Living with Purpose After Divorce with Ramsey Bergeron

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Interview Transcription

ADRIENNE:
Welcome back. And thanks for listening to the Team Lally Real estate show home of the guaranteed sold program or we’ll buy it. I’m Adrienne and I’m still Attilio and if you have any questions, just give us a call at 7999596 or check us out online at Teamlally.com.

ATTILIO:
Adrienne did you know I wanted to be a doctor? No, but I didn’t have the patience. Clearly that I was looked up the most terrible dad joke I could tell. And that was it. Okay. All right. So yes, please. Our guest today is a certified leadership dynamics and mindset coach, eight time Ironman and owner of Bergeron Well-Being in Scottsdale, Arizona.

ADRIENNE:
Beginning in 2006, he started his business dedicating his life to promoting well-being and health. He’s been a leader in the coaching and wellness industries for over 15 years and has over two decades of public speaking experience. And I’m going to add this in including he’s done some stand up comedy as well. Yep. Please welcome today’s guest, Ramsey Bergeron.

ATTILIO:
welcome Ramsey.

RAMSEY:
Oh, hi. Thanks for having me and Attilio I had a similar situation. I dated a girl who used to play a lot of tennis. We had a breakup because love meant nothing to her.

ATTILIO:
And then it’s like my own bad dad joke. I had to throw it dad jokes are like they’re like painful, but they’re so painful. They’re funny. And All right, so we want to talk about

ADRIENNE:
we’re welcoming you back. Yeah. And part of the reason is you have a new course that you’ve just come out with. Yeah, I’m Living with a Purpose After Divorce. So, so why did you create this class, Ramsey?

RAMSEY:
Well, thank thank you guys for having me back. I do appreciate it. And I created this class. I guess, after going through my own divorce two years ago, I realized there was there wasn’t a lot of support out there. That helps people in a profound way. Other than like legal advice, I really wanted to be able to help people from the emotional standpoint, and helping them find their sense of purpose and identity on their own after divorce. Because I know for me, that was such a challenging thing was, who was I? What did I want after, you know, the life that I thought I was going to have forever? ended up not materializing. Alright, well, what did I need moving forward. And so I created this course, to help people with some of the tools that really helped me be able to not only get my life on track, but to be the best version of myself ever asked

ATTILIO:
for us? Well, let’s, let’s take a let’s take the tour of the class here, as we say, but as they say, a radio is TV for the mind. So we got to describe it. Talk about. So how long is this? How long is the course?

RAMSEY:
Well, there’s that there’s 12 modules, and it can be done over three months. People can do it sooner if they want. But I intentionally drip out the content where it’s not, you can’t just power through it. Because change is going to take time, I want to make sure that people understand kind of the fundamentals before we move on. Yeah, it’s kind of divided into three parts. The first one is to discover who you are, decide who you want to be, and then develop a plan to get you there. So the first part of the course, it’s a lot of honesty with yourself, I started off with the ELI assessment, the Energy Leadership Index assessment with which I know Adrian has taken I offered a couple of years ago, and then some other assessments to gauge levels of emotional intelligence. And where are you just with your with your physical well being financially and with your community? And once you kind of had a starting point? And we’re going to say, all right, in one year, who do you want to be? And once you’ve kind of determined what are your values? And what’s your mission statement in life, then we develop the plan to get you there. What does that look like? And what’s what’s keeping you from moving forward? And how do we focus your attention on the things that are within your control. So there’s 12 modules, I said, there’s also a workbook, there’s a continuing education journal to help these concepts going afterwards, and a support community because that was for me, one of the things that I needed was just other people who were either going through divorce or just who understand and who can help be be an ear, or just a shoulder to lean on.

ATTILIO:
I think that’s important too, because divorce from a stress level standpoint, we know this from therapists and psychiatrists, and psychologists that it’s right up there with a death in the family, major traumatic change in your life. And you know, we may or may not and people, you know, there’s a statistically there’s a high probability that half the people listening to this can relate. Because unfortunately, I’ve been through that situation, and we know that

ADRIENNE:
or are going currently going through that or

ATTILIO:
what, what, what does this you know, because it’s not like you go to your, your, your your siblings, or you go to your parents or you go to your friends, because it’s kind of embarrassing. So talk about how these modules are helpful in that situation.

