One step at a time: Pianist's journey through divorce

Michelle Lynne 0:00 The piano is something that I've had since I was a little girl, since I was four years old. Nobody can take this from me. Because everything else had been taken. You know, my marriage, the hope for children immediately. Um, I really just wanted to get pregnant around my 30s. It was like my main focus. Everything was just ripped away. And not by choice. Kate Daly 0:20 Welcome to the divorce podcast, where we explore all aspects of ending relationships, separation, and parenting apart. If your marriage or partnership has ended, or you have friends and family who are separating, this podcast is for you. I'm Kate Daly, a relationship counselor, divorce specialist, and co-founder of amicable, the online legal service separating couples. In each episode, we look at relationships and separation from different angles, including the emotional, legal, and social. I'm joined by experts and special guests who share their own unique stories, experience and tips, with the goal of helping people end relationships in a kinder and better way. When a marriage ends, it can feel like you lose yourself too. I'm joined today by Michelle Lynne, a Canadian pianist and singer, to talk about her separation, how she rebuilt her identity, and how it shaped her music. She also shares what it took to turn that experience into a deeply personal album and how she got through it one step at a time. Today's episode touches on some heavy themes, including trauma and poor mental health and suicide. So please take care of yourself while you listen. If you loved this episode, then please subscribe and rate us on your preferred listening platform. Welcome, Michelle. Thank you for having me. It's lovely to see you. It's lovely to meet you. Now, you've just been telling me about your amazing tour of Europe and France in particular, and how that kind of came about after your divorce. But just before we get to that, which is super interesting, just give us a bit of background, Michelle, if you will. Tell us your personal story. How did your separation happen? And how did it affect or give you a sense of who you were? Michelle Lynne 2:12 Yeah, uh it's a big question, of course. And I just want to start by saying that I appreciate uh what you're doing, and I think your work is very important to have healthy conversations for anyone listening who's going through this. I think it's uh extraordinarily painful. It's hard to put words into what we've experienced. And sometimes I think uh you feel that no one else could really ever understand what you're going through. So it's it's I think a good thing to have resources like this to turn to. So when I moved to Europe with my ex-husband, we were coming here to pursue our musical studies further, both musicians. And uh, things became clear that they weren't going to be able to continue with our marriage. And I personally am a fighter, so I I desperately tried to rescue what I thought was possible, and ultimately it wasn't. So that was a very painful time because COVID happened, lockdown began. Everyone in the whole world kind of shut down, and my my whole world shut down at the same time. Uh, so that was very interesting to navigate. Kate Daly 3:18 Yeah, all of a sudden you're on your own, and not just kind of on your own emotionally, but physically as well. That must have been a real double whammy, I imagine. Michelle Lynne 3:29 Yeah, one of the first things I did was I jumped on a plane and went straight to my parents. And I didn't tell them exactly what was going on because I wanted to protect what I was hoping would stay, resolve, right? So I just told them that, you know, we were gonna go into counseling, that things were a little rough. They completely supported me. I cannot be, I'm so grateful to the my very core for my parents. They've stood by me from day one and they said, whatever you need, we're here. And I'm not sure everyone has that. So that's just a huge testimony for me that I knew where I could go. I knew where I was safe. And uh yeah, came back and then the the process of lockdown started, and we were still able to meet, but just distanced. So um, I had a small group of friends, women, and we would get together and we would walk once a week with our dogs and just go into the fields for hours and hours. I think I've spent, you know, thousands of hours outside with my dog during that time and just walk and talk and pray and discuss like what's trying to process because it was just so unexpected. I was really blindsided by everything. It's interesting you say that. Kate Daly 4:31 So that's such a familiar kind of thing I hear from people that they were blindsided by it. And, you know, it's like when you're not involved in that particular relationship, it's very easy to say, oh, how could you not see it coming? There must have been signs. But I hear that story so often that it just, you know, I I didn't see it coming, I didn't know what to do. And then you just have to, as you did, create some space to process and the importance of that space, and like you say, for you it was walking, uh, walking with the dogs and the the the women friends, that becomes such a key part of making sense of your journey, what's happened, and and helps you prepare for moving forwards ultimately, I guess. Michelle Lynne 5:19 Right. I think the process was so long that I didn't recognize in that moment that you just don't even know what to think. You're just you're just literally existing because you it can't possibly be true what you're waking