From Shattered to Shining (Holiday Edition) How to Rebuild Hope, Identity & Sparkle After Betrayal

Lora Cheadle [00:00:01]:
You're listening to Flaunt. Find your sparkle and create a life you love after Infidelity or Betrayal. A podcast for women who've been betrayed by their intimate partner and want to turn their devastation into an invitation to reclaim themselves and their worth. Tune in weekly so you can start making sense of it all and learn how to be okay on the inside, no matter what goes on on the outside. Download your free Betrayal Recovery toolkit at betrayalrecoveryguide.

Lora Cheadle [00:00:36]:
There is a moment after betrayal when you realize that you don't recognize yourself anymore. You look in the mirror and you see a woman who has lost her sparkle. She's lost the playful sense of who she is. Not because she's weak, but because she has been both trying so hard to survive, to hold everything together, and also to figure out which way is up because the rug has just been majorly pulled out from under her. If that's you, if that's you right now, or if that's you a while back, I want you to know something. She is still in there. You are still in there. The confident, joyful, radiant woman you used to be, the one who was confident and clear and could trust.

Lora Cheadle [00:01:45]:
She is not gone. Her sparkle has just been dulled. Last week, we talked about hope. We talked about how betrayal doesn't just break trust, but it breaks hope. A hope that your marriage could be what you thought it was. Hope that your family could be what you thought it was. Hope that you could grow old with this person. Hope that you could ever feel normal again.

Lora Cheadle [00:02:18]:
Hope that life could ever even be beautiful. Hope that you could trust again. That things would indeed work out. But here's what I've learned. I've learned that hope doesn't die. Hope hides. Like we talked about last week, hope hides beneath grief. It hides beneath anger.

Lora Cheadle [00:02:41]:
But it also hides beneath the masks that we have worn for far too, too long. The labels, the roles, the scripts that we have been living out. And when we begin to remember who we are, we begin revealing. We begin revealing ourself. One layer at a time. And hope returns. And that's what today's episode is all about. It's how to move from shattered to shining.

Lora Cheadle [00:03:22]:
Just in time for the holiday season. From shattered to shining again. So you can have a holiday season where you are feeling confident, connected, joyful. Even though things might look vastly different today, we're going to talk all about how to step into this holiday season and beyond feeling grounded, centered and completely whole. And in service of doing that, to help you with that, I have created something extra special that is totally free. And oh my gosh, I am sorry, so excited about it because it is exactly the thing I wished I would have had when I was going through this. On December 1st, I am hosting a free virtual book club and workshop for two hours called From Shattered to Shining. A Book Club Experience for Women who are Ready to Feel like themselves.

Lora Cheadle [00:04:33]:
Again, again, now, again. It's free. It's on Zoom. If you sign up, yes, you can get the replay. And there's going to be so much goodness in the workshop that you are absolutely going to want to go through it a few times. As you remove these layers, as you heal these different layers, you're going to want to interact with this content again in order to get the link to sign up. Again, it's free to sign up. To get the replay to all of that, go to the flauntbook.com that's www.theflauntbook.com.

Lora Cheadle [00:05:16]:
put in your name, your email. I'm not spamming you, but you will get the link and then you will get the replay. Now, this is not just a book discussion, it's a guided experience. Yes, we will work through my book Flaunt. Drop your cover and reveal your smart, sexy and spiritual self together. And don't worry, you don't have to have the book completely finished, but what you will want is your own copy nearby. Because there are some activities that we're going to do from the book. There are some things that you're going to want to highlight, reflect on and rediscover and work through together.

Lora Cheadle [00:05:57]:
You can get your copy anywhere books are sold, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, literally anywhere. And this workshop not only is going to be powerful and truly transformative, it's truly going to be your springboard into the holidays and beyond. But it's also going to be fun. And quite frankly, we need fun. You need fun. You deserve to have fun. You deserve to have a break from all of this. I am in recovery and you deserve to have that break of fun because I guarantee you're going to be serving and working and doing all of this hard stuff over the holidays.

Lora Cheadle [00:06:41]:
That, yes, can be fun in its own way. But this is a two hour segment of time that is just for you, for your heart, for your whole soul, for your sparkle. So definitely join me. Join us. I cannot wait to meet and interact with you personally and give you this gift. It's truly thrilling to be able to provide this experience for you. Now. When I first wrote Flaunt, it was so Divinely orchestrated, for lack of a better word.

Lora Cheadle [00:07:17]:
I worked on this book kind of on and off for like 10 years because I would have little sparks, I would have little ideas, I would have little. You know, this is. And that's. And I was working in the wellness coaching industry. I had stepped away from practicing law so I could stay home mostly with my kids, but I was still working, doing wellness coaching and physical fitness training and all of that good stuff and hypnosis therapy. So I would kind of come up with these ideas and I would practice them on my clients and I would get feedback and I'd be like, oh, my gosh, this is amazing. And I would learn all these different modalities. Well, then all of a sudden, I had this framework literally downloaded into my brain.