RAMSEY:
Well, you know, that’s a great point they went it’s hard to go to people. And not only do we know what to say, when we go to them, they don’t know what to say one of the hardest things like whenever I was going through my divorce was some days I would feel like yes, this is the right decision I can take on the world. And then if I’m talking with somebody and telling them to go through divorce, they say oh my god, I’m so then it makes me question they will, am I making the right decision. So it’s so hard to know what to say. And it’s so hard for people to be able to communicate back because they don’t know what you need or in that situation. So this course really just helps you understand what it is that you’re feeling and be able to articulate it. So I know a lot of people when they’re going through a divorce, especially men don’t know how to how to even share what they see as they don’t even know how to express what they feel So this course really helps people gain clarity by learning what it means to ground, to create space to be able to just sit and understand what it is that we’re going through. And then be able to, you know, and he said as well, it’s, it’s a grieving process is similar to death, because we’re grieving the life that we’re never, that we thought we were going to have that we no longer will. That is a death, you’re grieving the death of the life you thought you were going to have. And that’s a very real emotional experience. And there’s a way to honor that while still moving forward and determining who you want to be.

ADRIENNE:
So, so Ramsey, if someone like is in the middle of a divorce, would this course would this be good timing? Or should they wait until after like the dust has settled and then enroll? How does that work as far as the time what

ATTILIO:
would be your recommendation?

RAMSEY:
That’s a great question, guys. So I actually offer a complimentary one on one coaching call because everyone’s situation is different. It was a really amicable divorce, then maybe you might want to start this process earlier, if there’s a lot going on. From from a legal or financial standpoint, it really just depends on individual circumstances. But if anyone wants that complimentary coaching call to see if this class is right for you, then you can go to it’s a link on my website BergeronWellBeing.com. That’s BERGERONwellbeing.com/video bergeronwellbeing.com/video, it’s a quick little video, it kind of tells you some of the course. And then you can schedule a one on one call with me to see if it’s the right fit for you after you watch that video.

ATTILIO:
Ramsey I’m sure too, that this would be the thought that are popping up in people’s minds. Because, you know, when we sit down with a client, you it sounds like you do the same thing. You take a consultative approach, in that initial consultation to find out what their goals and priorities are. And sometimes we sit down with clients and want to sell the home. And keeping the home and not selling it is the best option is the best option for the goals and priorities. So I’m going to imagine I knowing you and we know you on a personal level that if he comes to find out that divorce is not the direction that they go that you would counsel them to, to say, hey,

ADRIENNE:
or even the timing of taking this course. Now, Ramsey you have additional resources. Let’s briefly touch on that I don’t want to take away from the divorce course you have recently come out with but I know that you have some other resources, as well that are worth mentioning. Yeah,

RAMSEY:
I do. Thank you. So I have classes on emotional mastery, just a general class and emotional mastery for men, which is very much specifically tailored for men. Because it’s it’s a whole different ballgame for us when we deal with anger and just issues that we haven’t been able to fully express. So yeah, I do have an emotional mastery class, which will help anyone who just wants to figure out what it is that you’re feeling, what is an emotion, how can I appropriately express my emotion, and the emotional mastery for men. So to address kind of what you’re asking a second ago, if there if I do have someone currently in my divorce class, who is not getting divorced, but it looked like it was going to go that way. So through this class, him and his wife have actually decided to how much that they do want to work on it and love each other. So it’s a great class, in general, for anyone who might feel like you’re living on autopilot or doesn’t know what they want in life or doesn’t know how to communicate, a lot of those tools are going to apply just as well to people trying to save their marriage, too.

ATTILIO:
I was talking with a good friend of mine, and he was telling me about a separation recently that they’re going through and I said, hey, whatever you can, I mean, they’re gonna go to college, they’re going to counseling, and they’re gonna get it worked out. And I said, I’d highly encourage you, you know, because I think the reason, here’s what I told him, and I think you probably think the same way. We’ll go get, say like a four year college degree, spend $150,000 hours and hours of studying textbooks, computers, taking tests to get this piece of paper for a relationship with a future employer. But how much time do we spend on the more important relationships like a significant other? Nothing. And that would be the reason I always want people to take this course with you as to how to, you know, you can’t be in a relationship with somebody else and understanding their purpose. If you don’t understand what yours is.

ADRIENNE:
You got to work on you first. Yeah, yeah,

RAMSEY:
I agree. I have a version of this course, which is just called Living with Purpose, which isn’t divorced centric. Yes. And that’s kind of the goal for that as well. And honestly, I started dating someone now after two years of being single, and we’re, we have a counselor. But even though we’ve only been dating for Few months. Yeah, I told anyone I said, Look, I want to make sure that we’re not waiting until things are wrong before we go to a couple of counselor. Why? Why did people wait until there’s a problem, let’s go make sure that we have alignment. And so I offer that service as well to people like with with couples coaching, you don’t have to wait till there’s a problem. If you want to make sure that you’re in alignment and growing together, I think you hit the nail on the head Attilio. Why do we wait until things are bad before we seek some kind of intervention instead of being proactive about it?

