Poet and best-selling author Maggie Smith shares how her divorce made her spend more time with someone she didn’t expect: herself. She explains how she learned to leave room for that self even as she shares part of it in her work. If you like what you hear, preorder
First off, I so enjoyed this. Thank you for bringing this conversation to us. I might have to listen multiple times just to ingest it as fully as I want to.
Second, this part weirdly struck me, about the notion of naming oneself as an ex-wife. I mean, I guess technically I knew all this time that I was someone's ex-wife. Obviously, right? But I realized until the very moment that I listened to the podcast finally this morning that I had *never* once thought about it, or about myself in that way. So much of the oppressive nature of my marriage was my former husband's insistence on defining our reality. His dreams determined so many of our choices. His desires constantly needed to be accommodated or managed. His ideas of who I was were non-negotiable and, ultimately, so incredibly constricting. When we split the most significant internal transformation for me was getting out from underneath those ideas and defining myself for the first time in nearly 14 years. I eschewed his perspective on me so completely that I ceased to think about it at all. And so, I actually never thought for a moment about the fact that there is someone out there for whom I am his "ex-wife" or that that might be part of my identity at all.
I find this odd and funny and also that it suits me. Whether or not I technically am an ex-wife has no bearing on my sense of myself or where I'm headed in my life so it will continue to be a label I ignore entirely when self-defining.
I think I thought so much about the term because of the book and encountering it in my research over and over. But I don't think it has the power it once wielded.
I am so happy you have not just reclaimed your own identity, but have defined yourself on your own terms.
This spoke to me too! I realized after I divorced that I didn’t honestly know what I liked anymore, even what was my favorite food? It seems crazy but it has taken me a while to find me again. It was just under 25 years and I didn’t realize how much I had lost of me.
"...(N)ot be half of a couple but whole as a single person" -- all of these lively purposeful exchanges enable us to bear witness to a new vocabulary being invented (and these guests and their host being wayfinders for that emerging vocabulary is not an accident). To describe a phenomenon and a class of human beings that The Man patriarch-ed us into not seeing and therefore not acknowledging is powerful. Maggie's great bit about stating which questions will be entertained at her book readings is powerful. Lyz-heads, you're in for a treat today.
I waited to listen to this until I finished reading Maggie Smith's book--LOVED it, LOVED this, and LOVE both of you!!!!! Thank you both so much, for everything! Xoxox
Always happy--and grateful--to chat with you about these lives we’re making for ourselves. xx
You are so talented and generous with your words and wisdom. We here at MYAM hq remain huge fans!
First off, I so enjoyed this. Thank you for bringing this conversation to us. I might have to listen multiple times just to ingest it as fully as I want to.
Second, this part weirdly struck me, about the notion of naming oneself as an ex-wife. I mean, I guess technically I knew all this time that I was someone's ex-wife. Obviously, right? But I realized until the very moment that I listened to the podcast finally this morning that I had *never* once thought about it, or about myself in that way. So much of the oppressive nature of my marriage was my former husband's insistence on defining our reality. His dreams determined so many of our choices. His desires constantly needed to be accommodated or managed. His ideas of who I was were non-negotiable and, ultimately, so incredibly constricting. When we split the most significant internal transformation for me was getting out from underneath those ideas and defining myself for the first time in nearly 14 years. I eschewed his perspective on me so completely that I ceased to think about it at all. And so, I actually never thought for a moment about the fact that there is someone out there for whom I am his "ex-wife" or that that might be part of my identity at all.
I find this odd and funny and also that it suits me. Whether or not I technically am an ex-wife has no bearing on my sense of myself or where I'm headed in my life so it will continue to be a label I ignore entirely when self-defining.
I think I thought so much about the term because of the book and encountering it in my research over and over. But I don't think it has the power it once wielded.
I am so happy you have not just reclaimed your own identity, but have defined yourself on your own terms.
The box in the attic (from a recorded message) resonated.
And when people ask, "But aren't you lonely?" I just laugh and laugh and laugh. And, then, I laugh some more.
This spoke to me too! I realized after I divorced that I didn’t honestly know what I liked anymore, even what was my favorite food? It seems crazy but it has taken me a while to find me again. It was just under 25 years and I didn’t realize how much I had lost of me.
"...(N)ot be half of a couple but whole as a single person" -- all of these lively purposeful exchanges enable us to bear witness to a new vocabulary being invented (and these guests and their host being wayfinders for that emerging vocabulary is not an accident). To describe a phenomenon and a class of human beings that The Man patriarch-ed us into not seeing and therefore not acknowledging is powerful. Maggie's great bit about stating which questions will be entertained at her book readings is powerful. Lyz-heads, you're in for a treat today.
I waited to listen to this until I finished reading Maggie Smith's book--LOVED it, LOVED this, and LOVE both of you!!!!! Thank you both so much, for everything! Xoxox