Lora Cheadle [00:08:02]:
I don't know if you've ever had that happen where it's like, bing. This whole framework gets downloaded into my brain and it gets downloaded like, hey, here is flaunt. And it's an acronym. And not only is it an acronym, this is what it does. It encapsulates the. When somebody is hurt, they collapse. They crumple. When.

Lora Cheadle [00:08:21]:
When people feel insecure, they, like, fold in on themselves. And flaunt is the energy of healing. It's the energy of aliveness. It's the energy of joy. And this framework will help people go from collapsed and depressed and shut down and living small to bam, sparkling and living large and being happy and speaking their truth. And I was like, dang, this is an amazing framework. And oh my gosh, this does. It encapsulates everything that I do.

Lora Cheadle [00:08:56]:
It encapsulates everything that I know that is clinically backed. Like, wow, I get it. This is amazing. And I thought it was all about authenticity. I thought it was all about full self expression. I thought it was all about, like, that being your authentic self. Living, expressing, being fully self expressed, being a powerful woman, being empowered. And I had an agent, and the agent kept saying to me, this is truly amazing.

Lora Cheadle [00:09:31]:
I have never seen a book quite like this. The way that you weave in the concepts of burlesque with these clinically backed tools. This is incredible. And you know, he's like, this is truly incredible. I can see this being a live TV show. I can see this being so much more. This is amazing. But the one thing is, what problem does it solve? And I was like, all the problems.

Lora Cheadle [00:09:54]:
It. It's like when you've got imposter syndrome, it's. It's when you've had something bad happen, it's. It's when you're locked into perfectionism, it's. And he was like, I get it, but it's not all the things. It can be all the things, but what is the one thing that it solves? And I was like, I'm sorry, I just don't know. I. I can't figure that out.

Lora Cheadle [00:10:16]:
And then my book got picked up by New World Library and the New World Library people kept saying the same thing, like, this is amazing. Oh my God, I can't believe it. We're going to do audio rights to the book. You're going to want to talk about film rights. You're going to like, this is amazing. This is really great stuff. But what is the one problem that it solves? And I was right back in that place of like, I don't even know what the one problem it solves is. What do you mean the one problem that it solves? I don't understand.

Lora Cheadle [00:10:44]:
It's. It's not one problem. It's from compressed to flaunt. And they were finally like, you know what? It's, it's too good. We're going to publish this book. It's going to be amazing. But I really wish it had one problem to solve. Well, guess what happened next.

Lora Cheadle [00:11:00]:
I found out about my husband's infidelity. And guess what it did to me. It crumpled me. It collapsed me. It sucked away my self confidence. It sucked away my self worth. It caused me not to trust myself. It made me think that the world is this dark, bad, evil place.

Lora Cheadle [00:11:17]:
And I shrunk. And it took me a while to realize, whoa. I was downloaded the solution to the problem of betrayal trauma before I experienced the problem of betrayal trauma. And it was like, whoa, that's not a coincidence. And then I got curious. I got really curious. Is this the solution to betrayal trauma? I mean, I've been using these tools on burnout. I've been using them on imposter syndrome.

Lora Cheadle [00:12:06]:
I've been using them for perfectionism. Is this really the solution? And the exact tools that I started using that I had been teaching to other women, I started using on myself in my situation. And, and guess what? They worked. And then I started pivoting. Instead of just women's empowerment coaching and learning how to be fully self expressed, I started working with people who had been betrayed, like me. My first few clients, it was kind of like, okay, well let's see if this works because it worked really well for me. And guess what? Every single one of them had a shift. Every single one of them found value.

Lora Cheadle [00:12:59]:
From these tools and not only quote, unquote, healed from the betrayal, but they were really able to get back in touch with themselves. They were able to become fully self expressed. They were able to advocate on behalf of themselves. They were able to, in the terms that I talked about in the book, find their sparkle again. And it was a really interesting process because in my book I talk about being the choreographer of your own life. And you know, my business is about life choreography. It's about how do we create the steps for our own life, how do we take accountability, how do we do the things to move ourselves forward, how do we create the life we love? And it's so hard because betrayal takes that away. Because your partner, the person who you think is building this life with you, who is privy to your hopes and dreams, who is right there with you, saying, yes, no, yes, no, yay, support, whatever, they're lying to you the whole time.

Lora Cheadle [00:14:07]:
And they have this whole second life or second lives, third and fourth lives that they're keeping from you. And you're being gaslighted. And it's so destabilizing, it's so shocking that it really can threaten to destroy us permanently. And one of the most important, powerful shifts that I came to realize is for you, for me, for women everywhere, healing from betrayal. It's not about fixing ourselves. We are not broken. We are not broken. Nor were we broken by our partner.

Lora Cheadle [00:14:58]:
That's not a thing. You might feel like you've been broken, but you haven't been broken. Your sparkle has been dulled. That's all it is. Your sparkle, your joy, your confidence, your self esteem, your self worth, your. It has been dulled. It has been smeared with muck, but it has not been broken. Betrayal recovery is about systematically revealing that sparkle again.

