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I’m Andrea Giles and you’re listening to the Heal from Infidelity podcast, episode number 205, What Team are You On? Choosing Growth After Infidelity

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Hello and welcome to the Heal from Infidelity podcast where courageous women learn not only to heal from their spouses betrayal, but to become the boldest, truest, most decisive and confident versions of themselves ever. If you know there’s more for you 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.

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Hi everybody. Welcome back to another episode of Heal from Infidelity. I have a topic today that actually came through in a client call with one of my private clients, and it was such a great analogy that I wanted to share with all of you today. So I’m going to go ahead and dive in schools, at least here in the United States, they have a class, they’re assigned a class, there’s class A, there’s class B, C, the A’s are the bigger schools. The B’s are a little smaller, the C’s are even smaller, and the sports teams that are in those schools are bigger or smaller, more skilled, more competitive, et cetera. And I was thinking today when I was talking with this client, what came up with her is that sometimes when we watch the things that our partners, our spouses are doing, it can leave us feeling like, why wouldn’t they do that for me?

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If we watch them, for example, leave the relationship, go get in another relationship, and it looks like everything’s great for them, they look like they’re so happy, they look like everything’s oh, just so buttoned up and perfect and it can feel like I must have been wrong. I must not have been enough. I must not have been fun enough or cute enough or whatever for them to bring that into this relationship. And another thing that happens is that sometimes we recognize that our partners do regret the things that they did, but we’re still kind of waiting for them to actually change from it to really take it and let it be this transformative experience. And what you see is that they’ll step forward and then regress, step forward and regress. And there’s the kind of beating your head against the wall going, are they ever going to get it?

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Are they ever going to understand? Are they ever going to really meet me where I am or am I always going to have to go backwards to meet them? Okay, now here’s where this analogy comes in. So I’ll start with myself as an example. I went to a pretty good sized school my freshman and sophomore year of high school. I went into a pretty good sized school and I moved right before my junior year to a much smaller school, a different class, much smaller class, smaller class of graduates just in general, a lot less opportunity, a lot less clubs, a lot less sports offerings. I was a singer and was in a really good choir at the other school. There was no choir in my new school and I felt the loss of that. But in my new school, there were other things that I could easily do that I could not do or that would be much harder.

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At my old school, I ran across country and ended up being the team captain. My senior year I was able to win student of the year. My senior year I was nominated to be the student body president. My senior year after living there for one year, I was nominated and won student body president. And those are things that would’ve been much, much more difficult in the bigger school because there are so many more people that I was competing against. Another thing in this smaller school is I did feel more comfortable being seen. I felt more comfortable just letting my hair down and being me and not feeling like I was competing with all of these other people. So for me, being in the smaller school actually allowed me to express my gifts, to express myself, to be seen. And it ended up being a really good thing for me, even though I didn’t have some of the experiences that I would’ve had at the other school, like the great choir for example.

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Now, sometimes though it goes in an opposite direction. Sometimes we will want to be on the bigger team, the bigger school, things like that. And we’ll want to be there but not necessarily put in the work for it, not necessarily make ourselves really competitive so that we can compete at that level. Now, what does this have to do with relationships? So I was meeting with this client and she was telling me how she just feels like she was too much. I’m just too much for him and too much for everybody. Like going back to her childhood of never quite feeling like she fit in completely. And what we talked through in this session was how she just was playing on a different team. She was in a whole different league. She was not into the small talk of the gossip and the well, who’s dating who and what’s going on with this person.

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She was more like, hi, I want to know you. Tell me all about yourself. The deep dives, that’s more who she is. She’s not a surface level person. She’s very smart, very thoughtful, wanting to go deep. And so the usual crowd did not work for her. She was in a different league and she spent her life making herself wrong for that. When in reality she’s just in a different league, she’s in a different class of school. It doesn’t make anybody right or wrong, it just is okay. And in her relationship, her partner left the relationship is with somebody else. And rather than making herself wrong for that, what we are talking through today is that this person was just deciding to be in a different class, play on a different team where there are different things required, different effort, different expectations, different output, different input.