up to every day. It can't possibly be reality. This doesn't make any sense. This is not what's supposed to be happening. This is not what I agree with. I'm not letting this happen. I'm going to solve this. You know, all of that kind of things were coming up in me. And it took a long time, I think, to kind of go through the the grieving stages to acknowledge and to not deny or be in denial. And I had very good advice from my actually my very first piano teacher. And she said, if he won't go to counseling with you, you go alone. And that for me was uh new information. I never had considered going alone. Uh, it ended up being life-saving. I did both talk therapy and EMDR, which is for anyone listening, uh, more heavy therapy around eye movement, reprocessing trauma traumatic memories. So yeah, that took a long time. And then in the middle of all this, I started trying to process my feelings at the piano, which is where I've always felt safe. It's always been my thing. And when you marry young, I think so much of my identity was wrapped into him. And I learned how to think from him. He he's extremely intelligent. I adored him in every way. I really looked up to him. So to try and figure out who I was after the fact was, I think, a really long process. And that was um something I didn't even realize was who am I without him? And so one of the things that I could for sure say was the piano. The piano is something that I've had since I was a little girl, since I was four years old. Nobody can take this from me because everything else had been taken. You know, my marriage, the hope for children immediately. I really just wanted to get pregnant around my 30s. It was like my main focus. My life, I mean, everything was just ripped away. And not by choice. So then you you can really fall so much into victim mode. And I know I had to continually try to get myself out of that. This has happened to me. This is so unfair. Because those things are true. But it we, if I chose to stay there, I wouldn't be able to try and move forward for myself. Kate Daly 7:30 It's a really, it's a really interesting balance, isn't it, between giving yourself some time and space to lick your wounds and to feel those emotions. Because, as you say, it isn't fair. I didn't choose this, needs to be acknowledged, versus knowing at what point do you say, well, that is still true, but actually my behavior now has to change because I need to get on with my life and I need to build that life. And I love that point you were saying about discovering who you are. And you tie that to being marrying young and being young. I think the opposite is also true as well. When you've been in a long relationship, you've lost your self of sense, your your identity, your individualism. Very often it's tied, you've sort of become a work role almost. You know, I am the person who is the mother, or I'm the person who's the father, or I'm the breadwinner, or I'm the cleaner up, or I'm the taxi driver, or I'm the emotional prop here, whatever it is, you lose that sense of who you are. So super interesting that it for you it was a time to come back and say, who am I? What do I stand for? What do I think about this or that, or what's my character? And I had a very similar experience because I'm married and divorced twice. And when I married the first time, I was quite young, and I hadn't done anything on my own. So I went from university to marrying my university boyfriend. I always say, I accidentally married my university boyfriend. It should have just been a university boyfriend and then gone off into the world, but I accidentally got married. And then you do have that sense of, well, what am I about? I did my growing up in tandem with a partner, and I then had to go back at my sort of mid-20s, late 20s, and have what I consider to be my teenage years again. So just to work out who I was and what I was gonna do. And it's it sounds like that's a similar thing. But tell me about the piano then. So tell me about the relationship with the piano and the impact that the piano had on how you emotionally coped with your divorce. Michelle Lynne 9:37 So one of the books I read early on that was very helpful was Love Warrior by Glennon Doyle. And she has this, I don't know if you're familiar, but um, she went through a very traumatic uh divorce as well. And uh, one of my good friends recommended this to me. And she has this whole chapter in the book where she talks about sitting on the mat, and this is in reference to her yoga mat. And she would go there, and it was the only time she allowed herself to feel her feelings was in this yoga class. So she would just say, I need to stay on the mat and and not run from the pain that is standing in front of me and not avoid it. So I translated that to sitting at the piano. And so I would go to the piano with everything that I was trying to avoid in of me because I was trying to be strong or find a solution, or your brain is always looking for solutions, right? Because you're in the middle of a disaster, you're in the middle of a crisis. So I'm like, okay, we're gonna figure this out. But at the piano, I could finally stop and take down any walls of pretending and just kind of face the reality of it, just in increments, because it was impossible to face it all at once, especially because your brain wants to future plan of, well, now what's what's six months? Where am I gonna live? I'm Canadian, I live in Europe. Do you know? And then the worst part is that people start asking you, so what are you gonna do? Are you gonna go home? Are you