Lora Cheadle [00:15:33]:
It's about unlayering, unveiling, and revealing the truth of who you are. In my book, I talk about, and I use the concept of burlesque quite a lot. For those of you who don't know what burlesque is, it comes from like the vaudeville era. And it's a parody, it's comedic. It is meant to poke fun of standards of the day, whatever those standards of the day are. Burlesque pokes fun of all of the hypocrisies and inconsistencies that we've got in our world. It's a parody, it's over exaggerated. Dolly Parton, in a lot of ways, is a burlesque artist.

Lora Cheadle [00:16:28]:
The hair, the makeup, the lashes, the heels, the figure that's an over exaggeration of the female form that is burlesque. Cher. Cher is a burlesque artist too, in that she leans in to the stereotype and kind of pokes fun at it too. Especially Dolly Parton. She's. She's amazing at poking fun. You know, I think it was her that said that dumb blonde jokes don't offend her because she's not dumb and she's not blonde. That's like a burlesque comment right there.

Lora Cheadle [00:17:03]:
It's revealing the layers, and it's calling out the layers, and I think that's why it's so powerful and that's why so many women in particular love burlesque, because it calls out the layers. I mean, think of. Think of your life. Think of most women. We use makeup, we use concealer foundation, you know, eyeshadow, eyeliner. We use all of these beauty products and we layer them on and then we do hair, and then we do shapewear, and we do heels. And like, we do all of these things to make us appear to be different than we are, and that's considered normal. And I'm not calling down doing things to make you look or feel better at all.

Lora Cheadle [00:17:52]:
But what I am calling down is those who deny it, those who are like, no, I just woke up this way. No, you didn't. Nobody just wakes up like that. And to me, that's what's so wonderful and refreshing about burlesque. It's like, hey, here are the layers and here's the corset and here's the push up bra and here's the stockings and here's all of these things that I am wearing to make me look different than I am. And I'm being very honest that these are the layers. And it's that conceal and reveal. It's Elsa and frozen.

Lora Cheadle [00:18:32]:
Conceal and reveal. Conceal and reveal. There are certain things that I put on to conceal. There are certain things that I take off in order to reveal. Life is a series of concealing and revealing. Life is a burlesque. Life is a grand burlesque. And when we call it for what it is, instead of pretend that it's what it's not, that's when we get our power back.

Lora Cheadle [00:19:01]:
We get our power back when we reveal ourselves authentically, when we call things for what they are, and when we no longer believe the illusion. I mentioned gaslighting earlier. When you no longer believe the illusion that your husband, that your partner is putting up for you, your real life has been revealed. The real truth has been revealed. And suddenly, you know where you stand is one of those things that we truly can only be where we are. And when we are where we are and we admit where we are, then we can get the help that we need. You know what I mean? Like, if you pretend to be better at running or yoga or gymnastics or golfing or some skill at work, you. If you pretend to be better than you are, people are going to expect different things from you and you're not going to get the help that you need.

Lora Cheadle [00:20:10]:
So you never can move up to that level. And then you're going to be frustrated and disappointed and then you're going to keep on piling more and more layers on to hide the truth. Whereas if you just say, no, I don't know that, sure, it might feel. You might get a little bit of sensation in the moment. Like, dang, I really wish I knew more. But. But then you get the exact kind of help that you need instead of saying, oh, yeah, I'm an expert at yoga and really, you did one video once. You can get the education and the support and the help so you can actually move ahead and grow.

Lora Cheadle [00:20:50]:
So that's what burlesque is all about. And I talk a lot in the book about burlesquing your world. When you burlesque your world, you come at life with a different sense of clarity and openness. So it's not this big threat and everybody's out to get you, but it's this big parody. And it's not that it's all a comedy, but it's lighter hearted. So your nervous system is not activated. So you become more clear about what can I do to change things instead of getting locked into that victim mode. Oh my God, this happened.

Lora Cheadle [00:21:29]:
And it's awful. You are more clear about, yeah, this happened. And here are the things that I can do. I can change this, I can move this, I can add this, I can subtract this, I can boost this up, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. All those different things. And that's one of the things we're going to do, actually do in the book club and workshop. We're going to talk about those ways you can burlesque your world, burlesque this situation, so you get put back in the role of the choreographer so you can start dealing with what is and start making changes instead of staying locked in. If only this were different.

Lora Cheadle [00:22:13]:
If only this hadn't have happened. If only he would do this, that and the other thing. If only I would have known. We're going to give you your power back. And when you have your power back, that's when you go from shadow to shining. That's when you have the ability to enjoy yourself in the holidays in the year ahead. Okay, so let's right now do a little bit of our own workshopping. Let's talk about rebuilding.

Lora Cheadle [00:22:51]:
As I've said numerous times, betrayal breaks a lot. We had talked about the hope, the trust, the identity, safety, like all of those different things, it. It breaks it. And like I was saying, it's not really broken in the sense that, oh my gosh, I have to repair it and I have to mend it with gold and make it pretty again. It just needs to be revealed. Because when we reveal it, that's when we can really see, whoa, this is just dented, or this is scratched, or this was never really solid in the first place, or, whoa, I thought this thing was really important. And really, it's not even so important. I don't think I even need it anymore.

