Let's be honest, most of us were taught to wait our turn, to tone it down, to save it for later. Later. When the kids are grown. Later. When the timing's right. Later, when you finally stop caring what they think. Well, I'm done waiting. I'm Hannah Embree Bell, Texas divorced lawyer, mom, and woman who rebuilt her life from the wreckage. This is Not Saving It for Later.

The podcast guiding women through divorce and beyond. The place where we stop whispering about what's hard and start talking about what's real. Marriage, divorce, money, motherhood, faith, sex, power, no filters, no fake empowerment, BS. Just straight talk and practical truth for women who are done pretending that everything's fine because your next chapter isn't waiting on permission.

and neither are we. Welcome to Not Saving It for Later with your host Hannah Hembree-Bell. This is the podcast guiding women through divorce and beyond. And I wanted to start this podcast to speak to all the women in the middle of divorce where I was just about 10 years ago. And back then there were not podcasts talking about this stuff and I felt completely alone.

and I felt like I had no idea what to do, how to get prepared. I felt ashamed. I felt like nobody else I knew was getting divorced. didn't know who to trust. I didn't have a sense for best practices. I didn't have a sense for like tips and tricks or what to expect, what to hope for, what to wish for. And so I thought about all of that time I spent.

back then feeling lost in the woods. And like, I want to go back and speak to that woman that I was. And this is how I live my own life. Like if you've watched any of my stuff on social media, or as you get to know me through this show, you're going to know like the things I talk to you about are from my own lived experience. I am not good at talking about things that I don't know nothing about, like that I haven't ever lived or whatever. I have to literally learn the lesson myself. That's just how

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I made if human design means anything to you, that is my human design. It is about my lived experience and then transmuting that and taking that gritty stuff and then building something from it. And like the name not saving it for later to me, this was a, it's just, mean, something I realized it really came to me in my kitchen as every morning I was making back then a

cup of coffee now I've switched to tea, gut health, hashtag, you know, whatever, but making a cup of coffee and I realized that every single time I went to the utensil drawer I would take this many like fractional pause before I would go to get a spoon out of the drawer and I never picked the good spoon. I was always saving it for later.

And it hit me, was like, this is the dumbest thing I've ever done because there is more than one spoon and I own a dishwasher and it runs at least twice a day every single day. Like the spoon can get washed yet something in me, maybe like something in you said that I don't deserve to have the good thing now. I need to always put my joy on layaway. It really matters to me what spoon I use. I know that is kind of like a dumb thing.

Maybe I shouldn't say it's dumb. It just does. It just is a fact. It does even now, um, which spoon I use and I withheld that pleasure from myself of having the good spoon. I withheld from myself thinking that, Oh, I do it at some point in the future. And I was like, wait a minute. So started on social media, my little Instagrams and everything talking about things we're not saving for later. And it just kind of caught people in real life would come up to me like, Oh yeah, well, because we're not saving it for later. And I'd be like,

And they'd be like, yeah, you know, like on your, on Instagram. And I'm like, my God, like, okay. They were listening and paying attention. And then it just kind of grew from there. And anytime we make posts about that or whatever, people just speak up. It resonates with them because I think, especially as women, we're always putting our joy on layaway. We're always going to do it later. After this, for you right now listening to this, it might be after this divorce is done. After you've told them you're going to leave.

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after the kids get to junior high, after you've lost 10 pounds, after you make a certain money, after you get the job thing at work. And then my friend, Lily said to me, she said, Hannah, later is a lie.

You're not guaranteed tomorrow. May death be ever your advisor. And that's not meant to be a morbid thing. That's just meant to say that y'all, all have, I think of it like we have this little ticker above our head, you know, like a countdown at a sports game. And we, if we knew what that ticker said or how many minutes we've got left on this planet. And if we could see it, I think we might lives our lives a lot differently, but we all have a ticker. We just choose not to think of it. That's this idea of,

death being ever your advisor. And there's another way of saying that, that the problem is you think you have more time.

You don't know that. And way leads on to way. That's from Robert Frost poem, right? The two roads diverged in a yellow wood. And the thing is each decision you make leads on to a whole nother way, a whole nother path. You're never going to have this exact moment again. And if you're always putting your joy on layaway and you're always saving it for later, I'm...

fearful for a lot of us what would happen is we look back on our entire life and we never did anything we wanted to do. We never experienced pleasure. We never went for our dreams. We always just thought we'd do it at some other time when we when we were more worthy. Really. I think that's what we're actually saying. When I'm more worthy, I'll use the special spoon. But as this podcast is about talking to

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various guests from all different walks of my life and people I've known and whose space in the world has resonated with me is just kind of being like the leader of us women of divorce land. Whether you're just thinking about it, you're in the middle of it, or you're already on the other side and dealing with custody. I think of us all as members of divorce land. It's like we're at a carnival nobody wanted to go to, okay?

