Think you’re “confused” about why your ex did what they did? You’re not. In this tough love episode, Sarah unpacks how confusion is really a convenient shield from feeling the deeper pain of heartbreak—and why answers won’t set you free, but courage will.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello, my friends, Sarah K's here and I am here with another breakup pep talk. I am talking about something that was inspired in my meetup group, which I'll post the link to. Please come join. It's absolutely free. I host events there all the time from workshops to support circles to getting coached live within the group. It's a really great place to be, but this was inspired in one of my coaching sessions with that group and it was something that I have heard over and over and over again. So I wanted to address it here because I bet you might be dealing with this as well. Have you ever found yourself asking why your ex did what they did and thinking If only I could understand why they did it, then I'd be able to move on. Or have you ever told yourself, I'm just so confused.
(01:01)
I am so confused. Why would they do this to me? Why would they do X action, take me out to dinner. Or I had an ex who helped me train for half marathon and was cheering me on the whole time, took me out for this big brunch afterwards, and then we broke up the next day and true story. And of course you could ask yourself why did he do all of that if he was just going to end the relationship? I'm so confused. Does that happen to you? Do you find yourself in that situation where you just are in this state of confusion and you can't wrap your brain around it? That's what we're talking about today because I want to talk about why you're confused because here is the truth. This is a tough love episode, okay? You're not really confused If you are honest with yourself, you might not like your situation, but if you look at it, you're actually not confused at all. There is something deep down inside that is like I either don't need the answer, I don't actually need the answer, or I don't like his actions. They were misleading or her actions. I don't like that person's actions. They were misleading. But I think I can wrap my brain around why this relationship ended. You are not actually confused, but there's a reason why confusion is showing up for you right now, and it's because confusion is convenient.
(02:53)
It is so much easier to feel confused than it is to feel what you are actually feeling. It's easier to feel confused than to feel disappointed, betrayed, heartbroken in grief or lonely. Those emotions are no joke. They can be really difficult and they can be really painful and confusion is much easier to feel. And if you were in confusion, your brain is trying to figure out an answer. So if your brain is busy, you don't have time to feel. You've got more important things to do. I have to solve a problem. I have to figure out why this happened.
(03:50)
Confusion's also convenient because if you are in confusion, you don't have to make a decision If you're in confusion, you don't have to accept what happened. You never have to change or grow. You get to just stay in analysis mode. And let me tell you, I get it. The only reason I could figure this out is because I caught it in myself. First, I just went through, I got ghosted, and then the person ended up reaching out and ending things and it was somebody I was really excited about. And so I got really stuck in analysis mode. I went into like, I am going to figure this out and my brain is smart. This is what I do for a living. I can figure this out. And I didn't entertain. It wasn't confusion for me, it was analysis. So it's just a slightly different flavor, but it's still all up in your brain. It's up in your head.
(05:04)
And if you've been listening to my previous episodes, emotions are in your body, heartbreaks in your body, and so if we get to avoid our body and stay in our head, we don't have to go to those painful places. So I can really understand why. If you find yourself going to confusion, I understand why you're doing it. The other way this can manifest, and I am very guilty of this, is staying busy. If you stay busy, it's pretty much the same as confusion because in confusion, your brain is busy, but if you stay busy, you never have to feel. So that might be a slightly different flavor of the same thing that you might be experiencing. So here is what's really driving you. If you find that you're doing this underneath your confusion is avoidance.
(06:04)
Avoidance of what? And you can answer that for yourself. What feeling or experience am I avoiding or what is convenient? It's convenient that I'm in confusion because if I wasn't in confusion, then I would be what I would have to face. The fact that my relationship's over, I'd be sad. I'd realize I'm really fricking lonely when I let myself go there into those feelings. When I get past the avoidance and I just let myself go there, they are brutal. They are hard, they don't feel good. And sometimes I know when I'm in there and I'm letting myself feel it and I'm going through it, I'm thinking, I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy. So I understand if you're avoiding it, but here is the absolute truth. The only way out is through. And what I mean by that is when you let yourself feel the pain or feel the feeling fully and you express it and you move it through your body and you're going to use the technique that I talked about a couple episodes, the lamp technique to process your feelings. When you let yourself fully feel it, the need to understand drops away. The need to talk to your ex even drops away, right? Because you are moving a thing through your body and on the other side of that feeling is a little bit of space, it's a little bit of peace.