Lora Cheadle [00:23:48]:
Instead of repairing the brokenness and fixing yourself, what's going on is you're revealing where you are. You're revealing authentically the truth of yourself in your situation. But more importantly, you are uncovering the woman inside the woman you were always meant to be. And when you uncover her and whether. When you fully integrate her into your psyche, into your heart, when you start living life from her, that's when you're untouchable, unstoppable, because you know who you are and you know that nothing externally can ever rock your world again. Yes, things can rock your world, but you're going to be okay because you have got your own back. For me, for the first time ever, for so many of my clients, in ways that they never really even thought was possible for them because they're like, but I'm relational. Yes, I'm relational, too.

Lora Cheadle [00:25:12]:
And you can still be very relational and have your own back and live from that state of complete authenticity where things won't bug you, you won't fall into self judgment, you won't fall into imposter syndrome. You won't need to perform anymore. You won't need to be perfect. You can just be. And oh my God, it is so freeing, is so freeing. I saw an Instagram video not too long ago, and I can't remember who it was, but it was somebody being interviewed around menopause. I've got a lot of menopause stuff on my feed right now, and they were saying one of the things that people don't talk about is when you get older, there's this we have been told that we need to be afraid because suddenly we're no longer, quote, sexually attractive. We are no longer going to be objectified by men.

Lora Cheadle [00:26:19]:
And ah, don't we all want to be objectified by men? And the inner she was talking about, I wish I knew who it was. She was talking about how actually freeing it is, how freeing it feels to be like, I am moving out of those years where I am constantly objectified against my will, where I am constantly sexualized against my will. And what would the conversation be like if we were saying, woohoo, once you hit a certain age, you are no longer going to be objectified and sexualized against your will. You will be free to be you. And how have we had that belief culturally how menopause would have an entirely different feel and how it could be so celebratory and how women can move into that. And that really hit me because it's like, yeah, you're right. We are told that it's good to be objectified. We're told that it's good to be sexualized on some deep level.

Lora Cheadle [00:27:25]:
You know what I mean? Nobody really says that overtly, but it's covert in the culture that don't we all want to be the one that blah, blah, blah, and that sometimes it's like, and no and no. I don't want to be sexualized and objectified against my will just because I'm female. I want to look how I want to look and act how I want to act. And I want to be free to be me. And that's what Flaunt does, is it puts you in that place of freedom. It changes your perspective to the point that you're like, I can own something and put it on, or I can take it off. Like what I want who I am, and I'm okay either way because it is about me. One of the things that we're going to do in service of that in the workshop is, and I talk about it in the book too, this is why you want to have the book before, at least thumb through it, if not read a few sections.

Lora Cheadle [00:28:20]:
But one of the things we're going to do in the workshop is create an alter ego. And I've talked about this on different podcasts. I've talked about this, you know, at various times. But it's creating that version of yourself that is fully empowered, that is fully in her worth, that is fully in whatever it is. And when you have to do something hard, you don't have to do it. You can Put your alter ego forward, and she can do it. And it's incredibly powerful. And we're going to have the opportunity to do that during the workshop.

Lora Cheadle [00:28:53]:
But, yes, grab the book, read through it, so at least you have a little bit more of an understanding about that. But for now, what I want to do is I want to take you through the framework of flaunt. It's a clinically backed framework. I want to take you through each acronym and just give you. Just give you a little bit to more than think about. I'm giving you a perspective shift. Pay attention to this part, because what I'm giving you is a shift. And what I want you to walk away with is not just like, oh, I have the cognitive knowledge that this is what flaunt stands for, and this is how you apply it.

Lora Cheadle [00:29:37]:
What I want you to walk away with is an aha moment. A shift in understanding, a way to show up differently. I want you broken out of the mindset that you're rebuilding and fixing yourself. I want you broken out of the mindset that I'm healing, I'm working on it. And into the mindset of, like, I'm revealing and I've got this, and I'm integrating and I'm good. I'm gonna have some ups and downs. I'm gonna have some good and bad days. I'm going to need help.

Lora Cheadle [00:30:13]:
Yes. I'm going to have tears. I'm going to have upsets and disappointment, and I can handle it because I am brave enough to reveal myself fully and authentically for who I am. Are you ready for that? Aha. Are you ready to see things differently? I love seeing things differently. All right, Flaunt. The energy of flaunt is an acronym, and the F stands for now. Don't be triggered by this word.

Lora Cheadle [00:30:45]:
Find your fetish. Ooh, I know, I know. Sometimes in a betrayal show, people are like, oh, my God, Lori, you can't use the word fetish. What are people gonna think? And it's like, you know what? I am using that word intentionally because I want you to go, oh, I want a little pearl clasping. I want a little sense of triggering. I want a little jarred moment. There's. Because that's the level of joy that I want you to move into.

Lora Cheadle [00:31:15]:
Finding your fetish is about remembering what lights you up. It's about finding that thing or those things that you enjoy. Not to get better at something, not to learn and grow and understand, but because it brings you joy. If you're anything like me, you have probably read, like, all the betrayal books, and you've done all of this work. Find something else. Find something else. If you were into mysteries, do a mystery. If holidays are coming up, if the cheesy Hallmark movies don't make you sad and they.