And people are not in the thick of divorce. Don't understand. Like it's not like it's fun. I'm not describing a fun carnival. It's like a scary carnival, a fun house carnival. You don't want to be there. Those scary house and mirrors. I never liked carnivals. They're always scary to me, but in there it's like, all right, we're here. We might as well make the best of it. And that is just sort of my attitude. And I've gained this more recently y'all.

than right in the middle of divorce. So if you're in the middle of your divorce, you're you are full of shit. Also, if you don't like cussing, then you may not like the show. I just do say cuss words sometimes. But if you're in the middle of it and you can't even imagine life on the other side, like I want you to know that I've been there. But here's the way you begin to imagine a bigger life, is you let little pieces of a bigger life come into your experience.

Maybe it's through this podcast and hearing some of the things that people who are on the other side have to say. Maybe it's consuming different sorts of content, going into new places, being into different rooms, because your ability to experience joy now, pleasure now, is always in your present moment. And it's at the edge of your capacity. And when people say capacity, that's one of those words people say, they want to sound smart, and it's like, what are they really saying? It's just sort of like, how big is your bucket?

Your bucket right now is maybe small or small to medium size. But did y'all know there's like bathtub size buckets of ability to receive good stuff? Swimming pool size, ocean size buckets of ability to receive good and pleasure and joy? I mean, at least that's what I'm told. I'm probably at a bathtub size bucket. When I used to be at a thimble, is that what that thing is called? The little, yeah, I think it's called a thimble.

Hannah Hembree Bell (08:43.99)

Little bit, okay? A little teaspoon maybe, the spoon thing. A teaspoon size. Now I'm probably compared to that at about a bathtub size, but I've heard people talk about good and joy and pleasure that's as big as an ocean. And you get there by degrees. So my hope with this podcast and every single episode is that your capacity to experiencing a life now, I'm gonna cry just talking about this, a life now.

that's worthy of you, that's wild and precious, that your capacity for that stretches a little tiny bit with every conversation. I'm not asking you to become a new person overnight. That's not necessarily how change works, right? Like before you know it, you look up and you're different. That's how the experience was for me in divorce. And it's probably the same for you or will be that it's like, it evolves bit by bit.

by bit and you look back and pretty soon you're like that gal I was a year ago still in that totally shitty marriage miserable and unhealthy and exhausted and burnt out. Who is she? Like that person me now it's been 10 years for me about I wouldn't recognize her. And it's hard for me to imagine and it also takes a degree of grace as you start to grow and change like

May we have grace with ourselves and go back and treat that woman and that person with kindness. Because if you're anything like me and perfectionism runs hard, as soon as we go through a stage and we grow through that limitation, that we go to the next bucket, we immediately are mad at and hate the bucket we just got out of. We hate that lower level of capacity if you're anything like me. And in one episode that may even happen, you may feel shame about the choices you made that got you into this marriage.

about a pattern you repeated, about a silly way of thinking you're still holding on to, about the joy that you're putting on layaway. So like just bring some grace and compassion for yourself in this process. And like, I'm pointing at you, cause it's like, do as I say, not as I do. This is an ongoing lesson for me to learn all of the time. But I think that that's what we get to do is just keep showing up. Nobody on the show expects you to be perfect. I'm not perfect. I try to be as up.

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and honest and direct with you about my own real life and what I'm really experiencing what it was like then and what it's like now. But what my heart is for this show is like the way I'm envisioning it is like across the camera from me is the Hannah who's still in that place in that very challenging marriage in a very challenging spot for myself where I felt like

I wasn't looking forward to anything anymore. Where I thought that happiness was a fairy tale that they sold us in the Cinderella movies. Where I'd sort of given up on looking forward to anything because that just meant more time with the person I was married to. And ultimately I now know how to say this, more time with the person I was then. And I didn't like either of those people. And that me who felt all wrong and disgusting and despicable for wanting more.

If I could have back then made myself fit into my too small life, I would have, I think, I mean, it wasn't possible. So it's like, you can't roller skate in a buffalo herd. But the thing is I would have, I think, put myself back into a smaller box, but I ain't made like that. And I'm not made like that because I'm supposed to come tell y'all that none of y'all are made for that either. And I'm so grateful I wasn't able to stuff it in and that I wasn't satisfied. It's like that Hamilton song, right?

that never satisfied. When I heard that song for the first time, ooh, it pierced my heart. And I thought, am I never gonna be satisfied? Because I was taught as a woman to be good, worthy, a good gal, a good mom, a good wife, a good whatever, that I needed to be grateful for what I had. And I needed to make do. And wasn't I so lucky that at least my kids were healthy and I was healthy and whatever.

