Perfectionist Fantasies After Divorce And How To Break Them

Perfectionist fantasies of what tomorrow will bring during divorce can feel useful - like we're moving toward something. Your brain whispers, “Once the decree is signed, once the schedule is set, once the kids adjust, once I heal, then I’ll finally feel calm.” But what if that promise is the very thing keeping you stuck?

In this episode I dig into two sneaky patterns that show up during and after divorce: perfectionist fantasies and tomorrow thinking. Perfectionism doesn’t always look like striving or being “Type A” it often sounds like totally normal thoughts such as “I should have my life together by now” or “I’ll finally feel okay when everything is settled.” I talk about how those expectations can erase the real progress you’re already making, including the peaceful moments you don’t even notice because they don’t match the fantasy.

I share a powerful coaching story from a client who expected instant relief, plus the deeper reason “imagining your future self” can feel so good while also fueling procrastination. I also connect the dots between perfectionism, fear of mistakes, harsh self-judgment, and why starting can feel unbearable even when you care deeply.

You’ll leave with three tools to get out of the fantasy and back into your real life today. If this helps, subscribe, share it with a friend who’s navigating divorce recovery, and leave a quick review so more women can find the support they need.

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Transcript

Welcome And The Real Goal

Karin Nelson 0:00

Welcome to Becoming You Again. This is the podcast for divorcing and divorcing women who want to stop waiting for some future perfect version of their life and start actually living the one they have right now. I'm your host, Karin Nelson. I'm a divorce coach who helps women get honest about the stories that are keeping them stuck so they can finally move forward into a life they love living. In today's episode, I'm talking about some sneaky thought patterns called perfectionist fantasies and tomorrow thinking. I'm going to tell you what they are, why they show up so much during and after divorce, and how you could start trading the fantasy life for the one that you actually want to build today. Let's get started. Welcome to Becoming You Again, the podcast where you learn to step into your power as a woman in this world, where you learn to reconnect to your wholeness, your integrity, and bring into alignment your brain, your body, and your intuition after divorce. This is the podcast where you learn to trust yourself again and move forward toward a life that you truly want. You are listening to Becoming You Again, and I am your host, Karen Nelson. Welcome back, all of you amazing women who are going through something really challenging, but I know you're up for the challenge because I know how capable and strong and amazing you actually are. And you're probably not giving yourself credit for like 90% of it. So I'm gonna start helping you recognize all of the ways you are capable in your own life and way and where you have been kind of overlooking those capabilities and that self-trust. I am so glad that you're here. Today's episode is a topic that I have talked about before: perfectionism, but I want to talk about it in a new way because I have been learning about two new specific ways of thinking about this from my mentor, Kara Loewentheil. I've talked about her before. I'm in the middle of a coach certification through Kara. She is a Harvard law grad. She is a master certified life coach. She has a top-rated podcast. She is a New York Times bestselling author. She is just a brilliant, brilliant woman. And so when she teaches something, and I'm like, oh my gosh, yes, I see it, it makes so much sense to me. I'm like, I need to present this to my audience, especially to women who are going through a divorce, so that they can see how this perfectionist thinking, this like fantasy that we are creating for ourselves is showing up in our own lives as we're going through a divorce and then after the divorce is final. So these ideas are cars, and I appreciate her willingness to be able to share them so that I can share them with you. So I think this is especially going to be helpful for someone who maybe isn't in the middle of the divorce yet. Like maybe you're still married and maybe you're kind of stuck in this idea of thinking, should I or shouldn't I? This might be able to help you get to that decision for yourself of understanding what's the best and right decision for you. Or if you're already divorced and you've been waiting for this life to finally feel the way you pictured it or the way you thought it was going to, I think this is really going to help you pin down that kind of flawed thinking and get you to be able to move, take steps toward the life that you actually want to create for yourself.

