Nora Wendel - Relationship Expert

Hi guys, I am so excited.

Welcome to the first episode of season two of Cat on the Loose, the first one of the year.

And I start with a bang.

I admire this lady.

I adore her.

And

I listen to every word she says and I read all of her posts.

And she's kind enough to be giving us this interview today, all the way from Bali, Nora Wendell.

I hope I'm pronouncing your name right, Nora.

Yes, hi, everybody.

So excited to share with you.

It's so sweet of you, all those kind words.

No, but seriously, it's from the bottom of my heart.

I've been trying to schedule you for like since the beginning of season one.

So, yes, we finally got you.

And so, today, this is like 6:30 p.m.

Tuesday here.

You are

a Wednesday, you're already on Thursday, right?

I'm already on Thursday.

I'm ahead.

This is my 7:30 a.m.

on Thursday.

Let me tell you about the future.

The future is amazing.

Oh, yeah!

So much abundance.

I love this girl.

Oh, my God.

And by the way, before we started recording, I was telling Nora that visiting Bali is for sure on the very top of my bucket list.

So hopefully, I'll make my way there soon and I actually get to meet you in person.

Please do.

Anyone, anyone who listens to this, if you come to Bali, shoot me a DM on Instagram and let's go and have a matcha or a coffee.

Sounds fabulous.

Tell you all about the secret places to visit and things to do.

Amazing.

So, guys, Nara is a relationship expert for women, right, Nara?

Just so they understand a little bit about your background.

And you have been, like me, like a lot of girls out there, unfortunately, through some pretty bad experience, bad relationships, kind of abusive too, right?

Yeah, you know, I, my tendency when I was younger, so I have a little bit of like a

gypsy upbringing.

I was born in Thailand, I grew up in Nepal and India, and my tendency was always to go with like bad boy men.

So I kind of was every five months living in Goa, which is like the party area of India.

And I was always having these rebellious men with tattoos.

You know, I'm back with the motorbike.

And that continued.

And it wasn't until I had in my 30s that I had a relationship which was emotionally abusive.

And it was from both of us.

We were both kind of blackmailing each other.

We both couldn't leave the relationship.

We were codependent.

And when that ended, I really thought to myself, I'm following men around the world.

I'm having these relationships where I'm not feeling the love and getting my needs met.

Surely there must be a way to have healthy relationships.

And that's when I started my journey of being like, okay,

so nobody teaches us relationships.

I certainly don't know.

If I

doesn't know, how can I go on this journey to find out?

How do you create a conscious, healthy relationship?

And that's been my journey the last about five years.

And it's super interesting that you said like so many incredible things, but I agree with you.

First of all, it's one thing that nobody teaches us.

how to do we learn a gazillion things in school in college blah blah blah but nobody sits you down and say look this is right, and this is wrong, and this is how you do it.

So, we really just learn through trial and error, like you said.

And I think now I'm on this boat that you said you've been through, but obviously, you became an expert, and I'm not of trying to learn what I accept and what I don't, and that there are certain things that are non-negotiable.

So, basically, when I started telling people that I was going to interview, I was bombarded with questions because

even before the pandemic, I think I started my podcast because it was cathartic for me after everything I've been through.

But once I started it, I realized that so many women out there want to talk about it.

Men too, but I get tons and tons of messages from girls, especially when I have experts like you, because they're like, oh my God, I have 10 million questions.

Obviously, I can't ask all of them tonight, but so I picked a few that I think are the most important.

And then if you're willing, we can come back and ask some more.

Today alone, I got like 15 more and I was like, girls, enough.

So

can we get started?

Please, please.

All right.

So the first one, like we were saying, I have been in an abusive relationship.

I was married for 15 years.

My husband drank.

I haven't even told the story on my podcast yet.

He was an alcoholic.

He was very verbally abusive.

but abuse is abuse, right, Nora.

So the question is,

how do you heal?

Is there like a formula, quote unquote?

What do you recommend?

How do you move forward?

What would you say to people that have been, or even girls out there that are listening to us and are in abusive relationships?

How do you get out of it?

What do you do?

Yeah,

I don't know if there's one specific formula I would prescribe.

However, if you are in a current abusive relationship, you really need to look at, is this working for you?

