The following podcast is a Dear Media production.

Welcome to the Tell Me More podcast with Nicole Walters, the only podcast where I'm not seeking to make you think more like me, but to help you keep thinking for yourself.

Okay, y'all.

So today's guest is bringing something that we don't talk about enough.

Well, we talk about it, but we talk about it in context of the hot mess express my life is.

But, you know, I think we all want more of.

And that is love.

Now, I'm not talking about the surface level, highlight real, what you see on social, the edited version.

I'm talking about that deep inside, long-lasting love that has healing involved, honesty, self-awareness, all the things that matter to us most. And Linnees Thrasher is known as the love cheerleader. And when I say known, I don't mean just casually by

her besties. I mean, like, it's her brand. You know, she's made it her mission to help people

show up better in their relationships. And she serves as a relationship encourager. She's a truth teller. Sometimes you're not going to like what she says. Okay. And she's also someone who can help hold up a mirror with both compassion and clarity. Now, through her work, she helps people like us, right? Like, I don't want to say the olds, right, but the accomplished and the elders. Okay. we are officially at that place, the ones who ask if the club has chairs. Okay. So she helps us with navigating dating, partnership, emotional growth, and all in ways that feel intentional and aligned. So what I appreciate about her is that she also isn't just hyping you up. I have a good friend of mine back in

Atlanta who just hired a matchmaker. And I was telling her, I was like, girl, you don't need somebody who's just going to tell you're great every day. You do need someone who's going to call you up, right? Not just call you out. Someone who's going to challenge you to do the internal work so that you can actually attract and experience the kind of love that you say you want. So I just want to let you know,

and I hope you've picked this up the whole time we've been chatting, that healthy love is not just luck, right? It's learned, it's practice, it's chosen, and we all deserve it. So I'm really excited that Linnees is here. Lenise, welcome. Thank you. I'm super excited to be here.

Yeah, it's going to be so, so good. So I've known you for a while now. And what's great is I've had the opportunity to experience all your goodness. I mean, you truly know your stuff to the point where I've trusted you to speak to my community. Yes. And they all of you too, naturally. So, Linnees, before we get into all of it, I actually need to know.

Your job is helping people heal from heartbreak, but you also went through your own divorce. I did. Yeah. So what was that moment like when you as the coach had to become the student? That was tough. That was really, really tough. I didn't even know I was just putting on a facade. I had no idea. Like, I thought, oh, I'm doing really well and no one can see through, like what's really going on. During the divorce or right after? Right. Well, during and after. I thought, oh, I'm just putting on a facade. Wow. That's so wild because I relate. And I think a lot of women who go through divorce are as well, partly because especially if you're a woman, odds are during the divorce, you're still called to do other things. We still have to work. We stop taking them kids. We still got to drink our water. You know, like there's all these responsibilities. And I always say one of the worst things about divorce is you can't just do divorce. That's a full-time job. Full-time job.

So you are showing up a little bit mass to other places. And, you know, as someone who has some, I call myself medium famous, right? Like, you know, some of this, like, high visibility online. I've had a lot of people as I have started talking about my divorce process more that are saying, like, wait a second. So was all of it a fraud?

Like was all of it fake? Like, and I was like, no, you just wear the suit you have to wear to survive in the moment you're in. Would you say that was the case for you? Absolutely. I was putting on like this mask, right? I would wear a mask one day, take it off, put another one on, take it off. And it wasn't a lie, but it was like,

I had to keep going. And I didn't have time to just be over here crying every day. Like, life still had to happen. And that's what I had to do. I think a lot of women relate, you know, where we just have to do what we have to do, especially as black women. Like, who's coming to save us? Who's going to carry us? who's going to fix it. And so knowing that I'm out here, one of the things I want to really

drill down to for our

conversation is I'm out here leading a company, writing books, running rooms. This is not

uncommon for Africans, Caribbean, Latin women, black women, you know, women from down south,

the old school. We have 15 and a half jobs and plus the kids, right? So when it comes to love after divorce, I'm going to be really honest. A lot of people are stuck and a lot of people can't even see room. I know right now some people are listening saying, listen, divorce, major breakup or just the season of life I'm in, ain't no room or space for no type of man to come in here with his mess, right?

...