gonna stay? I am literally shocked, traumatized. I have no answers. What do you expect me to have answers, right? So at the piano, I could just stay on the mat, stay on the bench and you know, play some chords and the emotions would would come and I could somehow try to process that. And that was, I think, very healing for me. Through that, I started to write songs, and that's where ultimately my first album came from. Kate Daly 11:16 And so before before the divorce, you obviously played the piano, you were a musician. Is that your job? Michelle Lynne 11:22 So you you were a jobbing musician and this full-time pianist, and uh we moved here studying with different teachers, master classes, looking at competitions, those things, just uh pursuing a freelance classical career. Kate Daly 11:35 So, do you think the emotion that you were going through actually changed the way you played? So, a really trained person, could they hear the difference between you pre and post-divorce? Do you think? Michelle Lynne 11:46 I mean, I think you can always tell when an artist is being uh open and true and honest. And you can tell when there's an artist who just wants to play well and play the notes. And I did have a few comments that people have said, you know, okay, we can we you can hear maturity in the playing. You can see when someone has gone through something. They're like, you know, so yeah, definitely as an artist, whatever we're going through in our life, we use that to fuel the art. But I think in in this case, it was the only way that I knew how to try and be honest with myself. Kate Daly 12:14 And was it specific pieces of music that you played that gave you kind of the ability to process, or was it just the act of being lost in the technicalities of the of playing the music and feeling the music? Michelle Lynne 12:31 I think I did a lot of kind of improvisational practice at the piano where I would just yeah, improvise based on whatever I was feeling in the moment. But I also did work through some well-loved pieces, some Chopin and um easy listening pieces, things that I've loved my whole life, that I maybe had more time to practice because it was the middle of COVID. So lots of time at home. And um also I started playing Coldplay, my favorite band. And this is a fun story because it ties into the candlelight uh explosion of my life in 2022 when the first call I ever got for them was, Can you come play a cold play concert in Brussels? And I thought, do I need to pay for this? Like this is this is the best thing ever. I've been practicing their pieces during COVID just to enjoy. And again, finding who you are without the other person is also coming back to like, what is my first love? What are things that bring me joy? What are things that interest me as a person? Have I laughed in the last six months? Like, where can I find something that's interesting for me? So that helped. Kate Daly 13:27 And what do you think then technically happens when you're playing a piece of music as far as the brain and the emotional healing is concerned? Do you have a sense of what's going on for you? Because I guess there might be other people who are maybe obviously not necessarily in the same league or in terms of what you do, but they might be interested, they might tinker with the piano, they might they might have a passion for it. What do you think is happening when you're connecting with the music from an emotional perspective? Michelle Lynne 13:56 The first thing that comes to mind is that you know you can bypass your rational brain to all of the noise in your mind. You can just stop. Yeah. Just give yourself a break and say, you know, I'm not I'm not gonna solve the world in the next 30 minutes, I'm just gonna listen. And I think it also teaches you to be present because there's so much in our future that is unknown when a marriage fails. So many things you thought were going to happen and are no longer going to happen. So the the future is empty somehow and scary. So if I can just sit here in this moment, I don't need to figure things out right now. I just need to be here. Kate Daly 14:32 Yeah, and I'm okay. I am here, I'm safe, I'm alive, I am feeling, I am being, I don't have to do more than that. There are some moments where you just need to breathe, aren't there? And just be and and not plan. And you're right, it's it's precious that ability to turn off the noise, whether that's through the piano playing or the yoga that you mentioned, or or whatever it is you do, but but carving out those moments for yourself when you're going through something like this, something as tumultuous as this, is really important because you're right, everything's thrown up in the air. Isn't it? Everything goes up in the air. Your future, your present, you question the past, you question motives, you question conversations, all of it goes on and on and goes around and round in your head, let alone all the practical stuff that you have to do, as you were saying earlier. Where the hell am I gonna live? What am I gonna live on? How am I going to plan for my future? What about if I am now faced with not my life not planning out like I wanted it to, whether that's children or whatever it is. So huge, huge things, a very crowded brain. What an amazing skill to be able to quieten that down. Michelle Lynne 15:51 Mm-hmm. And you can do that with other things. You know, I I remember I was meeting with him weekly at one point as we were trying to navigate if reconciliation was possible. And I came back after a particularly hard meeting, and my neighbor