What I Know | Ep #41

I’m Andrea Giles and you’re listening to the, Heal from Infidelity podcast,
episode number 41, What I Know.

Hello and welcome to the, Heal from Infidelity podcast for courageous
women, learn not only to heal from their spouse’s betrayal, but to become
the boldest, truest, most decisive, and confident versions of themselves
ever. If you know, there’s more freedom than the life you’re currently
living, but don’t quite know how to get there? You are in the right place.
Stick around to learn how to create a life that will knock your own socks
off. Is it possible? It is and I’m here to show you how. I’m your host,
Andrea Giles. Are you ready? Let’s dive in.

Hello, everybody. Welcome to episode number 41. I hope everyone is doing
well, that you’ve had a good week. So, today’s going to be a little bit
different. I am just going to talk to you today. Usually I have something
that I’ve researched out, that I’ve spent time writing out and working
through before I come and record it. This time, I just have some things I
want to say. Some things I just wanted to share and talk about, mainly
because it’s been on my mind and I’m always thinking about, “What might be
helpful to my listeners?” I’m wondering if some of the things that have
been on my mind might be helpful to you as well.

As you well know, my friends, life can throw us some curve balls, right?
Life sometimes is not what we think it’s going to be. We make our plans, we
think we know how things are going to go and then we are proven wrong again
and again and again. Sometimes it can make us question things like
question, what do I even know? What can I count on? In my own life, there’s
been some circumstances of late that have been a lot for me personally, to
think about and to process and have brought these questions up of, what do
I know?

And so, today, I want to share with you what I know, and I’m going to give
you some specific examples of how I know. Okay? My hope is that, by sharing
these things, it will remind you of what you know. There’s things that you
know, but sometimes we forget that we know and I’m hoping to jog your
memory. Also, I hope that you can borrow some of my belief in some of these
things.

So, number one, what I know, this too shall pass. Wherever I might be,
wherever I might be feeling unhappy, feeling hurt, feeling pain, whatever
it might be, whatever situation, it will pass. This too shall pass.
Whatever I am feeling will not always stay the way that it feels. So like,
if I’m feeling a really acute emotion, I can trust that it will pass. That
I will find relief, that something will shift, that I will start to see a
different perspective, that I will start to allow those feelings to work
through me until I’m ready to feel something else. This too shall pass.

This one I learned from my mother. My mom is one of the toughest people I
know. She’s been through a lot. She lost her husband, my dad at a very
young age. She had three little kids. I was two days old when my dad was
killed in a plane crash and she went through a lot as you can imagine. A
second marriage that failed. She got divorced and then just life, different
things in life. She had a very wise therapist at one point that taught her,
this too shall pass. She was in a lot of pain and he taught her that and
she has taught me. And you know what? My mom is right as moms often are.
She is correct. Anytime I feel really heavy with something, I can know that
it’s temporary. That it’s not always going to be there weighing as heavily
as it might be in that very moment so that’s number one. Okay?

Number two, I’m wiser than I know. I get to talk to people all the time who
are in the aftermath of infidelity and I hear a common thread, “I knew it.
I knew to check this. I knew to ask this. Something just told me that I
needed to go look at this or that I needed to ask this.” Now, sometimes we
don’t follow up on that because as you’ve heard me talk about, sometimes
we’re so afraid of the answer that we mute our own intuition. I understand
it you guys, okay? No judgment from me, but when the truth is told, you can
go back and see times where you knew it, where your gut was telling you,
“There’s something here that you need to pay attention to.”

We are wise. We have our intuition that is usually pretty spot on, and the
more we can learn to discern and sort out what is our intuition and what is
coming from fear or doubt or from trauma, things like that, when we can
clean that up and really learn to tune in and listen, our intuition will
never lead us astray ever.

I remember, when the story started falling apart with my first husband,
when I finally was seeing the years of deceit, the patterns and the
different things that I had been told for all of these years and it started
to just crumble and I was putting pieces together. Even though it was very,
very difficult, very painful, there I learned something. I learned that,
the many times that I had a thought to ask a question, to go look at
something, to dig a little bit deeper, I was correct. Even though the truth
was hard to know, it was very validating to know that I was wise in that,
that I knew. That I knew that there was something off.

Just as a reminder, a way to know this is, it’s not going to come from a
place of fear. Okay? Intuition does not come from a place of fear or
scarcity or lack or, “Oh no. What if he’s doing it again? What if it’s
going to happen again?” It doesn’t come from that space. It’s like this
deep, inner knowing that actually feels pretty calm and powerful and
resolute. It feels very different than those panicked, “Oh my gosh, what
if?” That is different. Okay? That’s a different emotion. That’s coming
from fear, which is normal, right? But that’s not what I’m talking about
here. You, my friends are wiser than you think you are. You have answers
inside of you right now that will guide you to take the next steps forward,
if you are willing to set down the fear and go inside and listen to
yourself.