ATTILIO:
Yeah, and why do we spend so much time and money into all these other areas of our life, and we neglect probably the most important area of our life is our relationships, right? Because it spills over into everything. I don’t know if anybody I went at home is having a rough time, and you can go into work and be a superstar. I think that’s a myth that’s been busted over and over that you can do it in the short term, but long term, it’s not sustainable.

RAMSEY:
I agree. And that’s why I start the course with that energy leadership index, because that’s what it shows people and shows you who you are on a regular day, and then how your energy shifts when you encounter stress. Because it doesn’t matter what you know, like you can be certified and have all these these, like you can, you know, if you’re an engineer, you know how to use a CAD software real well. But if you don’t handle stress, well, you can’t perform, whether it’s a job at home and things you don’t love to do that the right and affects everything. And I think, fundamentally, it starts with the relationship with yourself. And so many people rush into a marriage in order to have someone else fix them or just to not be alone. And that’s really why we peel the onion back so much in almost all of my classes. So really figure out who are you What is it that you want? And what’s your current level of emotional understanding? Because if you don’t know what you’re feeling, then someone else is never gonna be able to figure it out. Yeah.

ATTILIO:
I think people are like, they’ll get into a relationship. And they’re like, Hey, he’s kind of a nut job. Oh, don’t worry. I’ll change him. You know? Yeah, we get married, no, doesn’t work.

RAMSEY:
50% of our programming of what we were, what we’re attracted to, and how we think, is determined by the time we’re seven years old. Yeah. And, you know, and there is a much bigger conversation here and why I think therapy is very important. And I don’t intend for this class to be any substitution, pretty deep therapy work that some people need to do. But you’re right, like, figuring out why we’re attracted to people is helpful, because we might have a certain type that’s not conducive for our long term health and well being. And once we start to look at our values, and understand what our values are, then we can see this other person even have the same values I have, and we can eliminate so many things on the front end, just by knowing what’s important to us and what we really want out of our life.

ATTILIO:
Yeah, I think the purpose is like, your own personal GPS, you know, I always tell people that you have a phone, you punch in the address in the phone, and it tells you it gives you like, proceed to the route directions. But it can’t do that if it doesn’t know where the phone is to begin with. And you’re going to help people purpose, figure out where

ADRIENNE:
they are. And then where are they going where they want to end

ATTILIO:
of this series. Ramsey is going to tell you proceed to the route?

RAMSEY:
Well, it depends on it depends on where they want to go. Yeah, right. If I’m trying to get to New York, it’s very different if I’m starting in Scottsdale than if I’m starting in Honolulu. So if you don’t know where you are, you’re never going to have a plan to get where you want to be.

ADRIENNE:
So, so Ramsey with this course. How soon is your next class starting? Yes. How do people I know you said you do the initial call to determine like, is this the right time? Or is this the right fit for them? But how soon?

RAMSEY:
Well, next week, I’m starting a new cohort for the Living with Purpose After Divorce. Yeah, but if even if they miss that first week, the recordings will be there and they can get caught up and join the class. And the community that we’re building there is that online community as well. I’m going to be doing calls and their weekly and they also no matter when you start the class, you’re going to have a one on one call with me every week to make sure that you understand the material you’re progressing along. At least for the next couple of months if this really blows up because there’s a huge need for this. I might have to just scale it back to doing group calls. But as of now, if anyone is to jump in this week or next week, I am still able to offer those one on one weekly calls for everyone that enrolled because it’s so important to not just give you material I want to be your partner in this and be in a hold you to help hold you accountable and help clarify anything that you might need help with along the way.

ATTILIO:
I just want to let our listeners know we didn’t Ramsey didn’t call us out of the blue or spam us or send us To Text Hey, call me I got this. No, we know Ramsey on a personal level and what kind of person

ADRIENNE:
he’s come out and trained all of the, like top leaders grew up in Honolulu, not just the Honolulu group, but like Maui, Big Island, all like the KW one, he’s come out and done some leadership development with all of us.

ATTILIO:
So I think both of us, myself would be very confident in saying that. The worst thing that could happen to you if you had a consultation with Ramsey is that you’re gonna go on, he’s going to invite you on a hike.

RAMSEY:
Yeah, it’s all about, yeah, both of you guys have been hiking. And that’s why I love reaching out with with you guys. Because you guys are also certified, you know, to be able to help people real estate, purchasing or selling in the real estate aspect of going through a divorce. So the fact that you guys are certified, it was, that’s why I reached out to you guys. Yeah, it meant a lot to know that you guys are also doing the work to help people in that in this very challenging situation.