just had a cup of tea waiting for me on the side table. And I don't know, it just that moment was so important to me because I just came home and someone took care of me. And it was like, just take a minute because you just need to sit. And um, yeah, little things like that to find yourself, to distract yourself, to get away from the pressure or the decision-making process, as you're saying, there's so many decisions that you have to make as well early in the process. Kate Daly 16:28 Yeah. It does, it feels very overwhelming, doesn't it? The number of decisions you have to make. And at a time when you're feeling so kind of discombobulated and yet and vulnerable. These are some of the most important decisions you're ever going to have to make, aren't they? And I always think it's just like that's it's the weirdest thing. It's like teenage girls starting periods as mothers are going through menopause. You know, it's like, who designed this system? Who actually designed it? Because this is mad. It's just mad. But it's that kind of thing, isn't it? It's just like I completely at odds with my emotions, and yet here I am having to make life-changing decisions about where I'm gonna live and what my pension's gonna look like, and you know, how I'm gonna cope and earn money and all of that kind of stuff. So yeah. You went back to your parents. How did the story unfold from there? And what help and support did you find most useful once you'd kind of regrouped at your parents and then sort of what happened next? Michelle Lynne 17:28 It was good to be there, but I I think also like your brain is vibrating so fast because you're just not sure what's happening. So when I came back, actually, I had a group of friends who picked me up from the airport in Amsterdam and they drove me home and they had like a welcome home sign, and that was just extremely meaningful because I knew I have no idea what's gonna happen to me, but I have people here who love me. And um, I think at least every day I had to reach out to someone for a phone call or support or encouragement. Or I had so many people also letting me know they were praying for me for a big church community, taking it really, I think at some points moment by moment, where it was so heavy. It felt so heavy that I could not think of the whole day. I had to really just say, How am I gonna get through this next hour? And one important thing I wanted to mention was the allowance I had to give myself to not be okay. Because I think some people try to rush you through the process of emotional healing, and they'll say, You're young, you'll find someone else, or you know, you're gonna be okay. Look how much, look, you know, how many gifts you have, or you're gonna figure it out. It's like you cannot rush someone through their process of pain and grief. And that's something that I had to learn also for myself because I'm also someone who likes to be next, next, next. And so this was really just such a huge stop sign. So the part of writing the album, there are uh multiple songs that I wrote with the lyrics, and some songs are really just about acknowledging the current situation, and there's no smile on your face at the end, and there's no pat on the back, and there's no hope. Yeah, no happy ending. Kate Daly 19:03 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Michelle Lynne 19:04 You are, and that's okay. Kate Daly 19:06 Yeah. Yeah, I think that's so important because you're right, and it's all sort of comes from a well-meaning place, but you so many people want to say, Oh, but it's all worked out okay, don't they? Just because their own brain wants to conclude, wants to cut it off, wants to square the circle, whatever you want to call it, doesn't it? Because that's cognitive dissonance, otherwise. So we like our brains like to have a nice, neat, wrapped-up ending, and that's kind of the the essence of storytelling, isn't it? And they all lived happily ever after. But actually, it's not that, is it? And it not necessarily, and you just need the acknowledgement and the space for it not to be okay, and that to be okay, that it's not okay. Like you can be not okay and the world not end, they're two different things, aren't they? But you can just want to sometimes sit with the not okay-ness of it all and be messy and not have the reassuring pat on the back. And and it sounds like that was really important that your friends maybe gave you that space to be not okay as well. So it's kind of a two-way street, isn't it? Michelle Lynne 20:09 And my circle became very small. So it was interesting to see the different reactions of people. Like, I've always been someone who had 50 best friends. I told everyone everything, like, my life is an open book, you know. And then after this experience, my life, my inner circle got very small. And you quickly saw who were the people that are going to actually listen to you when you say, like, actually, I I can't, I can't put a positive spin on this. And they'll let you be there, as you're saying, they'll walk with you through that. And then there's the people who are like, Oh, you know, you gotta get through this, you gotta move on, you gotta, you gotta think ahead. And and so that for me kind of became the determining factor of how close can I let people in right now? Because I had to learn what I needed in that season. Kate Daly 20:49 Yeah. And did you feel able to tell people what you needed? Because I think that's the other thing, you know, when I talk to people all the time, they're quite reticent to be that direct. And maybe that's a