Number three, I can always count on me. I can always count on me. That’s
pretty good to know. Right? I know myself. I know who I am and I know the
kind of person I am. I know that when I am thrown difficult circumstances
or circumstances that are a lot for me to wrap my head around, I know that
I will work through it. I know that I will always get back up. I know that
I will keep going. I know I’ll figure it out and keep moving forward.
That’s good to know. Right? It’s good to know about myself and I’m
wondering if you, my friends, know the same thing.

Do you know that about you? That as low as you might feel, if you have
moments of self-doubt, if you have moments of pain, of regret, anything
that you might feel, that you’re not going to hang out there for long,
you’re not staying there. That you’ll keep going. That’s your good
information to have right, about yourself. That’s good to know.

Number four, I’m never alone. Never have been, never will be, something
that I have known from a young age. So, growing up, as I just mentioned, I
had some different situations with stepparents and with blended families
and things like that. I had some times where I felt very alone and felt
like I wasn’t being looked out for. I learned at a young age that I have
people that are watching out for me.

Now, I know that some of you listening to this podcast are not religious
and I don’t intend to in any way tell anyone what to think or what to
believe. But since it’s my space, I’ll tell you a little bit about my
thoughts on this and please know, take it or leave it. This is just my own
thinking on it, my own beliefs. Okay? It comes from my own experience. I
believe that we’re being watched over and that, for me, who that is, is
heavenly parents, heavenly father and mother who are very well aware of me
and people who love me who have passed on like my father.

I believe that they are way closer than we think they are, and that they’re
always cheering us on. That they’re always trying to help us to be
successful and to be happy. At a young age, I had some experiences where I
felt the reality of this and I knew, I knew who it was. I knew that it
wasn’t made up in my head. I knew at a young age that I was not alone, that
I was being watched over and cared for. That knowledge has carried me
through some really hard things and always happens. Like if I feel lonely
or feel like I’m here alone, it’s just me, always, every single time
something happens or something is… I don’t know. It sometimes is a person
that shows up right on time or something that I read that I know is very
specific to me that lets me know, “I got you. Paying attention.”

I recently had a client who shared something with me about an instance
where she was really struggling to trust something. She had something
happen when she was out on a walk that brought her comfort. It was like
something that personally meant something to her, something that she saw,
where she felt like, “Okay, I’m being looked out for, all is well, I’m
okay.” She was like, “Does that sound silly?” To me, my answer to her and
to any of you is, of course not, not at all.

I think that the beauty is that, we’re all known individually and so, it
makes sense that we’re all going to hear things in different ways, right?
Just like we all like different music, different music speaks to us in
different ways based on our own preferences, our own experience. It’s very
personal, right? It’s personal and so, we’re going to be spoken to and
taught and reached out to personally in a way that means something to us.
And so, what might stand out to me as letting me know, “Hey, I’ve got you,
I’m paying attention, I’m aware of you,” might seem even silly to somebody
else. Like, “Really? That’s how you read that, that’s what you made that
mean?” I would say to that, who cares, right?

You get to make things mean what you want them to mean and trust that those
little things that remind you that you’re not alone are everything. That
they matter. That you are being looked out for and spoken to in a way that
is personal to you, not to anybody else, because you’re not anybody else,
you’re you so of course, it’s going to be personal. Of course, it is. Why
would it be any other way?

The last thing that I know that is along the lines of what I just said but
a little bit different too is that, I always get the help I need. I have
some pretty big evidence of this, my friends and I’ve been thinking about a
particular situation that I was in that I’ve never shared on this podcast
and it’s time. It is one of the most pivotal moments of my life and I want
to share it with you now. I want to share with you how I know that help
always comes, that there’s always help.

The day that my first husband died, the circumstance was this. His family
had a family reunion in Utah, and he had left on a Sunday morning from Utah
to go back to where we lived in San Jose. And so, he left to travel back to
San Jose to get back to work on Monday. I had the kids and on Wednesday
morning, I left Utah to drive back to California, so I stayed back for a
couple of days.

On the drive, I was four hours into the drive so I was in Nevada, out in
the middle of the desert with nothing around. It was just desert and my
phone kept ringing and ringing and ringing, and it was a number I didn’t
recognize so I finally picked it up. Fortunately, not on speaker phone. I
picked it up and answered the phone and the woman on the other line was a
county investigator in San Jose. She proceeded to tell me that my first
husband had been killed in a car accident that morning. I pulled over to
the side of the road and just stood there in horror and disbelief.