And if it's not, I know how scary it can be to make the decision that this is not working for me and to then leave.

Now, how do you leave when you're so much in fear?

You have to create your support network around you.

You need your friends, you need your family.

You just need everyone and to share with them, right?

What I've noticed is a lot of people in abusive relationships, they keep it to themselves.

they don't share so that when they want to then leave nobody knows about it so you have to create these like I call it like create your pillow your buffer of pillows around you so that you can fall and that you can cry and that you can grieve and you know that you're going to be supported in that way but Nora you know sometimes I understand what you're saying but in some cases um if we tell people there's a lot of criticism

don't you think like many times they think they're helping but they're like oh just get out.

He's such an a-hole or don't do this.

Why are you so stupid?

So many times we don't talk because it's not very helpful what people have to say.

Don't you think so?

People love sharing their opinions.

People love being heard, okay?

So then you're not telling the right people then because I know I have certain friends in my life who are just there for being listeners.

And I actually approached them saying, I'm not looking for your advice and your opinion.

I actually just need your support.

and this is what the support would look like so I'm very clear in the support that I need so if you're talking to a friend that's just like what are you doing I've told you this a million times that's not the right person who's going to support you because she's just going to create a bigger wound in you saying oh maybe I should just stay or maybe I'm stupid and that's not what we want right here so and you know going to counseling going to therapy then is because therapists and healthers are technically not supposed to give you their opinion.

They're there to help you process what you you need to process.

So that's if you're in an abusive relationship right now.

And I understand how complicated, how deeply fearful and scary it is if you are in this and just know that there are people out there who do want to support you.

And the second then is, okay, now you've left it.

Okay.

You've left the relationship and you're like, wow.

I'm traumatized.

What do I do?

You probably don't trust men anymore or women.

And you're like, what do I do?

I never want a a relationship again right you're like avoidant yeah and first step is always forgiveness yourself forgive yourself for being in it forgive yourself for believing in love for being in that relationship in the first time first instance and also forgive your partner I have a firm belief that every action we do is actually coming from this childhood conditioning, this childhood longing for love, that more than likely it's an unmet emotional need from our childhood that wasn't met.

And that creates our behavioral patterns as adults.

So, the first step is always forgiveness.

And if you can look at your partner as a wounded child, that's how they're acting out, that's going to help you.

You cannot move past in life if you're not willing to both forgive yourself and your partner.

That's amazing.

That is so true.

So true.

Now, it goes this next question: is from one of my single friends.

She said, If I meet a guy that I really, really like, should we really play these games like a lot of girls do or not?

Like, you know, waiting hours and hours or days and days to call him back.

Or if he sends a text, I'm not going to answer right away.

Or make believe you don't like them.

Do you think this works to get the person's attention or it's just a waste of time?

I've actually tested this myself.

Yes.

Are the theories true?

It's like seduction games.

I'm very careful about unhealthy feminine and what some people call toxic femininity, and that's like manipulation and you know, wanting attention for yourself because you're wanting validation.

So I was like, all right, let's test it out.

Let's not message guys, but it doesn't work for me because that's not my personality.

I know.

I feel icky.

My neither.

Yeah.

In playing games, because then I'm like, if I want to be with a man, I'm very clear about it.

And I set my boundaries and I tell him how I want the relationship to go or the dating to go now if the man's like no then it's no and you don't take it personally then it's like you have to think about who is that your ideal man and how does he show up does your ideal man want you to play games with him with you probably not probably not I agree with you I just I just You have to go back also and let me just share a little bit about like the psychology of the brain and our, you know, our old reptilian brain.

Men love to be providers.

men love to give for to women and women you know love receiving they love to be taken care of now yeah there may be feminists listening to this and i'm not denying feminism and that's also okay but what i see happening a lot is that men feel emasculated in their roles they kind of don't know what role they have anymore and and the simple thing is like you know men offering you a jacket or opening the door for you and and and women are just like no like i don't want that i don't know i personally

expected it makes i know

good i personally love these gestures these old-fashioned gestures like you said i think uh it for me makes all the difference in the world i completely agree with you uh so no no playing games no i don't think so i was just about to say it's like i don't think so you don't you and and look at the anxiety playing games i know you i agree

should i message him is it the right time okay wait i'm gonna set a timer and now i'm gonna to do it.