Lora Cheadle [00:32:00]:
And you enjoy them, lean into it. If they do make you sad, go back to some of the Christmas movies and specials that you watched as a kid. Is that fun? Does cooking light you up? Does baking light you up? Does decorating and doing something around the house? Does walking around? Does gardening? Like, what is it? What are those things that light you up? I've said this a million times before, but dancing always lights me up. Turning on music that I love and creating stuff. It's fun. It lights me up. When you find your fetish, it brings the real you back to the surface. You uncover those layers of judgment.

Lora Cheadle [00:32:46]:
It's the dance. Like, nobody's watching. You put on the layers of judgment. Oh, my God. What if somebody sees me? When you find your fetish, you're removing those layers of judgment. I don't care who sees me. I don't care who sees me. Skip down the street, swing at the park, dance like nobody's watching in my living room, even though people are watching.

Lora Cheadle [00:33:08]:
It doesn't matter to me. I have found that fetish, and I am honoring myself enough to bring that part of me forward. I've said this on shows, too. I'm a total Star Trek fan. I'm a total Star Trek nerd. That is like, my guilty pleasure when it can be like, ooh, I've got 45 minutes. I'll be like, hey, do you want to watch an episode to my husband? And he's like, yes, that's like my fun fetish. That's one of his fun fetishes.

Lora Cheadle [00:33:38]:
And it's fun and it's silly, but I'm putting myself forward and owning it without judgment. Because, honestly, we don't get judged by other people. We get judged by oursel. Wait, what? We don't get judged by other people. We are judged by ourselves, and then we put that judgment on other people. Other people don't think hardly anything about us. They're too absorbed in their own life. We get worried that they're going to judge us, and we put our judgment on them.

Lora Cheadle [00:34:10]:
So finding your fetish is about letting go of judgment and leaning into what makes you happy. The Ellen Flaunt is for laugh out loud. And I had talked about this a little bit earlier when I talked about burlesquing your world. Laughter is the number one way to calm and re regulate the nervous system. Number one. Number one way. Why does calming and re regulating the nervous system help? Oh, my goodness. So many reasons.

Lora Cheadle [00:34:38]:
One, you feel better, you feel calm, you're not stressed, you're not having cortisol spikes, which also means your metabolism is working better. You're not holding onto fat, you're not having digestive issues because you're stressed. You're sleeping better, your face looks better. I don't know about you, but I swear for like nine months after D day, I look in the mirror and I'd be like, whose face is this? I was haggard, I was ashen, I was like hanging. It was awful. At one point, I actually even went to the lady that I see for acupuncture, and I was like, can you get the grief out of my face? Because this is ridiculous. And sure enough, she did some work on my jaw and she's like, yes, we can work on that, but you also have to work on it on the inside. And that was that laughter piece.

Lora Cheadle [00:35:32]:
So not only do you look and feel better when you're laughing, but when you calm and re regulate the nervous system, you move from that survival reactive, harsh place in your brain all the way up to the prefrontal cortex where you can make rational, rational and reasonable decisions. So you can say the right thing, you can do the right thing. You won't be locked in that place of, oh, my God, am I doing the right thing? Am I doing the right thing? The golden center of flaunt is a U, and that stands for accept unconditionally. You've probably heard me say this before too, but I'm not a huge proponent of forgiveness. I'm not. I will push back on that to anyone. There are a lot of, quote, experts out there, end quote, who are like, it's all about forgiveness. I really don't think it is.

Lora Cheadle [00:36:33]:
And here's why. Forgiveness. You can forgive somebody if you're like a hierarchical relationship. If somebody is above you or below you, then it can be like, I can look down on you because I'm above you and I can forgive you. And I don't want to be in a hierarchical relationship with my spouse. And I really don't want you to be in a hierarchical relationship with your spouse. You can find acceptance and you can find forgiveness, but it's mostly about acceptance. It's about acceptance for who they are revealed.

Lora Cheadle [00:37:16]:
I mean, when I say betrayal uncovers the truth, that's all about burlesque, right? There isn't it? Because it uncovers the truth about who they are and what they've done. It uncovers the truth about who you are. It uncovers about this, the truth about the relationship. That is the unmasking. That is the burlesqueing. So can you accept this version of your partner? Some people are like, no way. Who I thought he was is dead and gone and never was. And I don't want to be in a relationship with this new.

Lora Cheadle [00:37:49]:
This person now that I know who they are. Totally fair. If this is not a person you want to be in a relationship with, you don't have to. But what a gift that now you know they have been burlesqued and unmasked and now you're like, dang, that's not who I thought you were, and I don't want a part of that. And then for other people, it's like. Like for me, dang, I don't like that at all. And yet still I can find acceptance for that because the story makes sense. Knowing his background, knowing the pain that he went through, knowing what he was experiencing along the way, his cheating weirdly makes sense.