cultural thing from a you know a British perspective. But you know, it's kind of quite rare for people to gather their friends together and say, look, this is what I need. I don't need this, I don't need that, I do need this. I think we tend not to be that direct culturally in this country. So I don't know whether Canadians are a bit more direct than the British, not terribly. Yeah. Michelle Lynne 21:25 Well, yeah. I think in the moment I could not tell people what I needed because I didn't know myself. Because I was just trying to process it. And I was, yeah, I was unable to say, this isn't helpful. Now, on the if somebody says, Wow, look how great your life turned out, it's so you know, good that happened to you, then I'll stop them and say, you know, actually, that's not how I see things, but thank you. Because I see that they're trying to be supportive, but I I am a person who will never say, I'm glad I went through that, or it's okay that it happened, or, you know, that's not what I believe. That's Not where I stand. So it's okay if people want to share their opinions. I think also it depends how close they are to you. If it's a stranger on the street, you know, whatever, they can have their opinion, or for one of my followers or whatever, it's fine. But if it's a close friend, I think they know me a little bit better than that. They know they've seen inside the curtain. Kate Daly 22:16 Yeah. Michelle Lynne 22:17 Interesting. Kate Daly 22:18 So so what so tell me about writing this album then? So you you wrote an album, but then did you write it specifically about the divorce? Or was the divorce just a sort of two steps back, kind of informing it, or to what extent did the divorce play a part in that album? Michelle Lynne 22:40 Yeah, you're great questions. You're right. I think in I was just so in the moment that I wasn't thinking of a zoomed-out strategic way of doing this. I was just walking through it. So the album theme is about healing, um, water, and refreshing. So water is cleansing, water is renewing, there's uh new life. That's why I have cherry blossoms on the cover, that there's there's newness and hope that comes because I think by the end of the album we get to a place of hope. But just to give you an idea, the first, the first one's called Hold On. And so being specific about the divorce, there's nothing in here where someone would listen to this and know what I've gone through. My my personal story is not in the lyrics. However, I did use a lot of imagery around loss, death with the one of the songs called Empty Promises. And the lyric is literally, Did you know that you were everything to me? What do I do with these empty promises? Because I I had a hope and a future, and that was ripped away and destroyed. So, what do I do? What do you actually do at that moment? I didn't know. So it's asking these questions. One of them is pretty vulnerable. It's called Let Me Heal. I had the feeling when I when everything came out that, you know, I believe marriage is a strong soul connection with someone. So your soul, part of your soul dies. You know, I felt like I was at the very core bleeding. So the the lyric is carry me on a stretcher, I'm bleeding from within. Cut so deep I can't breathe. Help me walk again. And so I think anyone who doesn't know me now has listened to this and said, Oh, I I knew something happened to you, but I wasn't sure what. And honestly, this is the first time I've ever publicly spoken about my divorce. So this is also a little bit of a step out for me. Kate Daly 24:16 Yeah, and I well, the obvious retort to that isn't, and how does it feel? How uncomfortable is it to be able to put voice to what is what's very, very personal. Michelle Lynne 24:28 Yeah, it feels obviously vulnerable. And I hope that the message for anyone listening is hope and encouragement that there is a way forward if you're facing this, when you're facing this, because there was a point for me where I truly believed that I had nothing to live for. And it was it was such a dark place, and now my life is completely transport and different, but I could not see any possibility of a bright future back then. So I think through the album and through the music, my intention is to give anyone who needs hope just a place to sit and be with their feelings and to be honest with themselves and honest with their friends and others and and to walk through this in a healthy way. Well, I'm full of admiration. Kate Daly 25:12 I just want to say thank you for you know sharing for sharing that because it is really difficult when people come on a podcast and have to talk about something that's quite say personal. So, on behalf of everybody listening and anyone that's going through this, it's a really difficult message to convey because, like you said earlier, what somebody going through this doesn't want to hear is, oh, you'll be okay. But the reality of it is, as you've just said, that you are okay and you have come through it. And it's really difficult when you're in that moment to even countenance that and to be able to imagine what your life will be like or anything. And I think sometimes that's one of the hardest things because it is really hard to find the light at the end of the tunnel when you really are in the thick of it, and that sense of hopelessness that you've just put voice to and spoken about is so common, and yet so many people feel afraid to voice it or to say anything. So the fact that you can come here and say those things is just so amazing, and I'm so grateful that you that you have. So just a big fat