and all these things and that's all also true. But the only people saying that to you are the ones who want what you're trying to get or like are afraid of you becoming something more. People who have more than you who are like a step ahead of you on the journey, don't remind you, hey, you should be grateful for the bare minimum. That's not what they're doing. Nobody on this show is gonna say that. It's acknowledged right now. So we're all very clear. It is acknowledged that

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We are grateful for the good things that we have. Okay, stipulated in lawyer world. yeah, cause I'm a divorce lawyer for my job. I haven't even said that yet. I'm a divorced divorce lawyer and it is stipulated. That's the thing we do in court. Like, so somebody doesn't say all this stuff that like you agree with. You're just like, I'll stipulate your honor to whatever. So stipulated that we are grateful for our healthy children, our own health. We're grateful. We live in America. Like we're grateful for all of these different things. Okay.

We're talking about the next level of that. Like if you're able to listen to a podcast, I already know a few things about you. Like you have some sort of a technology device to find me on, right? That means probably you have enough food to eat. Probably you've got some running water, right? So like there are a lot of things that were all agreed that we're grateful on, but what you're never going to hear anybody on this podcast tell you. And I think people ahead of you on the journey, they're not going to be like, look, you should be grateful sister. You should want less.

this podcast for me and for all of, I'm just one of us, okay? I don't have this stuff figured out and I'm learning as much as anybody else from every single guest where they're saying, hey, you can have more. Your life doesn't have to medium suck because essential belief of mine and essential tenant of mine is that women and men too, okay, I'm gonna talk about that in a second, but like, I think people really,

settle into accepting a life that like medium sucks. Okay, maybe they're not an abusive situation. Maybe it's not the worst thing that ever happened, but it's not good either. There's a lot of at least, well, at least I'm healthy. Well, at least he's a decent dad. Well, at least I've got my job, but we're not living an at least life. We're living a the most life.

best case scenario Lily talks to us about in that episode about we're living our best case scenario because we say so. And here's the thing, I'm not going to tell y'all anything that I don't know to be true because I've already done it. And so the me 10 years ago that didn't have any money that felt completely furious with herself and her body for wanting a different, bigger life, the me that was ashamed and would have done absolutely anything else.

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If I could have continued to survive in that marriage, like I would have done anything else, but it was not a choice for me. Like that is the choice that I think all of us listening to the show agree that there's something in you at least if it got you here and you're still listening, that something in you says, I think there's something more. This can't be all that it is. If you're anything like me, that's a thought you've had regularly. Like, is this it?

So I went to school and junior high and I made it through all of that. And then I went to high school and I graduated and I went to college and I met this person. I got married and ta-da, I got these cute kids. Why am I still so miserable? My moot court coach when I was in law school, that's like a debate team for law school. I had adapted y'all and this may be you too, where on the inside I was asking those questions. But on the outside, was, looked like I had everything together.

Right? was succeeding in school. Look at you. You're driving an hour and a half to commute to law school every day. And you've got these three adorable, perfect children and you're married and like, look at you and you're succeeding on the moot court team. You're top of your class in law school. And I remember flying to a moot court meet, a competition. I wasn't prepared. I was not ready. I was kind of a mess to be honest, but on the outside I was like, you know, looking cute and whatever.

And go and I remember talking to my moot court coach and he was asking about me and how things were going in my life. was like, oh great and you know he would ask some other questions and I remember him saying to me, Hannah, like. When you talk about anything that really matters in your life. You are so incredibly sad. And I find that to be a profound waste of an amazing.

even talking about it all these years ago. Ricky Poole, I'm sure glad you said that to me. Because he was right and I felt seen. and to be seen in this life. I hope when you listen to this show that you feel seen in the same way. That if when you're really talking about the things in your life that really matter, if you're profoundly and horribly sad, I agree that it's a waste.

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of an amazing life and it's not what I want for you and you may not have the Ricky Pulse in your life to tell you. So your divorced sister Hannah, she's gonna tell you because I believe in you because there's a fundamental truth that in this show we believe. You are worthy because you exist. Let that sink in. Really hear me. You are worthy because you exist.

Not because you're a wife, a mom, a good girl, a good daughter, pretty, skinny, smart, strong, wealthy, well-off, white, brown, black, yellow, Republican, Democrat, none of that. All of those labels are derivative of you. You don't have to do a thing to be worthy of living a good life.

