaning out your closet, maybe you have some items that belong to them. If you could just get rid of those items, that's a step of letting go, saying that this truly is over. I'm giving these things back, or I'm donating them. I'm getting them out of my house as a way to detox my life and let go. But if you're really resisting it and hanging onto it, that might mean that you're in a bit of resistance.
(17:01)
And so my invitation for you is you transition into how do we get ourselves to soften in the face of resistance? I want you to get a little curious with yourself and do a little self-reflection. What am I so afraid might happen if I move on? Because sometimes we create the story for ourself of it'll be easier if I go backwards. It's easier if I go back to my ex. That's what I thought. It'll be easier. I don't have to face this and I don't have to be vulnerable with somebody new of going through those early phases of dating where you're getting to know somebody, which I always thought was so uncomfortable. And I always had the story of like, oh, I just don't connect with everybody. And so dating was really hard for me. So I had all these stories of like, oh, I really hate dating and my life would be so much easier if I could just get back with my ex. And so I was in this sort of regression, but now that I can name it, of this habit that I have is resistance and it's not making my life any easier.
(18:18)
I can build more safety about letting go and moving forward. So for yourself, take a moment maybe with your journal to get curious with yourself and ask yourself that question, what am I so afraid might happen if I truly move on? Okay, so one of the things that really helps for anybody who is in this feeling of being stuck in the resistance, something that's really helpful is that we don't know what we're moving towards and that future feels scarier, it feels murkier, and therefore we tend to stay away from things that are scary and murky. And we try to go back to what's familiar, kind of like I said, of how to have the relationship you already had, but you don't know how to have the relationship you want to have. That's scary, that's new, that's change.
(19:20)
One of the most helpful things you can do for yourself is let go of the how am I going to make that happen? And instead get really, really clear on what is it that I actually want and what does that look like? And get yourself clear in crystal clear detail, so clear that you could describe it to a friend and that they could even see it too. If you described it for them, they could picture it in their head. And when we get more clear and more familiar with what we want and what that would look like, it starts to get a little less scary because it'll start to feel more familiar as we paint that picture clearer and clearer.
(20:26)
And you're not going to know the whole list of steps, how to get from here to where you want to be, but once you know where you're going, it's a little bit easier to figure out the next right step to get there. Because if you are in New York but you don't know where you're going, it doesn't matter what plane you get on, you could get on just any old plane and you'll go somewhere you might not like where you end up, but you didn't dictate where you were going. But if you're in New York and you know that you want to go to la, well, then you're going to get on a plane to LA and you're going to pack for la. It would be very different if you were going to go to Scotland. Totally different direction, totally different packing list, totally different vibe even.
(21:44)
And so what I want to invite you to do is to start getting clear on where do you want to go, whether it's in a future relationship and you want to get really clear of what that is or what the most fabulous single life would look like for you. Get really clear about it and while you're figuring this out, as much compassion that you can bring to the process as possible because this resistance is really just here trying to teach you something. It's probably trying to show you how much you did care about that relationship, and it's trying to show you the things that you did enjoy. And I bet if you get clear of what those are, those are things you can create in future relationships.
(22:44)
And it also wants you to continue to give yourself your own safety and your own comfort as you're going through this process of change. And don't be afraid to reach out for help. There's so much that I can give you in these weekly podcasts. I can offer so many tips and so many podcasts, and I can love you from the bottom of my heart and let you know that I do care about you even if we've never met. I really do care, and I hate seeing people in pain like this, especially pain I have lived through and I suffered without seeing a way out, and now I have a way out. I so badly want to help you through that. And I know I can change things very quickly when people work for me, work with me. I'm actually running a summer special right now that if we talk in the month of June, you will get three months of coaching plus a VIP half day zoom session with me where we're going to go deep into this work of creating your future vision.
(23:57)
And that's a bonus. I don't offer that all the time. That is usually something that costs a lot of extra money because you get very dedicated attention from me for a long period of time that is very focused on you what you want, getting clear on what you want, creating a whole plan around that. And we create visuals and audios. And then I also help you with any obstacles or challenges that might come up around that. This is an amazing deep dive session that is easily worth a thousand dollars, and I'm giving it to you for free. If we start coaching together this summer and we start working for 12 weeks on your life reboot program where I help you get over your ex and I help you start your new life, you would be amazed at how quickly things shift when you work with a coach.
(24:49)
So if this is something that's really interesting to you, I want to invite you to book a free consultation call with me and I'll put the link in the show notes for you. This is an opportunity for you to tell me your story, and I'm going to ask you lots of questions and I'm going to create a whole plan for you, and you get to decide if coaching is a good fit. I would love to have the conversation with you, and I would love to help you change where you are so that you can drop this resistance that you might be feeling and really start to figure out the step-by-step how's, because that's how I really help people, is I help you figure out the how's. You don't have to know it ahead of time. And I'm also going to help you get really clear on what you want your life to look like and how to deal with any obstacles that come up and you get that support from me every single step of the way so that you don't have to face this alone.
(25:43)
How amazing would that be to have somebody by your side through this process of healing and building a new life, and you don't have to do it alone. So again, I'd love to invite you to do a free consultation call with me so that we can create a plan and you can make a decision if coaching's right for you. Go ahead and head to the show notes and click on the link and get on my calendar because I know that spots are going to fill up. And this VIP day is only going to be available if we talk this summer. Okay, my friends, I look forward to talking to you more soon, and I hope you have a beautiful day and take good care of yourselves.