ADRIENNE:
Thank you. Thank you for reminding the listeners about that. If you go to our website of Oahudivorce.com. Yep, there is all sorts of resources on the real estate side of things. And Attilio and I are both certified to

ATTILIO:
we’ve done a ton of transactions, unfortunately, that were the result of divorce. But we went and did more extensive training with actually family law attorneys and judges or judges 60 hour course it wasn’t inexpensive, and it took a lot of time and testing to get to even hone that samurai sword even more to be able to help people navigate through dividing unfortunately, the biggest asset that most married couples have which is their home. But I think you Ramsey my opinion, you have a more important role helping them with the emotional emotional navigation Yeah, of it.

ADRIENNE:
So we’re gonna make sure that we add on our, on our page

ATTILIO:
resource, a resource link for Ramsey. Yes, I will address the home aspect of it, you’ll you’ll help them navigate the emotional aspect of it. Because we do know, you know, when you think about it, too, and we can all relate is that when you do get the divorce, you’re more likely in a social circle with other married couples. And it’s embarrassing, and you don’t want to go to them, though they want to be there to help you. Um, you know it for me, I mean, you know, a lot of times too, I felt Ramsey my own personal experience. And I know my friends are good, and there will be there for me. But then we write this story, right? That we’re like a pariah. And we don’t, you know, they don’t want, you know, their husbands hanging out with me because I might infect them with a divorce virus. And we know that’s not true, but it’s a story rewrite. We don’t have this resource like you to go to to be able to learn differently.

RAMSEY:
And that’s such an important key that we actually do. The first and second module is how do we separate facts from the story, we’re telling ourselves, removing judgment from facts and looking at things objectively, because, you know, this is one of the things that people have a hard time understanding is your thoughts are lying to you. You know, whenever you have thoughts, we all tend to believe every thought that pops into our head. And the challenging thing after divorce is especially because I got into a really very trauma bonding relationship right after my divorce. And it really made me realize that I can’t trust myself right now that my thoughts aren’t being honest, I can’t be objective. And that’s part of what we do in this class to help people slow down and say, Okay, what are the facts here? versus what’s the story? I’m telling myself. And that’s, that’s really so critical, because the story usually has no basis in reality. Yeah.

ATTILIO:
I think too. We talked about it on another show, but we call it cognitive dissonance. And that’s where he like, you’re like, you are a good person. And people do want to be around you. But your thoughts are, I’m a bad, terrible person, and nobody wants to be around me. And that’s that monkey, and that’s called cognitive dissonance. And they’ve done studies on it, it affects you at a physiological level. It affects what you’re projecting what’s around you, and you’ve got to close that gap to the reality of who you are, and that you’re still a good person, even after divorce.

RAMSEY: 
Agreed. And I think sometimes we get so stuck in our head, and then we’ll get mad at ourselves for having those thoughts like God, what’s wrong with you? I’m so stupid. Why am I thinking and all that does is perpetuate it and make it even worse because then we’re, we’re piling on top of piling. So I think one of the important things that we do is okay, well, let’s focus on the what do I want moving forward? And because too often I know we talked about this on another call. If I say don’t think of a pink elephant, what happens?

ATTILIO: 
That’s what do you think that’s what you focus on? Yes,

ADRIENNE: 
That’s right.

RAMSEY: 
Yeah. So when you’re telling yourself what you don’t want because the subconscious doesn’t understand negative, so it’s like, I don’t want to be sad. I don’t want to hurt anymore. I don’t want to feel this way. Well, then you’re you’re continuing to tell your mind about your thinking about the elephant. So, think of the green giraffe. Let’s think about what do we want to experience? What would it look like to move on? What would it look like and feel like to love yourself? And is this trying to shift the energy that way?

ATTILIO: 
Well, just like everything, all good things must come to an end and,

ADRIENNE:
and thank you Ramsey for giving us like a little sample and taste of relieving of wanting more. Yes, and we will encourage all of our listeners to go check out his website, give Ramsey a call. See if this is a good fit for you. We’re gonna have Ramsey’s on our website and

ATTILIO: 
our resources tab. So it’ll be there and we highly recommend to get around good people like Ramsey to help you. There are people that bring energy to you and there are people that suck energy from you. And Ramsey is the bringer of the energy.

ADRIENNE:
That’s right. Thank you Ramsey for for developing this course and for sharing it with our listeners. We appreciate it.

RAMSEY: 
Thank you guys both. I really appreciate the both of you and look forward to seeing you next time I back out that way.

ATTILIO: 
Yeah, when Heike,

ADRIENNE: 
thanks Ramsey.

RAMSEY: 
Amen. Take care Mahalo

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