Lora Cheadle [00:38:30]:
And I'd say a little over half, maybe 60 to 65% of the clients that I work with end up staying with their part because they can find acceptance and understanding for that new version of their partner. And you know what? That's a pretty high number. But it's not about forgiveness. It's about accepting unconditionally. This is that person. This was their habit, their default, their patterning, their problem, their way of acting out. And now I can accept them for who they are. And now I accept me and I accept the ways I like.

Lora Cheadle [00:39:05]:
I have to accept you never caused. You never caused it. You never caused it. You never caused it. But I have to accept the ways I performed in my life. The way I lent leaned into having a transactional marriage, the way I let myself lean too much into my ego, the way I would be a little bit holier than thou. Those are things that I have uncovered and accepted about myself now. And because I accept me and because I accept him now, we've burlesqued things.

Lora Cheadle [00:39:47]:
We're in the state of pure authenticity. And then we can decide do we want to move forward from here or not now, the next step in flaunt. And yes, I know I'm going fast, but I want to get this laid out. So when you are ready for the book club and workshop, you've got the scheme up N is for navigate the negative and this is what's really important. And this is. I do a lot of work with. Around this. When I work with people one on one.

Lora Cheadle [00:40:15]:
It's. It's not about avoiding the darkness. It's about integrating the darkness. It's about integrating the shadow. It's about finding wholeness. It's about moving through the valley of the shadow of death with grace and with dignity and with integrity and with vision. It's about navigating the dark night of the soul and not getting sucked into victimhood, but moving through it. Did you ever see the movie? It's an old movie with Robin Williams called what Dreams May Come.

Lora Cheadle [00:40:55]:
What Dreams May Come. It's. It's a great movie. It's very disturbing, but it's great. He is a physician and his wife. I'm not going to go through all the parts of the movie, but his wife commits suicide. And when she commits commit suicide, she gets lost on the other side. It's almost like Dante's levels of hell.

Lora Cheadle [00:41:20]:
She is in this level of hell where it's hopeless. See, there we go with that hope again. She is in that hopeless level of hell. And if she can't have hope, she can't move out. And that there is forgiveness and there is love and there is light and there is all this amazing stuff waiting for her. But because she has lost hope, she has sucked down. And that's what navigating the negative is. It's about breaking out of that all or nothing.

Lora Cheadle [00:41:50]:
It's about finding the hope and it's about accepting and receiving the love, the light, the positivity, the gifts. It's about integrating. Not like this didn't ever happen to me. No, you don't have to be as public as I am about it. But how can you integrate this into your life, into your marriage, if you're staying together into that narrative of your life with your kids, with your family, with your friends. That's what navigating the negative is about. It's about not shying away from that darkness, but it's about integrating all of it. And t.

Lora Cheadle [00:42:30]:
The very last step of flaunt is about trusting your truth. A hope is rebuilt again through trusting your truth, trusting your voice, trusting your intuition, trusting your body, trusting your knowing. How do you trust your truth? Let all that judgment, let all that fear go and stand firmly in to who you are. And with that as the backdrop, what we're going to do in this workshop in the book club is really working on reclaiming your whole self, reclaiming the whole woman who by revealing her. Not by stitching her back together because she was so broken, but by reclaiming the wholeness of who you are and honoring your experiences because your experiences make you who you are. Flaunt is all about your labels, your roles, your scripts, your identities. You know, you play the role of the good mom, you play the role of the good daughter, you play the role of the good sister. You, you have been labeled the smart one, the organized one, you know, the hot mess one.

Lora Cheadle [00:43:50]:
Like, we have labels, we play roles, and then in our own mind, we have these scripts. This is the way my life should work. And the problem with infidelity and betrayal is it disrupts that script. Like, my script did not include infidelity. My script, the way I had scripted out my life, did not include infidelity. And my guess is yours didn't include it either. So when we can identify this was a script and it didn't work. This is just a role I'm playing.

Lora Cheadle [00:44:23]:
It's not who I am. This is a way that I have been labeled or that I have labeled myself, but it's not who I am. Or maybe it is a part of who I am. That's when we reclaim the whole. I love doing a lot of the parts work. If you've done some parts work, you know what I'm talking about. If not, it's just basically the recognition that there. There are parts of us that want different things.

Lora Cheadle [00:44:48]:
Like, there's a part of me. Yes. That wanted to stay with my husband. And there's a part of me who wanted to, like, take him for all he's worth. You know what I mean? There was a part of me that wanted to, like, go cheat and show him, blah, blah, blah. There's a part of me that wanted revenge. There's a part of me that wanted to move into, like, oh, I am this godly, perfect little angel, and I would never do that. Like, there are parts of us that want to do all sorts of conflicting things.

Lora Cheadle [00:45:15]:
And it's not problematic that there's different parts of us that want conflicting things. What is problematic is not acknowledging and admitting that there are parts of us that want different things. And by pretending that it doesn't exist. No, it's not great to be like, there's a part of me that wants you to die, but it's great to admit to yourself, like, there is a part of me that really hates you. There is a part of me that wants you to go away. Like, when you admit that, then it's no longer scary. It's no longer threatening. It's a part of me.

