• What if the other person gets mad?
• What if they leave me because of it?
• What if I lose my job because I speak up?

Toxic messages all around

The worries are endless and the results are the same, women give away their power—to their fear, their loved ones, the men in their life, their work and their world. They struggle with simply standing in their power and owning it. Most women don’t even know what having power means or what it would look like. Instead, women all over the world have bought into the toxic messages infused into them via television, magazines and their culture.

Women’s magazines teach women to be anything but powerful. Their messages focus instead on how to look alluring, dress sexy, attract a man and to gain happiness by losing weight, saying the “right” thing and other superficial changes—as though doing these things will be the answer to a happy life. Not only is this advice unhelpful, it’s often toxic. Far too many women have bought into these messages to such a degree that they’ve lost themselves, starved themselves, silenced themselves and, as a result, hate themselves.

This pressure sets women up to not see what they see, to not trust that they know what they know and to look to others for answers they actually have within themselves. All of these factors lead women to settle for less than they deserve—harmful relationships, unhealthy work environments, one-way friendships and unsatisfying lives. The messages from women’s magazines, television shows and our world at large sets women up to dummy down, slim down, cow down and ultimately, stay down.

The pitfalls of staying down

Women staying down, however, is not only harmful to women, it’s harmful to our world. Unless women get the courage to step up—in an entirely new way—we are destined for a pretty rocky ride, to say the least. When women keep themselves down, they teach their daughters and the next generation to stay down as well. We cannot afford future generations of women putting everyone else’s needs and wants ahead of their own. When we can’t fight for our own needs, we cannot expect others to fight for them either. Similarly, when we don’t have the courage to stand up to poor treatment, we expect that others too will treat us poorly—why would they treat us better than we treat ourselves?

True power

It’s time women started fully stepping into their power and owning their place in the world—and not in a “bitchy-in-your-face” kind of way, but in a grounded, confident, matter-of-fact way. I propose that women step into the world in an entirely new way—with a Grounded Powerful Strength [GPS] rather than an aggressive strength or meekly. Much like a GPS is a roadmap for travel, a Grounded Powerful Strength is a women’s roadmap for life. Our world equates power with aggression. It’s time we challenged this old “power-over” paradigm and replaced it with a new, more effective, more powerful and more respectful “power-from-within” paradigm.

A GPS is all about that power-from-within. It’s about feeling confident in your own skin, trusting that you know what you know and being courageous enough to stand behind yourself in such a way that you have your own back without leaning on those around you. Few women are able to do this. We’re too worried about how others are going to respond, what they’ll think about us or how we’re going to look if we simply slow down and determine what we want, how we feel and what we would like to do—and to then courageously stand behind that. Our world would benefit beyond measure by women stepping up in this way.

How to access your GPS

• When we have the courage to let go of the toxic messages that push us to be anything but authentic, we create true change that can ripple into world change.
• Get off the treadmill of trying to fit in, be liked or please others. We have enough people acting like everyone else and letting go of what they believe in because they think these are the paths to being loved. Stop spending endless time and energy on becoming who you think others want you to be and instead figure out who you are, what you believe and how you want to be and boldly inhabit that space. True love happens as a result of what you’re made of on the inside, not what you look like on the outside. Strengthen your inside and the rest will fall into place.

• Regarding having your back in times of upset and anger, avoid the extremes. Do not tip-toe, cower or walk on eggshells to calm another’s rage and never use your own rage to silence another’s voice. Cowering hurts you and bullying hurts those around you. Neither is okay. Set a limit to others’ rage and stay calm when you feel your own begins to rise. Find the middle—in life, relationships, work and even in strive. Ducking has harmed women throughout the ages and rage has harmed everyone. Avoid both. Allow the other person to have their reaction and don’t change your resolve as a result of their response. Step in with calm, confidence and strength and be proud of yourself regardless of the outcome.
• Making hard decisions is not easy. Taking the time to think through your options, your motivations and your goal, however, will help in the decision making process. Always take the high road, and make the decision that is in your long-term best interest. The more grounded and respectful you are in even the most difficult of times, the more powerful and strong your message is.

Power-from-within is about knowing what is and what is not okay for you and then walking in the world in a way that supports that knowledge. Rather than bashing the other person with your anger—in reaction to them bashing you with theirs—stay calm, matter-of-fact and grounded in your messages. Then see how GPS changes your relationships and your life.