I remember it so well, it’s burned in my brain forever. I was standing in
the middle of the desert, all six kids were in the car. They didn’t know
what was happening. There was nothing, no gas station, nothing. I was still
nine hours from home and in that moment, everything changed. I didn’t know
financially how we would be okay. I was looking at my children in the car
knowing that, even if they didn’t know it, their life just changed
drastically forever and there was nothing I could do about it. I felt
horrified to know that he was gone, that I would never see him again in
this life, that he was just gone. It was just all rushing through my mind
and I was just thinking, “How am I going to get home? How am I going to do
this?”

I was standing there on the side of the road and a car pulled up. A woman
got out of the car and she walked right up to me and she said, “I’m here.
For whatever you need, I’m here.” Now, this woman had no clue who I was. I
told her what had happened and without missing a beat, she said, “Why don’t
you follow me to my husband’s work and there, you can make phone calls and
he can give you a blessing.”

Now, for those of you who are not of my faith, blessings are, they’re like
special gifts of comfort, of peace, of healing, things like that. Now, the
significance of this is, this woman did not know me. She didn’t know
anything about me yet I knew those words. I understood them and I needed
some help at this time. She said, “And then you can come to my home and you
can stay for as long as you need.” I’m a total stranger, right? And so, I
followed her, I followed her an hour and a half to where her husband was
working and she had called ahead and he went and got popsicles for my kids.
I made some phone calls and was given this blessing of comfort and peace
and then I followed them to their home.

At their home, Julie made us dinner. She played with my kids. The rest of
her kids played with my kids and it was at their home that I sat my
children down and told them that their dad was gone, that he had died that
day. We all tried to go to sleep and I know for me, I don’t think I slept a
wink, I don’t think I slept at all the whole night. I just laid there with
my mind reeling. It was just one of those long, long nights. Right? The
next day I got up and I went upstairs and there was Sam and Julie, and they
said, “You didn’t sleep much last night, did you?” I said, “No, I didn’t,”
and Julie said, “I’m going to drive you home.”

Julie drove me nine hours home and got a plane ticket back home. Because of
Julie, I was able to sit in the back with my kids who would randomly start
crying and I could hold them and comfort them and be with them. I could
make arrangements. I had to take phone calls and we were making
arrangements and putting things together, and I was able to do those
things.

That moment when I was standing there on the side of the road and Julie
showed up, it was a moment that I cannot deny that I was being looked out
for. The thought that I had at the time was that, “If God himself was
standing in front of me, what He’d be saying to me is, ‘I see you. I know
what’s happening right now. I know this is hard, but you’re going to be
okay. Get back in the car and keep going, keep going.'” Even though it was
still very, very difficult, I had that strength that I needed to keep
going, to be brave for my kids, to be strong for them, to keep myself
together so I could take care of the things that I needed to take care of.

I tell you this, my friends, because I believe that there are helpers all
around you as well. Even though you might not have as dramatic of a story
as that, sometimes it can be hard to see when we are in it. Sometimes those
helpers can be hard to spot. It can be hard to see when we are buried in
our own pain. I just want you to start looking, look for the people who are
showing up. Look for those little comforts that come that remind you that
you are loved, that you are cared for.

I promise you, I am no more special than you are. I am no more cared for
than you are. I have my own experiences and I want you to look for your
own, and seek them out and notice them when you see them. I know that you,
my friends, who are listening are loved and that you are cared for. That
the pain that you are currently dealing with is acknowledged and noted and
seen. That you have people who care deeply about you and want you to be you
okay. I’m one of those people.

I wish I could sit down with each of you and just wrap my arms around you
and tell you what I see. I think about all of you and your various lives
and your various circumstances, and I’m fortunate that I get to work with
some of you, I get to talk to some of you and hear your stories. But what I
see in every single person that I talk to is strength. I see goodness, I
see wisdom. I see courage.

I’m talking to you. You have all of those things in you too and I want you
to think about what you know, and let those things lead out when things
start to feel confusing. When you don’t know how things are going to turn
out, what do you know? For me, when I don’t know how things are going to
turn out, I can go back to those anchors, the things that I know.

I know that this too shall pass. Whatever hard thing I’m facing, it will
pass. Sunnier days will come. They’ll come for you too my friends. I love
you all. I hope that you can see how amazing you are, that you can feel of
your own strength, your own goodness, and keep going, keep going. I will
see you next week my friends. Bye-bye.

Thank you for listening to the, Heal from Infidelity podcast. If you would
like to be kept in the know about upcoming free classes, new podcast
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it’s andreagiles.com/lies-about-infidelity/. I will see you next time.