Lora Cheadle [00:45:59]:
It's a part of you. Do you know how many people in coaching sessions are like, I've never told anybody this before, but there's a part of me that hates him? Well, duh, of course. And then there's also a part that loves them and there's a part that's going to miss them, and there's a part that's this and there's a part that's that. But when we can integrate the parts, that's when we become whole. It's. It's again, it goes back to that performance. I am not performing being healed. I am me.

Lora Cheadle [00:46:34]:
And I'm mostly healed because I'm mostly present with what's going on. And I still have some bad days and I still can lean into fear and I still can. It's rare and I don't stay there as often, but I'm never gonna lie and be like, I'm perfect and I'm amazing, because I'm not and neither are you. So healing really means inviting all of you back in. All of you back in where you feel like things are cracking instead of desperately trying to fix or heal. Reveal that crack. Reveal the shadow. Because like I said earlier, that's when you're going to say, oh, it's not cracked, it's just dented.

Lora Cheadle [00:47:20]:
Oh, it's not cracked. It's just all scratched up. Oh, it's not cracked. It never needed to be there in the first place. It's getting in touch with your anger, your desire, your power, your sensuality, your truth, your grief, your, like, your rage, all of it. And inviting all of that back in. Because the shadow self, the dark parts of you, that's not the enemy. That's not the enemy.

Lora Cheadle [00:47:52]:
That's where your strength lies. That's where your power and your strength lies. Think about. It's physical, so it's easier to think about. But think about the corset. I use the corset as an analogy in my book because it's such a powerful one. The corset cinches you in and it pulls you in. And the tighter you cinch that corset, the less mobility you have.

Lora Cheadle [00:48:25]:
And women would faint. They would actually faint and pass out because they can't breathe, because the corset is pushing them into place. Nor can you bend down and pick things up off the floor. Nor can you eat. Like it's holding you into place. And how often do you do that to yourself? How often do you Put on that metaphoric corset and hold yourself into place. I got this under control, but I can't breathe and I might pass out and I can't eat and I can't pick things up and I'm not comfortable. But dang, I look good.

Lora Cheadle [00:49:03]:
Like I've done that a million times more, more than I care to count. And that's, that's not healing, that's bracing, that's propping up and that's moving into the illusion. And healing happens when you drop your cover, when you drop the illusion, when you trust your truth and you stand as you are. This is my post menopausal belly and waist. This is my gray hair. This is my really messed up marriage and family. And this is my husband with a really stinking, traumatic, poverty stricken and horrendous past. And these are his messed up parents.

Lora Cheadle [00:49:56]:
And this is the damage that they have caused. And this is what the impact that it had on our kids. And this is what train wrecked in our life when all of this went down. And it's not that I'm sugarcoating and I love it all and it was just great because I hate that, I really hate that sugar coating. But it's that, yeah, let me be honest about it because I'm not judging it. The only way I judge it is it's really unfortunate. It's really unfortunate I have to be doing this. Like, it's really unfortunate that I'm here right now.

Lora Cheadle [00:50:34]:
And it's really unfortunate that my husband went through what he went through and that he had these experiences with these other women, that he drugged them into this. It is really unfortunate that he had the childhood and the upbring he had. Like, oh my God, this is just bad. Is really bad. And it's really unfortunate. And I'm going to tell you the truth about all of it because I feel no shame about it. I mean, part of the reason I don't feel shame is I didn't cause it. It's not my fault.

Lora Cheadle [00:51:03]:
But still, I am still going to admit the pieces that I did do wrong. I'm going to tell you all the ways where I shamed and judged him unknowingly and sometimes knowingly, where I manipulated, where I was not my best self because I don't judge myself for that. So I don't feel guilt or shame or fear that oh my God, somebody else is going to judge me because I am so comfortable with myself. And that's, that's the point that I want you to get to too. Because that is what's healing. Healing is being who you are and being like, here's my dents and here's my cracks, and here's my. And being okay with it. Because I'm not judging myself, because I don't think I should be.

Lora Cheadle [00:51:51]:
Another way. Many of you know, I. I did dance burlesque. I haven't done it since 2020. I'd love to do it again, but I haven't done it for a while. But part of the reason that burlesque is so freeing is you do get up on stage and you show yourself. You're never naked. You're never, never, never naked.

Lora Cheadle [00:52:11]:
So don't be like, oh, my God. And even if you are like, oh, my God, that's okay, because I'm not. Oh, my God. I'm just okay with me. But it's about getting up and showing your body as it is. This is my tush. These are my thigh dimples. These are my stretch marks.

Lora Cheadle [00:52:28]:
And I can still get up and dance and be in joy. And that's why it's so powerful in burlesque. You get up and you dance. Enjoy as you are. And the removal of clothing is done to remove the stereotypes. It's done to remove the judgment. It's done to remove all of those things that make you look the way that you want to look, but really don't look. So, like in burlesque, you might remove the corset, and you will remove all of these supporting material costume pieces in service of revealing yourself as you are to dance and frolic and play and show.