thank you from me for saying that. Well, thanks, Kate, for creating space for it as well. Thank you. Was there anything when you were writing the album that surprised you in terms of did you expect a certain level of healing or a certain journey you might go on and it not quite be that way? Because I think sometimes when we tell the story, it looks like it's a nice, easy narrative. I know when I talk about, you know, the journey to amicable art, there's a story now about how it goes and why it came about and all of that kind of stuff, but it didn't feel that curated at the time. It just felt like a whole series of random events being thrust at me. You sort of try to navigate your way through and you look back and oh gosh, there's a story. But yeah, I don't know. Was it the same with writing the album? Did you feel like you were in a process or did it was it a bit more random than that? Michelle Lynne 27:07 It took so long to get this album out because I had the first of all, in the classical music world, it's not common to cross-genre. So this was a step out for me artistically to have both singer-songwriter plus classical repertoire. There's some revell on here, some list. So that was a kind of a risk that I was taking because it was my debut album, and I didn't want the classical music world to then qualify me as uh lesser than, and she went in the pop direction. So that was a big mind block for me. Then there was a crowdfunding element that I did for the album. So that was a big mind block because I ended up raising 10,000 euros for the album, but then I had to promote it and the campaign, and so that was a whole thing. And so there was a lot besides the the divorce stuff that it was actually just really hard to bring an album out as an independent artist. And then something that surprised me was the amount of wonderful people who came along and supported the project. So my producer really helped kind of craft my songs. I would come to him with little pieces and ideas, and then he showed me what the process was to put it together in a demo. I'd never done that before. I'd never seen what it was meant to produce a pop song because I'm a classical pianist. I had a vocal coach who was walking with me every week, working through all of my, you know, technical flubs and things, giving me confidence. Um, and then that's the confidence that I carried as through the tour, as my, you know, the stages got bigger and more frequent. And I just, I kind of just grew into this bigger version of myself, uh, I guess I can say, because of these people pouring into me. So that was really fun. Kate Daly 28:31 I mean, that's interesting, isn't it? Because your career, I guess, enabled you to sort of rebuild your sense of self as well. And maybe that's harder if you work in a call center or you know, you're on the front line of some kind of service kind of industry. I guess that is going to be harder. But the idea that building your confidence is actually part of the healing journey, I think it's quite important, isn't it? Because guess when somebody's, you know, you've been through the breakdown of a relationship when you've been left and you've experienced that sense of the relationship not working, you you're left feeling with all sorts of negative emotions. So to actually, and your confidence is on the floor. So that build back of confidence is actually a really important part of the journey, isn't it? So I guess that must have been quite a thrill to be able to look back in such a visual way, like you say, of audiences getting bigger, stage is getting bigger, venues getting bigger. It must have been quite a thrill to watch yourself, you know, progress through those stages, I guess. Michelle Lynne 29:37 Yeah. One important thing was I changed my name after the divorce, and then my career really started to take off. Because as an artist, our name is the public, how people know you. So I'm really glad that I didn't get more well-known with my divorce name because then you have you have to lose and rebuild. And, you know, that takes time as an artist to get your name out there. And it's just these things we have to think about, unfortunately, as I think as women as well. But yeah, it's nice to look through the photos and see the journey because you're right. And, you know, of course, I've hired people to, you know, the personal trainer and like starting to eat better and the mindset stuff. And I have a coaching company for musicians. So we've had done a ton of branding trainings, social media, all of the things. So I think on every angle, it's been kind of rebuilding. And when I first realized that I had to rebuild my life, it was the most overwhelming, awful feeling because I didn't want to rebuild my life. I liked my life. Yeah, nothing wrong with the old one. Yeah, exactly. I didn't, I felt so angry and unjust. Because I'm why should I have to rebuild? I've worked so hard to get here as it is. But rebuilding has actually been fun and I'm still building. Well, that's the thing with rebuilding, it never stops. Kate Daly 30:42 I always think it's like goud is uh cicada familiar, isn't it? It's just like it's one of those, well, though, although to be fair, that they have just finished that. So that was probably a rubbish analogy. But yes, that's been a long project. But yeah, I I I guess it's it's it's great to see that sense of rebuilding and repurposing of life and how you can move on. Do you think there are lessons learned sounds really trite? I don't mean it in that sense, but do you think there are things you're gonna