And I think most of us are waiting for our permission slip. Mine came in the form of Deidre, who was a counselor at St. Mary's Law School where I went to school. It the first time I'd ever gone to a therapist or a counselor or anything, but y'all, I was not doing good. I was wasting away. I, like I said, was not looking forward to anything anymore. And I remember saying to my best friend, my law school bestie, Megan, saying, you know, I don't

I don't think I'm doing okay. And I have a way of like survivors, y'all know we survive, we get things done. We keep serving the peanuts as mom, moms, but I was something in me was still saying, I don't, I don't think I'm doing okay. And so in law school, the counselor was free. I mean, I think it was free. Maybe I paid for it. My tuition. don't know. But anyway, I went over there and was talking to her and was talking about, but I can't, you know, my, my marriage and the situation and everything that I was going through and

talking about how like it just kind of is what it is, right? Like this is just how it is. My life is just this way. It just, you know, I needed to just buckle, you know, pull myself up by my bootstraps and buckle in and hang on and tie a knot at the end of my rope. And, you know, just try harder, be better, be more content. Couldn't I just be grateful? And I remember her just saying to me, Hannah, you deserve to have a happy life.

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Before we go any further, let me ask you something. What if you didn't have to Google your way through divorce at 2 a.m.? What if you actually had a place with real women to talk to, real answers, and real time? That's The Circle. It's where I go live every single week, unpack the hard stuff, and help you stop spinning. Go to myconfidentdivorce.com backslash circle because confusion costs more than clarity ever will. I cannot wait to see you in

A tool I recommend for every client that I work with and every woman that I would meet on the street is called Our Family Wizard. And y'all, this app, this website changed my life. I cannot overstate its impact because we all know that the hardest part, once you're done with the whole divorce thing and you've got your papers, it isn't the decree, it isn't the calendaring, it's the communication. Because if you're in a situation like I'm in,

You will get messages from everywhere. Text message, Snapchat, Instagram, Facebook. Now, I mean, it's even worse with all the social media. Phone calls, direct messages. It goes on and on. But what our family wizard does is brings that all into one place. So you have one place to check for messages, one place to be interrupted from your daily life to deal with the whole co-parenting situation. like.

In addition to the messaging, it does amazing things like tracks expenses in real time so you don't have to argue about who did what with what receipt. It does calendar entries so you're not like, wait, sorry, I never got that invite. And you have that whole BS where you're not sure what to do. You can check in in real time if you're ever worried about any future enforcement of the provisions in your decree or your judgment.

This This app changes lives and they've got special promotions and deals for listeners of the show. You can get access to those at ourfamilywizard.com forward slash HHB. I was like, oh yeah, I know, I know. And I tried to let it go. She said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

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I'm going to give you the same permission slip that Deidre gave me. You deserve a happy life.

because you exist. one way to get there for you, if you're here, may be through divorce. There are lots of other ways. Like I am not pro divorce. I am pro people living a life that doesn't medium suck. And to do so, a lot of people need to take the off ramp that, you know, get off this one highway they're on of divorce. What divorce does is gives you a second chance.

at reinventing your identity or a third chance or a fourth chance or however many chances. It gives you an opportunity to begin again because you will not be the same person pre-divorce and post-divorce. Like however your divorce goes, you just ain't gonna be the same. Now you have a choice to make. You can be bitter or you can be better. On this show, I'm going to assume and we all choose better. We're making decisions to be better. Bitter is backward facing.

better faces forward, up into the right as I always say, like on a work chart, you always want to go up into the right. And that is a choice that we have to make together because when you make that decision, bitter or better, what you get to do and what we can do together is let that be the North Star and the guiding principle through your divorce and beyond.

so that every decision that you make, you're like, okay, if nothing else, if you get nothing else out of this whole show, that alone is worth the zero dollars you paid for it, okay? Is this thing I'm about to do in the middle of my divorce or after or with a custody or whatever, is it gonna get me closer to being bitter or closer to being better? If it's better, then do that thing. If it's bitter, don't proceed, right? It's almost as simple as that.

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but we wanna over complicate it. There's millions of videos and podcasts and all the things, but I wish I would have learned that such a long time ago. And I talk about it in the My Confident Divorce course about developing your one question. And there's this story they use in some business books and stuff like that, but it talks about the British rowing team who was really crappy and they wanted to be really good.

And the way they got there is by developing their one question. Their one question was, will this make the boat go faster? And before they did anything, should I go on vacation? Should I eat this cheeseburger and french fries? Should I get up at 5 a.m.? They asked themselves the question, will this make the boat go faster? And if so, yes. If not, no. So for you, that's the question. And it can just be as simple as bitter or better. Will this make me?

better or bitter and then make that choice. So you're gonna hear lots of examples of how to do this throughout the show. But like what I mean by this one question is this notion of like, let's say you're gonna maybe send a text message or let's do a, yeah, a text message and your X factor, which is what we call the person you're either divorcing about to divorce, thinking about divorcing or divorced from.