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And that it doesn’t necessarily make it right or wrong, it just is that some people want to be able to not have to work as hard, not have to expend so much energy to keep up with the rest of the team. And when we were talking through this, she had this light bulb moment where she recognized how much she has made herself wrong and how much she really wants to be with people who can meet her there. And she shared this really amazing thing she shared with me, and I’m going to share it here, something that she was taught in exercise physiology class. I might get that wrong, but in a class with understanding exercise, and this professor shared and it stuck with her that at the most elite level, there’s very little physical physiological difference between the most elite athletes. But the biggest difference that separates out these elite athletes is those that are more able to handle suffering, those that are able to push themselves harder and have a stronger tolerance to pain and suffering.

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Isn’t that interesting? The people that I work with are the people who are willing to face pain on purpose, bring it on, let’s go. I want to see it. I’m going in. Let’s go. Why? Because it’s in facing it. It’s in experiencing it. It’s in stretching ourselves and stretching our tolerance to it, stretching our ability to hold it without crumbling. That we get to have all of the things that we want. It’s in our willingness to know that we’re walking right into it, that we are saying, I want this top level, this big time thing. And I know that pain sometimes is the price, and that is the biggest difference. I thought that was so fascinating. So what does that have to do with you? It has everything to do with you. Some people are on teams, they choose teams where they feel like they will be validated, that they’ll be validated and seen and that they won’t really be pushed.

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They’ll get to be the star of the show. They’ll get to be the big wig and that everyone will admire them and tell them how great they are. And when that stops happening, sometimes they make the other players wrong, they make the coach wrong, and sometimes they leave altogether and sometimes they try to hop over to another team without letting this team know so they can get the validation over on this other team while pretending to be on this team. And then when that’s revealed, of course it feels like a betrayal to the people on this other team. So sometimes they hop all the way over where they feel like they’re back to where their skills or efforts are valued, where they’re validated, where they don’t have to suffer as much, where they don’t have to face so much pain where they don’t have to really, really understand what needs to happen to play at that level, to have that kind of relationship.

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And for those of you who are living in a space of going, it must be me, I feel like an island over here. It’s just me and this other person has kind of abandoned me or I feel abandoned. Or they just won’t completely commit. They won’t completely be all in. They’re saying the things, but they’re not completely coming in. What if it’s because you are holding a standard for a kind of team that gets the results that you want. You are holding the standard for serious athletes, as it were, okay, for serious whatever serious relationship, not this pretend polite parallel where we live this parallel life. We just pretend and put a smile on our face into the world that looks like we’re just the happiest ever. But we don’t go below that. We don’t drop into anything real or deep or vulnerable or anything that would actually risk that arrangement that we have.

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And some people move into that. That is where they live. That is what they claim that they want. It may be that they have deeper desires, but they’re not going to touch ’em because of what it would require of them. And it feels too scary. And so they say, no, this is what I want. This works for me over here. I want this. And you over here are just on a different team. You’re just in a different place. You want different themes. You want more depth. You want to go deep in yourself. You hold yourself to a high standard and you’re asking those around you that you want to do life with to also live by a high standard. Now I want to speak to those who are wondering where your spouse, where your partner is, if they’re even on my team, on that team of whatever team you’re thinking of, the different class, the A, B, C, D, whatever it is.

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I want to say this, that sometimes even on the bigger teams, on the bigger teams, there’s all kinds of different players. You’ve got your people that are sitting the bench most of the time, but they’re on the team. They are on the team. They did enough to qualify for the team even if they’re benched most of the time. And then you have your starters and you have your superstars, but they’re still on the same team. And there are people with different skill levels. There are people who work so hard and some things come harder to them. Some things come more naturally to them. And it may be that you have somebody who is on that team who actually is on that team, but they might not be the starter. They might not be the star player. They might be somebody who is very consistent. They might be somebody who knows that in a pinch that they will come through that they might not be as consistent, but that when we really need them, they can dunk the three pointers that they can make those shots even if they are terrible at the free throw, right?

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My sports analogies are all over the place today, but hopefully you are going where I’m going with this. Okay? So I want you to pay attention to what team you’re thinking that they’re on and is it possible? Is it possible that you’re actually on the same team but that you’re playing at a little bit of a different level, that you might be the starter. You might be like, let’s go. I’m here. I am ready. And they might be on the team, but just be in a different position on the team. Is that possible? Be careful with where you are, assuming people are, be careful with where you are. Labeling them. Be careful with that. And sometimes it really is. We are on completely different pages. They’re on a very different space. They want very different things and I allow them to go do that, but it doesn’t mean anything except that there’s a different place that I’m going.