(08:13)
It's a little bit of clarity. What you need in order to do this, to get through your breakup, it's not an answer. If you are thinking, if I reach out to my ex and I get my questions answered of why did they behave this way and why did they treat me this way and where did it go wrong? What could I have done differently, right? Those really common questions that we tend to all have after a breakup, the things that we say we want for closure, you actually don't need the answer to those questions. You have the only answer that you need. That person doesn't want to continue a relationship anymore. That's the only answer you need.
(09:03)
We think if we get answers, we're going to feel better, but actually even if you got answers, you're going to have more questions. That's how I know answers aren't the answers. Answers keep you in confusion, so you're in confusion for a reason and it's because you're avoiding a feeling, so you don't need an answer. You need courage. The courage to feel something uncomfortable, whether that's loneliness or anger or grief or acceptance. We are not fighting for your past here. We're not fighting for answers. We're not fighting for your ex. We're not even fighting for the version of you that was in the relationship. We are fighting for your next version of you who is moving forward, who is going to be evolving and growing from this. That's who we are fighting for, and that's who you need the courage for. You need the courage for six months from now you because you want that version of you to be better than you are today. You want that version of you to be further along in the breakup. You want that version of you to be over it and moved on. Whether that means you just don't think about them anymore or you just feel completely neutral about them, or maybe you're even in a new relationship by then, but the work you do today of feeling your feelings and moving through it, you are doing that for future you so that they are in a better situation.
(10:56)
So here's what's at stake. You have the option to stay stuck. You can stay in confusion and you can stay in the victim of, this happened to me, poor me. Look at how bad my life is. If only I could understand well, then I could finally let go and move on. That is at the will of somebody else. I need somebody else to give me the answers. I need somebody else to tell me what to do. I need somebody else to make me feel better. That's option one. Option two, you straighten your spine, you feel the hard feelings and you learn to protect your heart and open it again for your future so they can love again someday so they can see how great their life is. This is your fight. You get to choose how to proceed from here. It's like those choose your own adventure books and you can fight for your healing, for your future, for your future love story that hasn't even been written yet, or you can stay stuck.
(12:19)
Both options are valid and they lead to a different version of you in six months. So make your decision based on where do you want to be in six months? How do you want to be showing up? So I know that confusion can feel really safe. It's comfortable. Confusion isn't all that fun to be in, but it's somewhat safe, right? We don't really have to do any change. We don't have to be challenged, but courage is what sets you free. I'm going to invite you to choose courage and let yourself feel and remember that you are fighting for the version of you who still believes in love and who wants a better future than what you have today. I want to thank you so much for being here for this episode. This is a little bit out of what I'm doing week to week because this hit me with so much clarity of this is what I need to talk about.
(13:22)
This is what's really needed out there right now. And so I wanted to bring this to you without delaying it. So I'm interrupting the weekly flow that I have of how to really progress, but this really isn't taking us that far off course because this happens so often for people that are right where you are. So I want you to have this so that you can make a really powerful decision for your future if you find that you're in confusion and you are hiding from whatever scary feeling you're hiding from and you want some support around it, and you really do want to commit to that future version of you who is better than you are today, I want to help you with that. That is something that I help my private clients with all the time. I work with them for six months, so they do get to that future version of themself that they're really proud of and who is creating that life that they want, and you can explore if this is the right fit for you for free.
(14:27)
I do a free consultation call where I will talk to you about where you're stuck and where you're struggling, and then I will create a plan for you of what I see as the most efficient way to get out of that problem and how I can see you grow the most in six months and where I think you can be, and then you can decide if you want to work with me as your coach or not. If that sounds great to you, and I hope that it does, please use the link in the show notes and book your free consultation and we will get this settled away as quickly as possible so that you get on the path to that future version of you as quickly as possible. All right, my friends, I will also include the link to the meetup group because I would love to have you there. I would love to have you at these meetups in this really great supportive community. I hope you have a beautiful day. I will talk to you next week. Thank you so much for listening. Friends. Take care of yourself.