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“Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” goes a popular saying, though I think it’s applies equally to men as well. Few things get to a person’s soul more than the hurt, betrayal or ending of an intimate relationship. And few things are more damaging than the subsequent spin out and fury done in front of, or to, the children of the men and women scorned.

How bad-mouthing your spouse affects your kids

• Karen is 43 years old and still talks about the pain she went through when her parents divorced. Her father left her mother for another woman. For decades afterwards, Karen’s mother repeatedly told Karen what a cheater her father was. She made visitations a constant fight and she spent many years trying to turn Karen against her father. To say that Karen was put into a loyalty bind would be a gross understatement. She was not allowed to have any positive feelings for her father without her mother taking it as a personal affront to her. The divorce altered Karen’s life; the constant fighting between her parents damaged Karen’s wellbeing.
• Sally and Ken are divorced. During the marriage, Ken was emotionally abusive to Sally and their two children. After the divorce, Ken continues to be emotionally abusive. He tells the children how incompetent their mother is, he makes fun of her, he bullies his way into her home and dismisses Sally’s attempts to set limits. Sally’s children are growing to hate their father and learning to dismiss their mother.
• Mary struggled for years to save her marriage. When she was finally done and filed for divorce, Frank was shocked. He alternated between crying, saying he couldn’t live without her, and getting angry, making threats about how hard he would make this divorce. The entire divorce was rife with conflict. Frank would cry to the kids then angrily tell them that their mother “did this”. “She’s the one responsible for breaking up our family!” Their two kids wanted to love their mom and dad, but found it more and more difficult to be around dad. They cried when they had to see him. They begged to not go to his house, and over time, they just refused to go.

The consequences of trash-talking

Disrespecting your ex-partner hurts not only your children and your family, but also yourself. Listed below are just a few of the many repercussions of bad-mouthing your spouse—regardless of how bad a person you think s/he is.

• Carbon copies: Your children are made up of 50 per cent of your genes and 50 per cent of your ex’s genes. When you tell your children what a loser or cheat their mother/father is, they take that in. If you tell them that their parent is that terrible, then they think they must be too. Don’t put that on them.
• Loyalty bind: When you constantly bad-mouth the other parent, you put your children into a loyalty bind. They will feel as though they can’t love both of you without one of you being hurt. Not being able to love one parent because the other parent would be upset is a huge stressor for them.
• Boomerang effect: It is not your job to ‘show’ your children how awful their mother or father is—that’s unhealthy thinking. And it often has an uncanny way of backfiring. Children can get tired of constantly hearing how terrible their father or mother is and begin to hate the parent who’s doing the bad-mouthing—even if the other parent caused the original hurt to the family. Children are keenly insightful; they will see the true colours of both of you. Be sure you’re showing them the colours you want to be known for.
• Creating a template: Children live what they know, they know what they live. When they see two parents attacking one another verbally, emotionally and physically, they take that in as a template of the way to fight. They will internalise the idea that if they’re hurt, upset or mad at someone, they have the right to annihilate that person just as they see you doing to your ex-spouse. This behaviour will wreak havoc in their lives and relationships for years to come. Don’t set them up to internalise this dysfunctional template.
• From difficult to damaging: Divorce is difficult for children under the best of circumstances. However, when done with integrity they will be okay. When you go through divorce in a toxic and bitter way, you make a difficult situation a damaging one. Your children deserve much more from both parents.

The heartbreak and sadness of losing someone you thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with can be intense, to say the least. Many, if not most, people who experience divorce go through moments of feeling these intense emotions and, of course, no one goes through the process of divorce perfectly. However, one of the roles of being a parent is to always keep the best interest of your children at the forefront of your mind and at the heart of your choices. As a parent, you don’t have the luxury of letting your anger get the best of you—even in the most difficult of times—and certainly not over and over again for years.

Rise to the occasion. If your ex will not allow that to happen, then have your home be a safe haven from the strife of a bitter, vengeful parent. It will be the greatest gift you could give yourself and your child. Take the high road. Be the parent you would like to have if you were a child in this situation. The biggest gift you can give your children is the gift of an amicable divorce.

This was first published in the January 2015 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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