Okay, the X factor sends you something calling you a who's a what's it accusing you of never being able to remember anything because the soccer cleats weren't in the bag. Even though you really know that the soccer cleats, he kept them last time and they're in the back of his car, but he doesn't know that. And you feel the desire initially to respond immediately. Tell him he's a who's a what's it. Tell him those.

freaking shoes are in the back of your truck, you big old moron, you're always doing, you know, going back down this whole road, Responding in emotion. Now, just think this through, you caught this text message that's incendiary, right? Like it makes you mad, triggering, and then you want to respond. And you've already crafted this really good thing. And now we got chat GPT. So chat GPT may even help you, probably my chat GPT would help you slow down, but let's pretend your chat GPT is sassy and like, well, yeah, let's get him.

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But if you stop and have this one question, you can say, okay, will sending this message make me better or better? Will it get me closer to or farther away from the life I want to have after this is all over is ultimately what you're asking. Is sending a pop-off text message that you may see again in court by being a punk and getting down in the mud and rolling around with him, is that going to advance your goals? I'm going go ahead and just venture out to tell you no, it's not.

And you're the sort of person who thinks before you act, least you try to, right? If you're, we're always all trying, we can always get better. And you're not gonna do that thing. So that one question, that's a concept that's gonna come up throughout the show, right? There are these certain things that we believe. Another thing we believe that we have to get clear on right from the beginning is this show is pro-woman. It is not anti-man. I am not anti-men.

I am talking to women. Remember at the beginning, I talked about how I talk through my lived experience. I am a woman. I'm a sister. I'm a daughter. I'm a friend. Right? I'm a woman. So when I'm talking to people, I know how to talk to women. I kind of know how we think in general. I know the woman, the feminine experience. I don't have the same resonance and words and thought patterns in a man. like, I so clearly have to teach from what I learned. I can't even get inside their head. I don't know.

why or what they're doing that thing. So in doing this, the reason why I'm always talking to women and I get this stuff online all the time is because this is who I know to talk to and I have a special love for women and I am pro-woman, but I am pro-men. I think that the world is desperate for awakened, thoughtful, kind, masculine energy men. I think we are desperate and I celebrate

them and everything it takes for them to get there and everything about these guys. Okay, so just, I don't need all the millions of comments you might say, or I just don't want you to get the wrong impression that this is, yay women and fuck all those guys. I don't feel that way. think it takes, the world needs both sides of this. It's just that this is our space scales where we talk about the things from our own perspective, but we wanna make sure we're on the same page about that part from the front.

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So you may be asking yourself, gal on the internet or in the Apple or whatever, why should I listen to you? And you should be asking that question. All these people you follow online and you listen to, like, how do you know? Why should I give you a precious ounce of my life force energy? Because that's what you're doing. I take so seriously the responsibility of you gifting your energy and presence to this conversation. Like, even as I sit here in this studio recording this right now, I'm thinking of you.

And we are co-creating an experience together. That's how I believe that it works. So I want to be very respectful of the investment that you're making. So here's the deal about me. I am a divorced divorce lawyer. And I think that really matters because not only do I, I'm not just one of these people who's preaching at you about all the things, law, law, law, divorce, divorce, divorce, from the perspective of someone who's never actually done it. But y'all, I am divorced in a really hairy, messy situation.

the divorce and the custody situation. It ain't even done yet 10 years later. So I have lived it. When I talk to you about whether or not to send the pop off text message, I've had to consider that at least 1000 times. And what to do if your kids are saying, hey mom, I wanna go live with dad. I know what that is like. It's happened to me twice. And I think that that piece,

those two married, the law part, so I have a sense of how law things work. From having been working with thousands of clients, I have a law firm that, when we're recording this, has about 45 people there based in Austin, Texas. This is what I do as my day job. And personally, I live with this all of the time. So you're gonna hear me talk about tools that I use, like our family wizard.

that I've been using for six, seven, eight years and strategies that I've put into place that I learned from books like Divorce Poison and tactics I've used from all of the different therapists and amicus and all these different court things that I've had to live through. Y'all, when I got divorced, my kids didn't live with me primarily and I was the mom and I was like a pretty good mom. I don't take for granted.

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that at the end of this, your kids are gonna live with you. And I ain't selling you a bill of goods. I'm gonna warn you in advance of what could happen that you ain't thinking about. I got your back, right? I'm looking out for you like a big sister would is how I kind of think of it because I've been through this situation myself. just kind of backing up a little bit, I'm from a little bit of small town in East Texas, hashtag Go Vandals called Van.

The population sign outside of my town said 1,854, like my entire life. My graduating class had about 100 people in it. I then went off to college far, far away to a little small Christian school. I thought you go off to college and you come back married. That's what I did. At 21 years old, I got married to a guy. We got engaged after nine months that I met serving tables.