When The Peace Doesn’t Arrive

Karin Nelson 3:42

So I was recently coaching a client of mine whose divorce is almost final. We're very close to that. Uh, but her soon-to-be-ex had moved out, which is great. This is like an exciting time, right? And she was expecting everything to suddenly feel just like really amazing, like really peaceful, really calm, really wonderful. And we were coaching, and she's like, it's weird because I've been, I've just been on edge. I don't feel the way that I thought I was going to. I'm not feeling peace as much as I thought I was going to. Uh, I've been kind of like just, I it's just different than what I thought it was going to be. And so we started to get curious, right? This is what we do when we coach. When I'm working one-on-one with you, we get curious about like what's going on for you. What are you feeling? What are you, what are the thoughts that are creating these feelings? This is all what we're doing when coaching happens, right? I'm gonna take a look at what your brain is doing and point out to you what it's doing, and then you get to decide, oh, do I wanna keep doing that or do I want to think of something else and think about it in a different way so that I can feel something different? Like, that's all coaching is. So, anyway, so we get really curious, we question where the expectation of that came from. We start to question what she's actually feeling. And then she said something that was really fascinating that we both kind of like were like, oh my gosh, wow, aha moment, right? She said, you know, as we're talking about this and as I'm thinking back over this past weekend, I actually have had a lot of moments where I have felt peaceful, where I have felt calm, where I've really had wonderful moments in my life. And I didn't realize it in the moment. But when I'm slowing it down, I can see that I've had these moments all along. So we had to start framing it as something to start paying attention to that is actually happening, but that we've been overlooking this whole time. And this is kind of what this episode is really about in a nutshell, because that's the whole picture right there, right? We get so fixated on this fantasy version of what our life is going to look like. Like it's always going to be peaceful. I'm always going to feel calm. I'm never going to be dysregulated in my nervous system. I'm always going to have wonderful moments every second of the day. And that right there is descriptive of that idea of the fantasy life. Because as we know, we are human and that is not real. That is perfectionist thinking to a T, right? So as I mentioned, these terms, perfectionist fantasy and tomorrow thinking, Carl Lowenthal has taught about these.

Perfectionist Fantasy In Divorce Life

Karin Nelson 6:29

And perfectionist fantasy is exactly what it sounds like, right? It is this fantasy of life being perfect. It can show up at any time, anywhere. But in terms of divorce, it's like this belief that, like, well, if I finally just had the perfect co-parenting sp schedule, or if I finally had a co-parent who wasn't an asshole every second of the day, or if I just never raised my voice at my kids and I was just always this happy, cordial, amazing, present parent. Or if I just was able to find like this needle in the haystack man for my life, then I could finally live a happy, beautiful life. Then I could finally feel peaceful and calm all the time, then I could finally tell myself I'm a good mom, that I could, then I could finally recognize that the divorce was the right decision because my co-parenting relationship is great. Like we have these fantasies about if my life looked this certain way, then I could finally give myself permission to enjoy it, to be happy, to take up space, to use my voice, to feel wonderful, to love myself, to believe I'm a good mom, to da-da-da-da-da like fill in the blank. And Kara points out something really sneaky about this. And she says, in these moments of the fantasy thinking, we rarely, rarely recognize that this is actually perfectionism. Because the thought isn't like, I just need to be perfect in my co-parenting relationship, or I just need to be the perfect parent, or I just need to find the perfect guy to go to my perfect life so that I can live a perfect, beautiful life after divorce, right? We don't think about it in that way. It's more like, well, I should have my life together by now. I should have my shit together by now. I'll finally feel okay once the divorce decree is signed. I'll finally be able to live peaceful once he is moved out of the house. I'll finally be able to parent the kids the way I want to parent them when they're with me once he's moved out. It sounds reasonable. It sounds like goals that you're working toward or having expectations of something that you're excited about, but these are things that you're never going to be able to quite reach and often don't even really work toward. And that's because these perfectionist fantasies lead straight into this other term, tomorrow thinking.

Tomorrow Thinking And The Dopamine Loop

Karin Nelson 9:07

Like believing that it will finally start tomorrow, or tomorrow I will finally feel better, or tomorrow I'm finally gonna become that person that I think that I am in my head, but I haven't quite reached it yet. But tomorrow I'll be her. Tomorrow I'll be the mom who doesn't scream and yell at my kids. Tomorrow I'll be the woman who is attractive enough to attract the great guy. Tomorrow I'll be, right? You see it? Once the divorce is final, then, once the kids adjust, then, once I've healed a little bit more, then tomorrow is always where that fantasy lives. Today is the reality. Tomorrow is like the better thing, right? I can't be happy with what I have today, but tomorrow maybe. And as Kara puts it, in your fantasy of tomorrow, you're finally doing everything that you think you should be doing, right? You're finally enough, even if you'd never use it in those terms. But this is why this shows up so much during divorce, and why I wanted to present it to you, my amazing, lovely, beautiful listeners, is because I see this constantly and I lived it myself.

A Guide To Reconnect With You

Karin Nelson 10:26

I know what you're thinking. You're in the middle of divorce, or you're on the other side of it, and you found yourself thinking, I don't even know who I am anymore. First of all, you are so not alone in this. And second of all, I made something just for you. It's called 115 Ways to Get to Know You, and it's a $7 guide filled with ideas to help you reconnect with yourself, your wants, your passions, your personality in ways that you might have forgotten were even possible. I'm talking about creativity, adventure, self-care, joy, emotional healing, all of it. And the best part? You get to pick what feels good to you. There are no pressures, there's no rules, just permission for you to explore. Because the truth is, your relationship with yourself is the most important one you'll ever have. And it's never too late to start building it. Find the link in the show notes to grab your copy today for just $7. I can't wait for you to dig in.