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I want different conversations. I want to do different things. I want to live a different way. I want to take full responsibility for everything in my life and give it everything I’ve got. And this person over here kind of wants to just show up and play. They just want to show up, dribble the ball play. And it kind of reminds me of, for me, school came pretty easily growing up. I didn’t have to try very hard to get good grades. And then I got in college and it was a little bit harder and it was a learning curve for me to even learn how to study, to even know how to study. Like, oh, how I got by over there is not going to get me by here. And you either learn how to study or you flunk out of school. And with these same sports analogies, sometimes the things that we were doing worked for a while.

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The flirting, the charming, the chatting it up with other people. Maybe it got us somewhere socially or even professionally, but maybe it bit me in the butt and maybe it ended up really hurting me and hurting other people. I’m talking about those who have betrayed, who have made a habit of being the most popular in the room. And it probably has gotten you places. It probably has won you different things, jobs, opportunities until it didn’t, until the cost of it was really high and far outweighed the benefit. And it’s these moments where we get to decide what team do I want to be on? Do I want to be on this team over here where we sure enjoy tossing the ball around and having a good old time. But when it comes to the real depth and the real skill, like real skill and really being able to show up and be that consistent player and be that on that star team, even if sometimes you’re sitting on the bench, is it getting you there and choosing where do I want to be, right?

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And choosing who do I want on my team? Is this person pulling their weight? Is this person showing up? There’s things that come easier to one than the other. I’ll give an example. My husband and I, there are things that just naturally come easier to me than to him and vice versa. And sometimes I’ll want to judge that and sometimes I’ll want to make him wrong for that. In reality, there are things that I could learn from him. There are things that I could see that he does that he is better at than I am that I could learn from. He’s remarkable at letting things go. He’s remarkable at just moving along. If we have some kind of conflict, we will work through it quickly. Off he goes. And he’s sincere in that. And for me, sometimes I will hold onto things too long, which if you think about a game that’s going to slow down my game, I could learn something from him.

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What can we learn from each other? What team? Are we on completely different teams or are we on the same team but it looks different? And so where are we judging that? And after infidelity, we do need to know where do I want to go even if I don’t have the skill yet, even if I am very clumsy and would likely be benched most of the time for a while while I learn, while I push myself, while I grow my capacity, while I step into that pain, while I stretch those muscles and do those reps, what team do I choose to be on? And am I with somebody who is willing to be on that team too and willing to do all the things required to grow and become stronger on this team? If so, maybe this is something we can work with and if not, good to know, good to know, but we need to stop making it about us.

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We need to stop taking it personally. You just are on different teams. That’s it. You’re going in different directions. Do I want to keep Hopp over to this team over here? Or can I decide to be fully on this team and trust that other people that want to be on this team will meet me here? Or that this person may decide that they actually do want something different than what they currently think they do. And the only way sometimes that they’re going to know is if you stand firmly in the team that you are choosing. Okay, big analogy today. The whole episode today was one big analogy. I hope that you got it. I hope that you can feel it. I hope that you can let it sink in of where do I want to be? What team do I want to be on, and who do I want to invite to be there with me?

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And who can I let go of and not make it mean any more about my worthiness? It’s about me choosing something remarkable for my life and I’m putting in my dues, I’m paying my dues. I’m doing the things required for me to stay on this team. I’m putting in the effort. Is this other person putting in the effort? It might look different than mine. It might look different than my effort, but are they trying to be on the team? Do they have a place on this team and have they earned a place on this team? If not, what do they need to do to earn a place on this team? And do I even want to let them on? If I’m the team keeper, if I get to decide, do I even want them on this team? You get to decide that. Okay. Alright, my friends, that is what I have for you today.

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Thank you so much for being here. And I invite you, if you have not yet to go leave a review right in the show notes. There’s a very, very easy way now where you can leave a review. You just click the button and anywhere where you’re listening to this, whether it’s through Spotify or Apple, it’ll direct you right there. You can put in whatever name you want. It doesn’t have to be a real name. Leave the review, boom, it posts. Please go leave a review. It helps so much. It helps other people find this podcast. It helps get the word out there about the value in this podcast. So thank you so much for being here, and I will catch you next time. Take care.

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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 episodes, and other ways of working with me, go subscribe to my weekly email. You can subscribe@andreagiles.com slash lies about dash infidelity slash. Again, it’s andrea giles.com/lies about dash infidelity slash I will see you next time.