And then we, when I was 23, I had my first daughter. And then in just a couple of years after that, I had three kids. My kids were 18 and 15 months apart. And I only grew up as an adult, as a mother. So my growing up as an adult really started to happen more like when I was 30. Because in my 20s, I was just surviving. You got three kids. Like when I brought my youngest home from the hospital,

My middle one was not walking yet. He was a little tubbo who didn't walk till kind of late. He wasn't walking yet and their big sister wasn't yet three years old. So like that is a wild and I had C-sections every time. So like that is a wild set of circumstances. And then I started to kind of come up for air as they got a little bit bigger and like this call to more not living a life that mediums like my life to me kind of medium sucked. I wasn't content.

I definitely wasn't excited, I wasn't thrilled. I knew there was more. just felt like I was living the wrong life. So what happened for me, of everybody has this divorce story. And mine is I was turning 30 years old and in this little corner office, like not even an office, like a corner of this bedroom, my master bedroom back then.

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scrolling and I'm using a mouse like some scrolling on Facebook on an actual desktop. had a desktop if you all remember what that is like a big box that sits on your computer. I'm scrolling through Facebook and you know just going to trip down memory lane because I'm turning 30 and I'm looking and I'm seeing every picture that we're in and me and my now ex-husband we were never standing next to each other and in every picture I remember what was happening and why he was mad this time.

or what was the problem on that trip or what had happened immediately before in every single picture. So it was this idea of this Facebook perfect life with these, I have really cute kids, like these really cute children, they were adorable. And look at us, but I knew what was really happening inside and I'm a person who that bothers, right? That bothered me that those two things were inconsistent. And I was thinking to myself, you know, I wonder when my real life is gonna start.

and this like almost audible voice, I think like God, universe, Jesus, Buddha, whatever it is that you believe in said to me, Hannah, this is your real life. And I caught my breath even now to this moment, it just stops, my world stops spinning. It's like I thought that this was a dress rehearsal. I thought that one day in the future, I'd start living the life that was worthy of me.

And then I heard this is it. And every moment for the rest of my life was born out of that moment. And a lot of other things happen. And I made choices I wouldn't make the same choices again. I made mistakes. I made some good choices. I was also really strong. I can still hold my head up pretty high for how I handled the whole situation. But

It wasn't easy getting out of there. My kids didn't live with me primarily at first. When you tell people that they automatically assume like you're on drugs, you're an alcoholic or something. None of that was true for me. And I didn't have the money to get divorced back then. I had not planned or prepared. I had no strategy. I was just like, okay, I got to get divorced. And so I'm going to go do it now. Essentially it's it is.

Hannah Hembree Bell (36:25.554)

maddening to me now how I approached it the same energy with like, you're gonna, if you're like walking outside of Petsmart or something, they're having like cute pets out in the parking lot. And you're like, I think I'll get a cat. Like, and you didn't think it through and you weren't planning on getting a cat, but you just take it home and you're like, my God, what am I gonna do? It's torn up my whole house. That's sort of the energy of it for me. That's how much thought I put into it. Like I knew something needed to change. And I spent all of my energy making that decision as so many of us women do.

And they leave nothing for the swim home. So I wasn't prepared. And what happens y'all when you get divorced or can happen is your entire life can be put through a microscope. And I was in law school and on the moot court team and doing, I don't know if I was doing journal by then or all of that, but anyway, it was a lot. And I was pursuing that and I wasn't doing great. I was not emotionally in my best spot. was worse than the gum on the bottom of your shoe. I was a mess inside my own heart because I was so torn. I wasn't supposed to get divorced.

Like God hates divorce, don't you know? I was only ever gonna get married once. I wasn't gonna go back on my word. So that was all true on the one hand. And then on the other hand, I was living like that. My moot court coach saw in me a profoundly sad life. And I knew that I was different. I knew I was worthy of more than that. And so anyway, what ended up happening was I ended up settling.

the terms of my divorce that had my kids live with my ex, I paid child support because I knew that I would get beat at court because I didn't have any of my evidence together. I had not set up my life. If you were just looking at it from, you if you squint your eye and you kind of look, I'm making a pirate face. If you're listening, like, well, look at it this way. Then you might believe some of those things that weren't true that my ex was saying about me back then. And I knew I'd get beat. I know how to know when I'm And so

I also knew that he would never stop. So I resolved to live like what Sheryl Sandberg talks about my plan B, option B life. Okay. And I had resolved like, okay, I guess this is how this is going to go. And I'll be the best, you know, I'm using quotes, dad, like the other parent, the every other weekend parent, I'll be the best version of that, that I can be. I'll show up to all the school things. Like I'll do all of this and

Hannah Hembree Bell (38:50.922)

It ended up that living that life was very, very difficult. Someone who wants you gone in every sense of the word can make that very hard on you and on your kids. Ultimately, my kids were having a hard time and I went back and filed for custody modification because I believe it's what I had to do to protect them. And it is not advisable to do it this way.

