Hanna:
Hey welcome to episode 58! I’m going to be sharing some of my personal ideas about when to stay and when to go, from anything, but alot of you might interpret this episode in the context of a relationship. That’s where this thought originated. Someone asked me should I stay in my engagement or no, and of course my answer was “how would I know?” And she was like well let me tell you the circumstances, here’s what happened, here’s what didn’t happen, now what do you think should I leave or stay and work it out. And again I was like “how would I know?” The circumstances don’t matter as what you want to think about it.
So I want you to notice that one of the fucked up five thoughts is in the title of this episode so you know that this thought is a dirty one. Should.
That’s a word that’s part of what I refer to as the F-ed up five, The top 5 thoughts that almost never lead to anything good.
The reason that should is on that list is because it breaks you out of alignment with yourself and your own inner knowing and puts you at the mercy of something outside of you and reiterates the belief that you know nothing John Snow. Haha. No, the belief that you need someone to tell you what to do. That’s a danger to the spirit of your life. To the trajectory of your life and a hindrance to what’s meant for you, what’s coming to you. Right? I was just talking about this idea of shoulding inside the 7 days fo play challenge…which you can still join by the way, until the end of august. Go to my website hannakokovai.com/play to sign up. But I was talking about this as we were having a dance party and I was saying I like to dance it would when when my imagination is constipated. Like, when I can’t come up with new ideas about how to get shit done or what to say or how to approach situations or if I’m resting on what I “should do”. Because resting on what I should do is anti-evolutionary. It’s anti-growth.
No body knows what the fuck you should do except you. And when you use the word should it covers you in should.
I want you to imagine that the word should is actually a pile of shit.
And every time you say it, more shit falls on your head. You don’t want to be a walking pile of shit do you?
No, so stop shoulding on yourself. That’s a waste of your genius and it stinks.
If what you do end up doing happens to align with what someone might say you should do, fine, right, Like I’m going to tlak about when to stay and when to go, IN MY OPINON today, to take of leave, and maybe your thoughts and opinions align and to make some energetic space for the epic downloads your brain has on standby for you and THEN FUCKING LISTEN.
Right, what should I do becomes what do I want to do. Follow that. Follow your lead. Because that’s my short answer to this question. When should I stay in a relationship and when should I leave? When should I stay in a job and when should I leave? When should I stay in a city and when should I leave? When should I stay married and when should I get divorced. The short answer is: when you want to. When you like your reasons.
I don’t know when that is. Only you do ok?
Do you want to leave? Do you like your reasons? Make a plan and go!
Do you want to stay? Do you like your reasons? Make a plan and stay!
I like to notice the realities about life as it is now and imagine that it will always be this way. If nothing changed in the world, if nothing changed in my relationship, if nothing changed in my job, would I want to stay?
Here’s the kicker: there’s no right answer. Like the circumstances don’t MEAN that you should want to leave or stay. You get to decide to stay with the circumstance as it is or not. Like some people want to be in relationships with an alcoholic. I even know a coach who is an expert at coaching women who are in relationships with addicts. They choose to stay and work on their own thoughts about addiction and their own boundaries, right? Some people might say omg you can’t stay with a guy who is a drunk. That’s their opinion. They would likely choose not to stay, and they’d have great reasons. But someone else might choose to stay with someone who is abn alcoholic and like their reasons just as much.
So now this is the ultimate challenge for your brain, to change the question from should I stay or should I go to do I want to stay or go?
Because it gives you the power. And I think alot of times the reason we default to asking what we should do, is because we’re scared of the power. WE’re scared to choose. IF someone told me what I should do then it’s their fault it’s their responsibility, not mine, I just listened to advice.
There is no power in just listening to advice. Thats life of reactivity, versus proactivity.
Do I want to stay or go? What will I DO with that answer?
Ok so let’s talk about my criteria for staying and going. You can use versions of this or just use my thoughts to help you decide on your own criteria.
My first criteria is of course am I safe here? Not do I FEEL safe, but am I actually, physically safe. If yes then move on. If no then you might want to seek support to make a plan and leave the situation. And this could apply to a job? Am I safe within the job like do I get yelled at and berated by someone. Or is the choice to leave safe? Will i be able to support myself and feel myself and keep a roof over my head? Ok.
So now we’re all on the same page with if you are not safe that’s a hard pass. Like wanting to leave a job but putting yourself into a position where you are struggling to put food on the table and keep yourself clothed, then there needs to be another option like a new job right? We get this. We’re not here to stay in abusive relationships or be living on the street homeless.
So now this is my criteria:
First: Am I solving for emotional relief by leaving?
What I mean by this is: is my go-to response to unhappiness, not feeling fulfilled, not feeling loved, feeling unheard or ashamed or unworthy…am I trying to solve for those emotions by changing the circumstance?
IF that is the case, I usually want to stay and play with how to feel better within the current circumstance for at least a bit longer. When I’m like OMG I HAVE TO GET OUT NOW UGH IVE GOTTA GET GONE, that is an indicator to me, within myself, of the future I’ve got coming, which is seriously just another situation that looks alot like this one. I’m ither going to get the relief I wanted and instant gratification and then once I feel better I go back to the same person or I go to a new person right away to try to fullfill me where those emotions were feeling uncomfortable before and then just end up being disappointed in finding that the person, the circumstance isn’t what is making me happy or fulfilled, it’s my thoughts. My thoughts always come with me.