How Waiting Kept Me Stuck

Karin Nelson 11:28

I thought about divorce for many, many years before actually doing anything about it. I would like imagine this incredible future life. Like I would be calm and I would be independent and like fully into myself and finally authentically me. And that fantasy gave me like this dopamine hit of relief and excitement. And I would think about it and I'd get that dopamine hit and I'd be like, yeah, in a few years I'm gonna have the courage to do it, or I'm gonna have saved up enough money to like file for the divorce or like whatever my brain was telling me in those fantasy moments, right? But then the actual process of, but then I have to have hard conversations with my husband and with my kids and with my family. And I would have to figure out a lawyer and I would have to figure out can I make it financially on my own and figure out the finances? Like then those actual, like everyday life things come into play, and then I'm like, ugh, I don't like that. This is overwhelming. It doesn't feel good. I'm scared, I don't know what I would say, I don't know how people are gonna handle it, people are gonna judge me. Like all of the things, all of those thoughts come up, and I it would feel really overwhelming and really scary. And then I'd just default by saying, okay, well, maybe in a few years, or maybe tomorrow, or maybe next week, or maybe I'll be willing to do the thing, da-da-da. And then I would imagine that tomorrow that I wanted for a little bit longer, continuing to give myself that dopamine hit every time I'd imagine it, but never actually taking any steps toward it. And here's why this cycle feels like kind of almost addictive. Because it's when you are imagining your perfect future self who creates all of these great feelings, even though that future hasn't actually happened, you're creating those great feelings because you're giving yourself that dopamine hit of imagining yourself in this new life, right? In this life that you're like, oh, everything is gonna be so great, and I'm gonna have my own space, and he's not gonna be around all the time, and I'm gonna be able to like be with the kids and be present with them. It's gonna be so awesome, which is awesome that I you have that picture, right? Love that. And we imagine ourselves, we get that dopamine hit, but we don't actually do anything to follow through because those ideas of like all the steps feel overwhelming. We have to have hard conversations, we have to, we have to actually feel bad in our bodies when we're doing these things that don't feel fun, right? And so we don't follow through, or we hit a setback, or we feel the overwhelm, and then we criticize ourselves. And then our brain is like, well, we'll just stay in the perfectionist fantasy because that feels a lot better than the actual like bad feelings that we have, the uncomfortable feelings, the discomfort that we have, and we actually take steps toward the future that we want. That doesn't feel that good. So we'll just keep imagining it because that's where the good feeling actually is. And so we'll just keep running that cycle rather than just being okay with the discomfort that's gonna come up as we move, we actually move toward the life that we

Perfectionism Fuels Procrastination

Karin Nelson 14:49

want. So this isn't just coaching theory either, right? Like research on perfectionism has consistently found that there is perfectionism rooted in the fear of mistakes and harsh self-judgment that is strongly linked to procrastination. Not because perfectionists don't care, but because the fear of falling short makes starting something new feel really unbearable, really uncomfortable. And this lines up exactly with what I see in my clients, exactly what I'm seeing from women online who are messaging me, exactly what I have lived myself. And this is not laziness. I want you to know that. This does not mean that you are lazy in your life. What it means is there is a fear of like not achieving this high standard of the life that you think you want or the life that you are hoping to achieve someday, right? That's where the fear is coming from.

Where It Shows Up Most

Karin Nelson 15:56

So I see this most in two places. First, in the divorce decision itself. Like women who have stayed in a marriage for a very long time and they have wanted out for years, but they stay stuck in that tomorrow thinking. Waiting until they have it all figured out, waiting until the kids are older, waiting until they've saved enough money, waiting until they have like enough boxes checked on the list of things I need to get done before I can to be able to take those steps. Now, I'm not saying that you should just leave willy-nilly, like definitely have a plan. That's not a bad thing, but it's being stuck in this idea of this fantasy of like having the perfectly timed divorce is when I'm I'm gonna be able to make that step, right? Maybe it's not gonna be perfectly timed. I think there's again that fantasy of like, if I have all these steps in place, it's not gonna hurt as much, or I'm not gonna have to feel bad as often. It's gonna feel bad and it's gonna hurt. We just expect that. So it's going to be imperfect in the steps that we take. You can have the plan laid out as perfectly as possible, and it's still going to feel not amazing every step of the way. And the second place that I see this is after the divorce, and it's in what I what I talked about with my client, right? It's this belief that like life is finally going to feel good and feel amazing once we reach this imagined finish line. Like once the house sells, once the custody is settled, once I've healed enough, once I find that new person for my life, once my kids are over the transition, like all of the things, we tell ourselves it's going to look a specific way. I'm never going to feel any negative emotion. I'm never going to feel whatever I don't want to feel, that discomfort. And meanwhile, we're living in reality and we're having some good moments and we're having some bad moments. We're having like this mixed bag of 50-50, right? And it we completely overlook the good moments that we're actually having, the good times where we're actually feeling good in our lives, and we, the times where we actually show up as the person we want to be, and we don't give ourselves credit for that because we're so focused on this like perfectionist fantasy of tomorrow that we completely overlook what we're actually doing in our lives that are great, that are noteworthy, that feel good, that are peaceful, that are calm, that are beautiful.