The way I did it is very, very, very, very, very, very hard to change custody after the divorce is done, to upend the kids' lives after things had just finally gotten settled. If there was another way to have done it, I swear to God I would not have done it. But I felt duty and responsibility to them as their mother meant I had to do it. So then y'all, what happened was I went back through a whole custody modification. That's what happens after the divorce if you try to change custody.

You go say like, judge, hey, things are different now. Things didn't work out the way that we thought that they would. And it's best for the kids if things change. OK? And that costs like six figures in legal fees and years of time and a lot of heartache and battle. But the difference for me was that I had a plan and a strategy and techniques and some more support.

I'm now remarried, that's the happily ever after of this. But back then I was just dating my now husband, Drew. I had his support, also friends. It was just a very different circumstance. And I had planned and gathered the evidence and gotten all of that together. And so like, it's in that energy that I bring to you this show, there's like a planning element to I've created the My Confident Life.

women circle and the My Confident Divorce Program speaking exactly to that, helping women prepare for divorce without losing their kids money and sanity. So like that's one of the things that I've got going. If you like the podcast and you want to get connected with other women who are in the same space and they don't want to feel alone. They don't want to feel like they're swimming upstream all by themselves. They don't want to feel overwhelmed and confused. You can meet us in the circle and

Hannah Hembree Bell (41:15.284)

I had made this course called My Confident Divorce where we walk through those things I'm telling you, like those strategies and that prep. I crystallized them down based on my experience as a divorce lawyer, working with thousands of people. And then also my experience as a litigant, a case, someone living this life and putting them all together in this course, which you can get for free in the circle. First, we charge money for it, but I just did not want any of this to stand in the way.

of the listeners just like you making sure that they don't have to live the experience that I did and learn this the hard way because you can go in and be prepared and not get backed into a corner where your only option is to settle or you know go to court and have to spend a good jillion dollars doing that. So I've got that going on and then also all of this experience and getting prepared and ready and even thinking about the divorce decision I'm sort of

wrapping up together in a book called Carry Your Own Groceries. And that is talking about the experience of being able to handle your own life. Like you don't have to stay in a marriage so that you'll have someone to carry your groceries. I had had this dream.

whenever I was thinking about getting divorced back then. So the de-dress situation where I'm having the permission slip moment, my moot court, like all of this stuff. The thing is when you're ready, the road rises up to meet you. Helpers show up. know, Mr. Rogers says, look for the helpers. In your own life, you can look for the helpers. Like when you're there, it starts to converge all of these different parts of your life. So I was having this dream and I remember I'd like come back from Walmart in the dream and going around the back of like an SUV.

and go in to get all of the groceries out of the back of this car. And I'm trying to load them all on my arms and I'm like, but wait a minute, how am I gonna get all of these groceries in? He was the one, he always did that, always carried all of the bags and that kind of thing. So like, how am gonna get all these groceries in if he's not here to carry all the groceries? And then in the dream, I was like, I'll carry my own groceries. So that's the book.

Hannah Hembree Bell (43:28.652)

you can carry your own groceries and we're gonna walk through there, like making the divorce decision, deciding whether this is the right move for you and then how you can practically get ready so that you don't find yourself in the exact position that I was in. And we'll talk about different parts of that throughout the show. We're doing it in season. So this is for season one and we've got really great guests lined up. We're gonna talk about.

mediation and like what that means practically for you. We're going to talk about how to bring your body into the conversation and what it means to want more. We're going to talk about some woo woo stuff and identity and who we are as women and what that means and like what about the divorce glow up like what do we need to do practically if we're ready for that phase of the experience. We're going to talk about money and we're going to talk about how to get

back our power when it comes to our finances so we never again make decisions in our life because we need a man's money. So you're going to want to stay tuned throughout the season there's going be something from the sort of isoteric like things in our head we're talking about and spiritual kind of woo stuff if that ain't for you just like you can tune that part out okay. All people are welcome here let me say that about me as a person. I have compassion and empathy

and see the beauty in love in all people, all kinds, all sorts. You don't have to be a certain way. You don't have to believe a certain thing to be here. I think the thing we'll probably all have in common is divorce has touched our life in some way and we are collectively wanting to.

Hannah Hembree Bell (45:07.87)

leverage that experience to build a better life that doesn't medium suck. I think that's the only prerequisite to hang around. So if you want to take this conversation, you know, online, offline, how would you say it? Because we're getting out of the podcast world and like into a community and you want to be a part of our group, of our tribe, you can go to myconfidentdivorce.com and just sort of

follow along, we're gonna be talking about each episode and talking about big takeaways and practical ways we're putting things into practice, right, and into our daily lives. And we would love to have you be a part of that conversation. There's lots of extra bonus stuff in there and I go live sometimes and we talk about, you know, from the nitty gritty to what to do in certain situations and, you know, we're talking about what do we, holidays are coming up, what are we getting our kids? So like.