Lora Cheadle [00:53:11]:
I have total acceptance over my body. And that's the thing I do. I do have total acceptance over my body. I want you to have total acceptance over your body. I have total acceptance over my life. I want you to have total acceptance over your life. Why? Because then nobody, Nobody's judgment matters. You don't care anymore because you're fine.

Lora Cheadle [00:53:37]:
You don't care because you truly are fine. So how can you burlesque your world? What can you strip out of? What can you take off? What are those layers of self judgment that you can strip out of and just be like, you know what? I leave that behind. The image, the illusion of the perfect marriage, being the perfect wife, being the perfect mom, having the perfect family. Like, strip out of that. Strip out of that. What are you left with? Because so often it's the fear of what it would be like to strip out of that. That the fear is greater than how it really feels being stripped out of it. It's so terrifying to be like, I'm going to quit judging myself because then I'm never going to try hard again.

Lora Cheadle [00:54:33]:
I'm going to quit judging myself and then I'm going to get all slobby and out of shape and. And then I'm never going to care again and everything's going to fall apart. No, no, no, no, no. That's a story you're telling yourself. When you strip out of the judgment, when you strip out of the labels, the rules, the scripts. When you strip out of doing all of these things because you think you're going to do something that's transactional. I think if I'm going to do this, then they're going to do that. If my house looks like this, then my kids are going to.

Lora Cheadle [00:55:03]:
My neighbors are going to think if I do this for my kids, then they're going to get in a good school. If I do this for my kids or my family or my husband or my whatever, then the neighbors are going to know that blood. Blah, blah. So then if somebody else, I mean, think about all of those layers, right? If I go to church and then people see this and then they're gonna know, oh, my God, we all do it. But there are so many layers that are strip out of it all this act of revealing is just showing the truth that has been there all along. Stripping out of the shoulds, the shame, the old stories, making peace with the shadow and bringing your whole self forward, bringing your whole self into the light. Because when we fully integrate all of who we are, the light and the dark, the fear and the confidence, the hurt and the humor, that's when we become whole again. That is what it means to go from shattered to shining.

Lora Cheadle [00:56:10]:
So once again, will you please, pretty, pretty please come to my free book club and workshop? It's going to be fun. You deserve fun. It's going to be transformative. It's going to be liberating. It's going to shift the way that you feel about yourself in your situation. And it's going to give you the gift of joy and peace. Peace through the holiday season. Again, it is December 1st.

Lora Cheadle [00:56:51]:
It's two hours and it's on zoom. Yes, you can get a replay. It is 12 to two mountain. But when you go to the sign up link, it'll give you all the different time zones. And if for some reason you're like, I cannot figure out my time zone, no worries, send me an email and let me know. To sign up, you go to www.the flauntbook.com the flaunt f l a u n t book.com we will read, we will reflect. We will reclaim. I want you to talk about that word reflect.

Lora Cheadle [00:57:36]:
We're talking about shining and sparkling and think about that reflecting. What are you reflecting? Think about holiday lights and snow and ornaments and all those pretty reflections. You reflect what's there. And when you create something that is really good and then it gets reflected, it's like those ripples in the pond and it just reflects out and just more and more and more and more and more goodness and peace and positivity happens. So we're going to reflect in more ways than one. Not only are we going to reflect internally in our brain, but we're going to reflect our confidence, our power, our joy, our acceptance of the situation that we're in. In service of reclaiming our whole self, in service of reclaiming the powerful person that we are, reclaiming who we are, exclusive of our labels, our roles, our scripts. We're going to integrate the shadow.

Lora Cheadle [00:58:38]:
We are going to uncover your sparkle, and we are going to walk or even dance into the next season feeling really grounded and strong. It's completely free, but you will need your own copy of my book, Flaunt. Drop your cover and reveal your smart, sexy and spiritual self. So grab it now. Start reading. Grab it wherever books are sold, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, you name it. Don't wait for the new year to start. Start now so December can truly be the month that you come back home to yourself.

Lora Cheadle [00:59:19]:
The month that you sparkle and shine. The month that you have fun so you can move into 2026 a completely different feeling person. Remember that hope isn't a light that somebody else turns on for you. It is that spark within yourself that you learn how to tend and enliven for yourself. Every time you laugh or breathe or release judgment or just show up to something like this event, you're stoking that flame. You're rebuilding hope. You're not broken. Your sparkle has just been dulled.

Lora Cheadle [01:00:02]:
And together, we are going to bring it back to life. So once again, from shattered to shining. A book club experience for women who are ready to feel like themselves again. Grab your copy of Flaunt and register@the flauntbook.com because betrayal does not get the final word here. You do have an amazing week. I can't wait to see you on December 1st. And always remember to flaunt exactly who you are, because who you are is always more than enough.

Lora Cheadle [01:00:45]:
Tune in next time to Flaunt Find your sparkle and create a life you love after Infidelity or betrayal. With Laura Cheadle every Wednesday at 7am and 7pm Eastern Standard Time on syndicated Dream Vision 7 radio network. Uncover the truth of what's possible for you on the other side of betrayal, and develop the skills and strategies necessary to embrace the future and flourish today. Download your free Betrayal Recovery toolkit@betrayalrecoveryguide.com.