Nicole:

Episode 45

Hey friends. So we’ve been chatting, just all about starting over this new relationship, my business, all these things and this particular chat, it’s chock full of goodness. So the first thing I wanted to tell you is that I’m really, really excited to let you know that my book pre-sale, and all the details, are coming really soon. When I say really soon, by the time you hear this, within the next like, probably two weeks after that, my book is going to be available for sale on Amazon. It’s going to be released this fall of 2023 but I wanted to let you know with intentionality, it’s really important that we get strong presale numbers. I know people will try to pretend or cover over it or be like, oh, yeah, this is for that. No, like presale is important because if we’re able to sell a lot publisher places more orders for books to be printed, and the book actually becomes more accessible.

So I know that as a community, we are able to do this together. I wrote this book for both of us. And you’ve been with me during this entire journey, all the chats that we’ve had so far, all the conversations we’ve had in the DMs on social media, I am telling you all of this is in the book. As a matter of fact, in the acknowledgments of this book, I talk about you in detail. Not just with thanks, but an awareness of the prayers, the hope, the support, the details, the medications, the recommendations, the parenting advice, all the things we’ve had to go through together to get through every single chapter of this story, I acknowledge in this book, because it is such a combination of everything you’ve been through. So I’m really excited. The book is a transformational memoir. It’s everything we’ve been talking about here in full color. I say that because there are so many things that are better honored through words on a page where I can paint the full story where I can take you into the moment where I can tell you things that, frankly, I haven’t been able to say in so many other ways, with the time and the reflection, I’ve really been able to put it down on the page.

And if you’ve ever found any strength or power from our chats that we have here, for things you’ve seen on social or the TV show, I just want you to know that this book is a natural extension of that relationship. And I want to thank you for helping carry me you know, through prayer and support to even finish this process. It has been a journey and also helping me pick the cover. So many of you have been helping me choose the right photos to us on social. So I’m grateful for that as well. And all of this is coming together, you know, we did it, it’s here, the moment is on and we’re kind of running to the races.

So it’s my goal, you know, to be able to say that a regular person like me, just like y’all, ginger ale drinking, Target parking lot, movie listening, hiding in the garage from my kids type of person was able to get a New York Times bestseller, you know that I am no one fancy, but I’m able to do fancy things, if I have the right people behind me and a God that I serve. And so I’m hoping that we’re able to do this together. And all that’s required is for you to go grab a copy of the book. So more to come on all those details, you can find out more on Instagram and in the show notes.

So, friends for this chat, I want to talk to you about something that I really was struggling with this week. I’m going to be really, really transparent, divorce is so so so hard, because it completely levels. I mean, it is like a bomb being dropped on a building, it flattens out so many aspects of your life. Now if you consider that life is something where you are building constantly, you’re building a home, you’re building relationships, you’re building children, you’re building businesses, you know, and you started off as like a parking lot, right? With a basic foundation. Well your vision is never for that for everything you’ve built to disappear. Your vision is that it’ll continue to grow and it’ll expand and it’ll scale and widen.

And so when you go through a divorce or when a divorce is, you know, put upon you or enters into your world. Just imagine that returning to a parking lot status again, and there may be some structures or maybe some outlines and certainly you absolutely know how to build because he did it before but it is a shift because you didn’t expect it. You know, you did not expect to be leveled and that grief continuously comes to you and I’ve talked about that plenty but what I want to talk to you about now is a new chapter in sort of tools that I’m using to not just get through, but to rebuild. And the thing that I’ve been focusing on this week actually came through therapy and I talk about this extensively in my book, because this is transformative wherever you are, if you are in a season of starting over, if you are in a season of hardship, if you are in a season of new careers, new baby, new relationship, this is so incredibly powerful.

What I want you to know, and what I am reminding myself every single day, because let’s show how the truth these chats are also for me is that you have got to stop focusing on what you don’t have, when you run into a problem. One of the biggest lies that worry and anxiety wants us to believe is that there isn’t a solution. Because nothing feeds and allows worry and anxiety to continue them thinking that you are fresh out of options, that you don’t have any choices, that you are stuck in a corner and that you cannot move forward. And I want you to know that there are always always more choices.

And if you find yourself saying to yourself, how can I move forward? How can I transition? How can I move on and you are cycling around, well, this person has this or I’m not this or I’m not pretty or I lack money or I don’t have access to this town, this place, this thing, this teaching, this training? Well, you’re buying into what is unfortunately reaffirmed by society, which is that you’re not enough and that you always lack. Friend, I want you to know that you lack nothing. Nothing is missing with you. I want to tell you how I came to this, in the past week.

So when you’re going through divorce, when I tell you, it doesn’t matter how much money you have or don’t have, you’re gonna spend all of it girl, okay, it is unbelievable. The amount of expenses I feel like I don’t write a check for anything that is under $5,000 anymore. I mean, it is absurd. Because you know, they say more money, more problems, the more stuff you owe, the more checks you can write. And it has been twofold. And you know, this is important, on one end, it has been baffling to me the sheer quantities of money that I’m able to spend maintaining two households as the sole worker, the sole breadwinner, you know, taking care of my kids, you know, as a solo mom, like all of that. But it’s also been impressive to me the way God has provided. Y’all I have not lacked, I have not lacked Lord, I have not God is deeply good because every single day that goes by and I only look at that day, I never need anything in that day, a roof over my head, food in my fridge, kids are good and covered, bills are paid, you know, I am doing it.

So you know, sometimes you gotta clap for own selves. You know what I mean? And I’m clapping for myself and saying, like, girl you are, you’re making it. I don’t know what 510 years is gonna bring. But what I do know is today, tomorrow, and the day after that I am covered. And I am blessed. And I’m grateful for that. But I also want you to know that it doesn’t mean that I’m exempt from having moments of worry and anxiety about what the future will hold. I want to be able to do and have and be everything that I know God has called me to be. I want to be successful, I want to be impactful, I want to leave a legacy, I’ve already done so much in my life that I’m deeply proud of. But you better believe that I still have high expectations for myself, because I want you to know this for yourself too. Everything you’ve accomplished thus far, is only an example of how far you can go.