There's a wide gamut and we really would love to have you be a part of the ongoing conversation. Something that I've been afraid to say out loud, but I'm willing to say to all of you, just my best friends on all of God's green internet is I want more. And I'm never going to stop wanting more. Literally as I say that, I feel like I need to whisper it to y'all a little bit.

My body is hot. I feel a little sweaty. Because as a woman, I think we are so conditioned to make do and to settle and to acquiesce our way to a wasted existence. Because then we're easier. We're easier to control. We're easier to manipulate.

were easier to use, were easier to leverage, were easier to...

Hannah Hembree Bell (47:13.01)

mine for value. So what I'm willing to say to y'all this whole entire podcast ultimately is pretty sneaky because what we're saying gals is we want more and we deserve it and we're gonna get it even if it means we gotta leave that M******* to do it.

If this is the only episode of Not Saving It for Later that you ever listen to or watch, what I want you to know is that you are worthy because you exist. You are worthy of living a happy life and that later is a lie. That string of logic to me is one complete thought.

And really on the other side of that concept is the life you've always dreamed of. Because if you believe that you're worthy and that you deserve therefore to have a happy life and you understand that doing it later, that's a lie. Cause you don't even know that as soon as you're done hearing this next word out of my mouth, you're not going to get hit by a bus. We just do not know drop dead of an aneurysm. Everybody knows that story. We cannot wait ladies. We cannot put our joy on layaway.

Or, okay, here's the thing, everybody in your life may want you to do that. It is inconvenient for you to want more and to think that you deserve more. It is inconvenient for everybody who's benefited from your acquiescence, from your being less, for your playing small, from your willingness to lead a medium suck life. There will be clawing and gnashing of teeth when you pull back your own power that says, know what? God damn it, no.

I refuse because here's the thing, where does it stop? Where is the domino stop? Because if we do that, we model it for our daughters and our sons, the same exact behavior. And then if all of us are doing that, where we're all living life for everybody else around us, and then all of us are doing it, whoever actually gets to enjoy anything. And then what's the point?

Hannah Hembree Bell (49:32.3)

What's the point of life, ultimately? I think, perhaps, it's to have a good time.

You may have a million counter arguments. I'm a lawyer, I can just hear you cross examining me, objecting in your head. But just think about it. What else would be the point? But ultimately to enjoy yourself. You ever meet somebody full of joy and full of love and full of life? Do you know somebody like that? You can't get enough of them. People want to be near them. So maybe a little bit of that, like, I don't know.

oozes onto you and it's catching. You know those people when you're around them, man you just leave feeling better.

I want for each of you, and if this is the only one that you hear, you to know that too can be you. It can get that good. It can be that wonderful, pleasurable. Now, not.

later, not once you've lost 10 pounds, not once you're finally divorced or finally got that promotion, I want you to finally stop, you know, watching Netflix on the weekends and you start eating salads like you're supposed to, right? Not once you do all these things. It is available to you now. You are essentially one decision away from that life. You are literally one, three decisions away from a completely different life. Did you know that? Did you know?

Hannah Hembree Bell (51:09.752)

that in a couple of decisions, your life can be completely different. And it is both the most encouraging and terrifying piece of information you can learn today, in case you didn't know, because then it's all on you. Did you know your entire life is your responsibility? 100 % of it is on you. You can't control what happens to you, but between stimulus and response, there is a space, and in that space lies your freedom.

Victor Frankl quote, okay? And it's in that space where I find you, okay? How are you going to act and react to your own life? That is where you get to take full radical personal responsibility for how things turn out. Around here, we don't point at, we're not even making the person you're divorcing the, you know, villain here, because then that makes you the victim. But I'm not gonna claim for you victimhood.

I'm not gonna claim for them villainhood. It's just a thing that didn't work out. I used to talk about my own marriage, old marriage, first marriage, very differently. And I made him the villain and look at poor, woe is me.

And then I started learning some of this stuff and I'm like, wait a minute. I allowed myself to be in that situation. I co-created that reality. I'm not blameless here. I have a part in this. And it's once I asking those questions and sitting with those answers that I started to understand this is all on me. my God, it's all on me. And also it's all on me.

It is all on me now that you mention it. It is delicious. And because it's in that space that you get to create the life that you want. And it is my ardent hope and wish and goddamn we will have done it. If any one person listens to any of these shows and makes a new choice to say, you know what? I'm not saving it for later.