Three Practices To Come Back Today

Karin Nelson 18:32

So, how do we start coming back to the present moment and getting out of this perfectionist fantasy and tomorrow thinking? So the antidote isn't to try harder to reach that fantasy, but it's actually just in learning to be present with and even learning to love, if possible, the reality that you actually have today. Even if that means you're still in your marriage that you don't enjoy, what is it about your reality today that you can love, that you can be present for, that you can enjoy until you get to that moment when you're ready to move forward with the divorce, when the divorce decree comes through and is signed by the judge, when your ex moves out, right? What about your life right now, today? Can you start to be present with and enjoy? So this is where we start, right? We start by noticing when you're in this imagining the future and it's giving you a high. We just notice that. We have to notice when we're in it. If you're starting to like fantasize about your future, think about what when this thing happens, but you have no real plan in place. And if all you're feeling is good with no fear, no friction, nothing real, that's probably a fantasy. It's not bringing you closer to your goal. It's not even a real goal. It's just like telling yourself words, but they feel good in the moment, right? The second thing we're gonna do is we're gonna get really small and we're gonna get really specific. So instead of waiting for this whole new life to arrive, and once everything is settled, then we can feel good. You want, I want you to ask yourself, what is one real doable thing that I can do today in the divorce process or in my life after the divorce that will that will bring me toward the goal of what I want my life to look like after divorce, right? So what's that one real doable thing that you can do today? Do I make a phone call? Do I meet with a lawyer? Do I look at my finances and just know where I'm at? Do I buy a new couch to create this beautiful life that I want, right? Do I notice when I've been yelling at my kids more often and instead give myself a break and go, sometimes good moms yell at their kids, right? We gotta do one thing that is going to bring us closer to the imagined life that we want, but we're willing to sit in the discomfort of not having it all perfectly perfect right now. Just do one thing to bring you a little bit closer and notice how you're actually feeling all the way through that thing that you do. It may not feel amazing, it may not feel peaceful, it may feel uncomfortable, and still nothing has gone wrong. And then the third thing that I want you to do is what my client did, which is she did it when we were coaching, but I want you to do it at the end of each day. I just want you to like look back on your day and ask, where did I have a real moment of peace or a real moment of joy, or where was I proud of myself today? I don't want you to look for the fantasy version of what you wished you would have done or what you hope you would do. I want you to look for what was real, what you really did and how you prom and how you showed up for yourself. This is where your brain needs to notice. Not the perfectionist brain, but the brain that is real, the brain that is like living actual life and being present as often as possible. That's what I want you to start noticing. You don't need a perfect tomorrow to start feeling like yourself again. You just need to come back to today, the one that is actually truly yours, the one where you are present and living and allowing yourself to be here. Going back to what I said at the beginning of this podcast, you are far more capable of creating the life that you want right now in the present that you are not giving yourself credit for. And sometimes not giving yourself that credit is continuing to live in that perfectionist fantasy. So give yourself credit for what you're doing now, even if it doesn't feel amazing, even if there's discomfort around it. Because again, nothing has gone wrong when we feel negative emotion. All right, my friends, that's what I have for you today. Thank you so much for being here. I love you. You truly are amazing. I will be back next week.

Coaching Invite And Closing

Karin Nelson 23:34

Hi, friend. I'm so glad you're here and thanks for listening. I wanted to let you know that if you're wanting more, a way to make deeper, more lasting change, then working one-on-one with me as your coach may be exactly what you need. Together, we'll take everything you're learning in the podcast and implement it in your life with weekly coaching, real life practice, and practical guidance. To learn more about how to work with me one-on-one, go to Karin Nelson Coaching.com. That's www.karin, N-E-L-S-O-N coaching.com. Thanks for listening. If this podcast agreed with you in any way, please take a minute to follow and give me a rating wherever you listen to podcasts. And for more details about how I can help you live an even better life than when you were married, make sure and check out the full show notes by clicking the link in the description.