take that you know as a consequence of going through this experience that you will not repeat again? Are there things that you will do differently? Or do we just not learn those lessons as human beings and we will just carry on making the same mistakes? Michelle Lynne 31:29 Oh boy, I hope not. I think one way that I changed is that I've learned to slow down also with people. It I think it takes longer for me to trust people now. I'm more careful with my relationships, I'm much more careful with what I share. As I mentioned before, 50 Best Friends has become four, and my inner circle is really protected in private. And um, even if it comes to like content strategy online, there are very clear boundaries for me. Like, for example, I never speak about my private life online. So again, this is today is a shift. But that's what I've learned. Boundaries is what I've learned, I think. Kate Daly 32:04 Well, look, in just a minute, Michelle, I'm going to ask you to share some advice on how to start rebuilding your life after divorce. But just before I do, if you're listening and this episode has given you a bit of clarity or comfort or just a tip that's made things feel a little bit better or a little bit more manageable, please make sure to follow the divorce podcast on your favorite podcast app. Each week we're here with expert advice, real support to help you through your separation one step at a time. So, Michelle, then some final advice. If someone is listening to this and you know they're going through what you've been through, what I've been through, what would be your advice for anyone starting to rebuild after a separation when it feels almost impossible? Michelle Lynne 32:47 One thing I realized, I told myself, when your whole, you know, half your life is on fire, you don't set the other half on fire too. So I kept everything that was safe or working, which is why I also didn't, you know, pick up and try to move home. Because yeah, the marriage was gone and a lot of things were not there anymore. But I stayed with what I knew. I stayed with the people that I knew. Rediscovering pieces of yourself from before that relationship or things outside of the relationship, I think can really help. And I would say any kind of creative act, whether that's journaling or painting or poetry or listening to a new genre of music, something to get you out of that rumination phase and to give you a little bit of space. Try to zoom out your perspective and most of all, don't rush the process. Kate Daly 33:37 And that's hard, isn't it, not to rush? Because sometimes we're just desperate to get out of a particularly tricky phase, aren't we? But like you said before, just accepting it's okay to not be okay is probably one of the biggest things that you can do. So yeah. Michelle Lynne 33:52 And if we want to avoid making the same mistake again, then we need to slow down because you have to pay attention and discern who are these people coming into my life? Can I trust them? What are my patterns? What and this is what therapy helps expose in you, your ways of thinking, things that you missed previously. Now I ask better questions. Kate Daly 34:10 That's interesting. Where can people find more information about you and the tour that you're doing? Do you want to tell us a little bit about that? Michelle Lynne 34:18 Yeah, sure. So my Instagram is this is Michelle Lynn, L-Y-N-N-E, and my website is Michelle LynnPianist.com. All of my upcoming dates are there. I am currently through Luxembourg, Belgium, and France and the Netherlands where I live. The album is everywhere. Spotify, YouTube, uh, Apple Music. It's called One Step at a Time, which is how I got through my divorce, one step at a time. And also how I released this album because it was hard. Kate Daly 34:43 Yeah, that feels like a really good title for this episode, isn't it? One Step at a Time. Definitely. It just feels like that's exactly what you've talked us through. You just felt that feeling of one step at a time. Brilliant. And the and it's a concert. Just tell us a bit about the concert. Michelle Lynne 34:56 Yeah. So I play multiple concert programs for candlelight concerts. They do Hans Zimmer, Inaugurate, Adele, Coldplay, Imagine Dragons, a lot of pop stuff. They also do Chopin, Mozart. Wow, brilliant. Kate Daly 35:08 So that's, I guess that's could be the soundtrack to people's divorces, then or separations, couldn't it almost? Michelle Lynne 35:14 Yeah, there's lots on Spotify to help with that. Kate Daly 35:16 Fabulous. Don't forget for separation and co-parenting support, please visit amicable.co.uk where you can explore our resources or you can book a free advice consultation. You can find me on LinkedIn and Instagram. You can hear about our new podcast episodes by subscribing for updates and visiting thedivorcepodcast.com or find us on your favourite listening platform. Now we'd love to hear how we can help further. So please share questions on divorce, separation or co-parenting with us at hello@ amicable.co.uk. You can also join our subscription platform, amicable space, where you'll find our community forum. And that's a safe place to ask questions as you go through a separation or co-parenting. Members get free access to our monthly QA webinars with amicable divorce specialists, and you can ask them questions in real time. The link to sign up is in the episode description, so please go there if you're interested. Michelle, it's been an absolute pleasure talking to you this afternoon. Thank you so much for joining me, and thank you everybody for listening.