This is the first question I always ask myself when I’m like stay or go? Am I relying solely on circumstances to change how I feel? Am I in a HURRY to escape this. If I’m unwilling to stay and look and learn myself more here, then I can almost guarantee that if I do leave, I’ll end up in the same position again very soon.
Ok so you can stop here and notice this is where thought work comes in for alot of people when they are like okay I want to feel better IN MY CURRENT SITUATION. Right? This is where growing and owning your emotions is mastered. Inside of a circumstance that you aren’t sure about.
Leaving when you feel good in yourself versus leaving when you feel frantic and upset and unhappy. Totally different experiences with totally different outcomes.
Next criteria is do I FEEL safe here in my body?
Sometimes, your body just knows. You have a sense in your BODY that this place is a NO now. This full body No comes after doing thought work, understanding where you’ve played a role in your own victimization and been brave with your boundaries and conversations and you still have this body NO that feels like it’s energetically ejecting you from the situation.
This is something that I don't want you to ignore. No amount of thought work can convince your body to just deal with it when something is out of alignment for you.
A full body no is not something to be ashamed of. You didn’t fail at thought work. You didn’t like, misunderstand the assignment. When you feel NO, and you listen, you 100% understood the assignment. Your body says no and your brain says “This is NOT what I want.” Right. I believe the want/don’t want thought every single time. You’re not grappling with shoulds anymore. It’s coming out of your brain like “I want to go.”
Next criteria:
Have I exhausted self reflection to the point that now the only thing left is to change the other person or the thing that is bothering me?
So this is about knowing that thought work can change how you feel, you know you can’t change anyone else, but you still want to.
Like that question I asked earlier, if nothing ever changed here, if this other person never changed, would I still want to stay? When the answer becomes “no”, I would know it might be time to go.
I teach a tool called the Manual. Basically it’s a made up set of rules for how someone else needs to act. We all have manuals in our heads for other people. Right? My friend should call me to invite me to the party. My boyfriend should kiss me goodnight. My mom shouldn’t come to my house unannounced.
We can do alot when we become away of our manuals.
For instance, we can set boundaries. Like If your manual for a relationship with your mom is that she shouldn’t show up un announced, you can notice that you can’t control what she does but you can say hey here’s what I will do if you show up unannounced. I will not answer the door.
Or, I will simply drop my manual and manage my emotions about it when she comes by. Or I will KEEP my manual and continue to be miserable when she comes by.
If you’re unwilling to drop your manual because you want to keep believing that the other person has to act the way you want, you recognize that, it might be time to end the relationship completely. You are unwilling to accept behavior as it is. Thats okay to do. I don’t want to be here because I genuinely don’t accept this person’s behavior in my life.
Next criteria:
I call this the rule of ten. For you, it might be the rule of 2 or the rule of 100, my number is 10 though. And the rule of ten for me is that if I have had the same conversation with myself or with the other person ten times and absolutely nothing has changed, it might be a sign to go.
We cannot blame other people for not changing. It is not anyone’s job to change for you. But if you’re having the same convo over and over with no different results, meaning the circumstances have not shifted AND you do not want to change your thoughts about it, you get to decide to go somewhere else.
Nxt, who am I doing this for?
Am I trying to appease someone by leaving?
This is just finidning out what my truth is versus looking at what other people would do or have done and basing my decisions off of that. Like sometimes I think we make the mistake of giving off this shameful energy at people who work a 9-5, for example. I do this or I used to do this. Like I gave the impression that somehow being an entrepreneur and leaving your 9-5 was a superior way to do careers. It is not. So if you’re like well Hanna works for herself and that seems cooler than working a 9-5 I should probably leave my job bc it’d probably draining me. No. That’s not a good reason. Ok so who am I making the authority on what is morally superior?
Ok my next criteria is a personal preference thing that some of you may genuinely disagree with. But something to think on.
Do I have to try hard to make this work? For me if the answer is yes always, then it’s not a good fit. I think that some of you might enjoy trying hard and working hard at relationships and circumstances. That might be because you enjoy a challenge, or it might be an outdated belief pattern about what relationships and life if supposed to be like. I don’t accept that life is supposed to be difficult all the time and something we need to fight to make work. I believe in the concept of 50/50, that half the time it’s supposed ot be hard. I do not subscribe to the notion that every day should be a struggle and WORK. When all you do is compromise your values and desires, all you do is fight and all you do is try to work shit out, then there’s no time to actually enjoy your experience. I believe there are places we can go that are aligned with us, that energetically say YES to what we value. Whether that is a person who we are in a relationship with or a circumstance like a job or an opportunity or a place.
Fighting for something that just isn’t working isn’t fun. I like to fight for things that are working but have growth opportunities, right? That’s fun to me for sure. You know the difference.
Ok so those are just some of my ideas about how to figure out how to get to your truest answer of do I want to stay or do I want to go. Of course you can always ask my favorite question of all which is: if it didn’t matter either way, what would I choose? Right. If my life will be 50/50 either way, what do I want to do?
It really can be that simple. So what I offer you humbly today is stop making things so complicated. Ask better questions to get you to direct and truthful answers.
I hope this was helpful! If you want some custom support, come to coaching where you’ll get more than just a general idea but a curated experience just for you.
Now before you go, I want to introduce you to my girl Crystal, who was kind enough to share a few thoughts about her badass life and how Coaching has helped her in making a decision about what she wants, honoring her authentic desire, leading herself through inevitably hard emotions and dropping the guilt about it. She was brave enough to ask hard, direct questions, and trusted her body and her mind to guide her.
Here’s a little tidbit from our conversation we had the other day.