Kyle: When I first saw that we’re gonna be discussing courage, Dr. Ramani, I thought, ah, what do you mean we’re discussing courage? We’re talking about divorce. Why is the topic of courage so applicable to this?
Dr. Ramani: Oh I actually think courage is one of the most applicable topics to divorce. There is a lot of courage that gets pinged in a divorce. It’s the courage to go and start a new life after attempting to establish it one way with one person.
It’s the willingness to reinvent and rediscover yourself. It’s the willingness to even face some of the stigmas and biases that the world has against divorce. I think there’s a lot of courage when a person gets divorced, and especially in a world where we still look at people who got divorced as having “done something wrong” or chosen badly.
As though they’re flying in the face of family values. So it is actually quite courageous to buck a kind of conventional tide and say, “No, I am not gonna try to win the family values medal by staying in a relationship that doesn’t feel right.” Or you may not have wanted this divorce.
So there’s a courage in having to face a new life that you may not have chosen for yourself and still get up and fight the good fight every day. That’s also quite courageous. I think anyone who can weather a massive transition of any kind and which divorce is a big one, there’s something quite courageous that you keep on keeping on and still try to show up as a good parent, as just a good person in the world.
That’s courageous.
Kyle: Yes. Does it take courage to take the action or does the action cause us to be courageous?
Dr. Ramani: In terms of the action, do you mean the action of actually getting divorced or pursuing a divorce, or just any action?
Kyle: I think any action that the person considers a courageous one.
Dr. Ramani: I think it’s a bi-directional relationship.
Taking action makes us more courageous, but it does take a little bit of courage to engage in the action. Some people will say, “No, it wasn’t courage. I had no choice. I had to get up. The kids had to get to school. This wasn’t courageous. If I had my way and I didn’t have these kids, I would’ve stayed in bed for a week.”
If you would’ve stayed in bed for a week, but you were willing to get up and make sure that people who needed you actually got to where they needed to go, that’s tremendously courageous because staying in bed could have potentially been an option and you didn’t take that.
So the fact that you get outta bed in the morning in the midst of this grief, and a lot of people in the process of a divorce don’t have the option of just climbing into bed, they have to, again, especially when there’s kids involved, they have to keep life going.
And unlike a death where your workplace might give you a week or two off…nobody’s giving you divorce days. You know you’re going through a divorce. In fact, if anything this is a mess you made. Go figure it out. And so people often don’t get to miss a beat at work or anything like that so that you keep on and keep going and keep trying.
People still keep going to their classes. If somebody went to their professor and said, “I can’t take the final because I’m going through a divorce”, the professor’s gonna go “What? No, you’re not sick. Take the exam.” So people are made to keep showing up even though they’re going through a tremendous stressor.
There is a courage in that. Even if you feel like it’s not courageous.
“I’m a mess. I go home, I do my thing. I collapse when I get home.” But I’m like, you did the thing. So I know people don’t often think of it because I think, like I said, it takes us back to this assumption that somehow divorce is quitting.
I think even in 2024, that’s a message we keep getting is that divorce is giving up, when in fact divorce may be the willingness to say this isn’t working. And two people staying in an unhealthy situation isn’t healthy for anyone involved.
But I also wanna put this in a context too, Kyle, is that in a very short period of time, the laws around divorce have changed. We have to keep that in mind. We’re talking about divorce like it’s been a static state, but if we rewind this tape and we don’t have to rewind it far, no-fault laws around divorce, meaning that there are still some states in the United States where this is true, but it’s not true in most states.
Most states are what we call no-fault states, which is…people can get divorced without having a reason, but those no-fault laws didn’t really start kicking in until the 1970s, which meant there was a time in history in order for people to get divorced, they had to have documented reasons for the divorce, like proof of an infidelity, proof of physical abuse…
And then, and only then could they get divorced.
And think of all the people you know out there who don’t have the proof that their spouse cheated. And they just are like, okay, this is shady and I want out. So there was the no-fault issue. And keep in mind until 1974, a woman in the United States couldn’t get her own credit card.
So even the sense of financial autonomy for women has changed so much. And here’s one thing we know, and this is an interesting statistic: people may not know that when no-fault divorce came into the picture, suicide rates in women dropped significantly, as did rates of domestic violence.
Now, women could leave marriages without having to come up with buckets and buckets of documentation that the court would often not honor. Women had a path out of marriage.
So we are talking about something that goes beyond the psychological loss of a marriage. We’re talking about a sociological phenomenon that has changed the fabric of society.
And since it’s a pretty narrow window of history…in 2024, what are we still around the 50-year mark?…is that there is still a bias and a stigma. There’s still a looking sideways. Tthere’s still a clucking. There’s still a sense of you made a vow between God and your family and all of that, and people still being shamed and made to feel pressure to stay in these relationships.
You better believe that’s courageous.
Kyle: How do we develop more courage?
Dr. Ramani: I think that all of us are probably more courageous than we think, right?
Given the mess that the world is right now, that we actually get up and sometimes have a smile on our face, it’s pretty darn courageous. So I think we save the word courage for people who are going off into battle and doing these sorts of big things.
But in fact, courage is often a million small things that we do every day when we take a chance. We go on a first date, that’s courage. When we go to our first sort of social event after a divorce without our spouse, that’s courage.
Kyle: I know that is courage…does that build more courage?
Dr. Ramani: That builds more courage.
So when you keep taking these chances, you go on that first date and you’re like, okay, the world didn’t end, I could do that again. Or you go to that social event, I could do that again. Or you go on your first trip alone. Like for some people, they’re like, I’ve never booked an air ticket on my own or stayed in a hotel alone.
You’re like – that wasn’t so bad. In fact, it was cool that no one was yelling at me while I checked into the hotel or let me have the aisle seat.
That was actually really pleasant. That builds courage. You may do it again.
And so courage is pushing through something despite the fear. You do that by trying things and pushing through the fear and recognizing it’s a bit like the efficacy. Courage is a better brand.
Kyle: I read a book a long time ago and it challenged the reader to go ask for a stranger’s number every day for a week. And I did it.
Dr. Ramani: How’d that work out for you?
Kyle: I’ll tell you personally…the first time I’m sweating, okay. I’m like, oh my gosh, I can’t believe I’m gonna bother this person at a coffee shop, but by the end of it, I was like, okay do you want my number? Or can I get your number?
Big deal. I don’t know if that made me more courageous, but it certainly took away the stress of this environment or of this situation because I just did it. Once you do it a few times, your body and your mind go, oh, this can happen. And nothing bad happens.
Dr. Ramani: Nothing bad happens, right.
Kyle: Worrying over bad things happening that aren’t happening, you know what I mean? I’m not suggesting that as dating advice. I know we just came out of dating.
Dr. Ramani: No.
Kyle: Ask for the number if you want it.
Dr. Ramani: Yeah. Not every day. But Kyle, there’s a courage in being one’s own self.
There’s a courage in being authentic. There’s a courage in showing up as your true self. Because that’s an incredibly vulnerable position because you’re thinking, “If I show up as my true self and I’m rejected, what then?”
I’ll say, what then is that your true self ain’t gonna work for everybody.
And that’s okay. That’s what courage is. And we are so socialized to be what other people want us to be rather than what we are. Divorce can be a real catalyst to saying, listen, if I’ve been through this, I might as well try to show up as my real self and see what happens.
And you’d be surprised that the kinds of relationships you do build are extraordinary and the people who don’t want any part of it, you just weed it out to suckers.
