Yesterday, Emma shared how her divorce taught her it’s OK to fail. She was married for just a year and as she puts it, .. “left my husband on my lunch break.” From there she went back home to her parents and found it was where her heart wanted to be. Here’s how she describes it.
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On the day I decided I was leaving, I knew that home was the safest place for me to go at the time but I think I also knew on some level that it was forever. It was a wonderful opportunity in a crisis – to make a move that my heart really wanted to make anyway.
After an initial period of hiding out and licking my wounds, I tried to spend a lot of time with the people I love. I hadn’t gotten to do that in years because I hadn’t live in my home state and I hadn’t seen my family except over the holidays and summer vacations.
At the time, I was working in publishing and I was very lucky that my company supported telecommuting. So I was able to keep my job and that enabled me to go through with my divorce. I probably wouldn’t even have been able to pay for my divorce or pay down the debts I’d accrued if I hadn’t been able to keep my job. That was an amazing gift.
I’m proud of myself for moving back. Before, I was more focused on my career and I’d move to wherever I needed to live for the right job. I was so achievement-driven I didn’t realize that where I wanted to be all along was home.
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I think in many ways Emma was fortunate to be able to go back home to her parents and I certainly hope that my children would do the same, if they were in a similar situation. For many people, complications with jobs and children mean that it’s simply not an option. It wasn’t an option for me and in truth, it’s been a long time since I considered the town I grew up in to be “home.”
Home isn’t just a physical shelter – home is where we feel most grounded, safe. Divorce is a time of great change and for Emma, it meant opening herself up to the realization she’d been living her life in a way that wasn’t true to herself.
I think my divorce was part of my quest to find home. I don’t feel I found it yet. Have you?
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