No, I don't get child support.

"Oh Hannah, I'm so sorry."

The response was becoming one where I was feeling strange share any details of my divorce. I've walked an intuitively beautiful path of truth telling and story telling and knowing what is mine to share and what might be too close to others for me to talk about. I trust my instincts, my gut, around my transparency.

When I tell people I don't get child support the reaction is one of pity or that I somehow am being wronged.

There is a piece of myself that is afraid to share my success, my blessing of being a stay at home mom who runs a business and supports herself and her children on her own. One of the motivators for me in creating a business to support me was freedom. Being able to claim my freedom and move into my next iteration.

When I was in the heart of divorce, even though he and I are quite close and loving, I was falling apart. And in my falling apart holding space for my business was challenging me. I was pulling out my hair, literally. I thought about how I might live in my van and how he would get the kids full time. I imagined and told myself that keeping a business like mine alive long term would be impossible and I would one day find myself without income to feed my kids and my now growing family. I got scared. I lived on fumes. I was scared to run programs, to bring in money because I had no where to hold it, the energy of it. My energy was surrounded by grief and loss and then partnered with finding a new kind of love, loving a man in a new way while surrendering to the pain of divorce.

I was exhausted. My bank account was dangerously empty. I felt stuck like I was walking in mud and I was scared.

Money is energy. When I open to the energy exchange that allows me to do this work and raise my family, the flow of success (my definition of success) is intensely real. Fear stops that flow. I needed to call in a pause and look at who I wanted to be now.

I don't get child support. It is not a statement on my beliefs of what anyone else should be doing. It is not me playing a martyr. It is not anything to feel sorry for. When I knew it was time to end our soul/marriage contract I wanted both of us to be free to create futures of joy and surprise and peace and ease. To be connected by the energy of money felt to me like not being able to release one another.

But the truth is. I don't need it. I need to provide for myself and give myself freedom from this work that I can only describe as pure loving joy. (Also, it is the hardest thing I do.)

I send him money each month for a credit card payment that we still have to make. It is the only piece of our relationship that feels unfinished and I am working to pay it off so we can both be free from that tie that must come undone. We share the kids time and hearts and parent like we always have, including the expenses of raising them. We have found success inside of our untangling and we are blessed with our children, our past, our knowing it was time to let our contract complete.

This work, this life is my blessing. Success to me is being able to work from anywhere in the world that has internet. It is how I can co-host a work event for my beloved while having a live chat with my Magic Making Circle. Success is living and working in clothes that feel like me, leggings and leg warmers and feet in the earth holding my coffee mug. Success is paying rent for a beautiful home, never running out of money to feed my family, and the way the sun is spilling out over my tattooed arms while I type this story to you. Success is every email from one of you, giving me back words and gratitude and fueling me with your hearts so that I can let the fears move through me, thank them, and write the next story. Lead the next circle. Offer my transparency as an offering of hope or change or truth or connection or sameness.

This is the story I will tell today. Sitting in the sun. Typing these words. I want to feel proud of this life I am creating. I want to make tacos (my favorite meal). I want to step back into the energy of my work, open the flow, teach what turns me on.

I want you to look at what success is to you. To find your definition. To write it on sticky notes. To use it as your gratitude.

Success is the kiss from each of our kids as they cuddle down into bed at night. Success is the way I have learned how to love him, take care of him, provide for him and our kids. (And learning how to receive from him.) Success is this business that allows me this life of ease mixed with fear mixed with risks mixed with failures mixed with all the things promising me that it is all OK. 

The response when I tell someone I don't get any child support? The one that feels like success?

"Oh Hannah, that is so completely amazing."