I mean, is that who you want to be in the relationship?

Because that's how you're setting it up in the beginning.

I know.

I completely agree with you.

I'm like super upfront and crystal clear, very open.

Some of my friends think like, oh, you're too open.

You just put it out there and you send these messages and you tell them how you feel.

I think I prefer to be like that, just be myself.

And like you said, if somebody wants to be with me, they're going to be with me.

And if they don't want to be with me, we might as well just find out, right?

Sooner rather than later.

Okay.

now it's kind of linked to this question and you were saying about the feminism but yeah men still a lot of men are still very old-fashioned very conservative and a lot of them even if they don't show it they have this macho behavior you know that they want to take charge in the relationship so it happens not just to me but i know i have a lot of single girlfriends here they have the same problem with their boyfriends um

men have this wrong idea or they're jealous about their work or they don't accept what they do.

Like in my case, I work with social media and I take photos and I do videos that I've had not boyfriends, but people that I dated before that it really bothered them.

So the question is not just for me, for any girl out there that works, even you.

Ladies that work, that have successful careers, there are powerful women, how do you deal with this men that don't understand what you do?

It's yeah, being old-fashioned in the new media world can prove, you know, have a lot of problems.

Yeah, and I like to just sit down and just explain them what I do.

And if they don't agree with it, again, it's like I wouldn't go on another date with them because it's my life.

And yes, you separate personal and business life, but nowadays, more and more it's intertwined.

So if a man doesn't understand what you do, he has to either just accept it and be like, like, that's okay.

I don't understand.

However, I want to support you.

And that means that you can do what you want to do.

I would never be with a man who says, no, you can't have a social media presence or no, I don't want you to take photos or you can't go on a Facebook Live.

That's not supportive of me.

I want my man to support me in every single way.

So that would be my answers.

Explain to them what you do.

Maybe they don't understand it.

Maybe they have a false idea about it.

Ask them, what do you think I do?

And if they're like, oh you know take silly photos you're like okay do you know why I do just question them a little bit try and try and see it from their perspective this is what I teach in women in relationships who have a lot of fights is that both parties think that they're always right and you need to kind of adopt the other person's perspective to realize actually both of you are right and there's no one right it's together you're right so ask him what his perspective is.

Why does he not like it?

Is he able to still support you even though he doesn't like it those are the kind of questions I would ask it's amazing that you said that because I think support should be

should be non-negotiable in a relationship do you agree like both ways I think partners should be completely 100%

supportive of each other

Well, you have to think, what is a relationship?

A relationship is growth, right?

A relationship without growth is stagnant and stagnancy doesn't work in this universal world.

Look at nature, nature is always growing, changing, morphing.

A relationship does the same thing.

So, if your relationship isn't growing, then what are you doing together?

And how you grow is you work through things together, you support each other in each other's goals and desires, and you also have a shared relationship goal, a shared relationship vision where you can grow towards.

And that's the number one issue I find

in women and men who have been in relationships over time who are stagnant then and who maybe focus solely on let's say they have kids together and then all the focus is on the kids and then the kids leave and then their relationship falls apart because they didn't they weren't interdependent they were so focused together on the kids yeah when the kids left they're just like oh my god who am I now now that I don't have kids in my life I've lost who I am and also just you know people in relationships who are so codependent they lose who they are you have to have separate goals.

You have to have separate things that you like doing.

That's probably the number one issue in relationships that I find is that they become so intertwined that when the relationship does end, it's so devastating because you've forgotten who you actually are and what you actually like doing alone and who your friends are alone.

So please make sure that you do keep a little bit of your personal identity and your own desires and your own goals.

It's so amazing that you said that ladies out there, listen up.

We have to have our own lives, our own interests, our own work,

our own hobbies.

We cannot make any man in the world the center of our universe, right, Nora?

Hopefully, you can't.

You cannot.

You can.

You can, but it's not a good idea.

You can, and it may lead to extreme devastation when that man is no longer in your life.

So are you willing to go there?

Yes, it may be amazing and it feels, you know, NRE, new relationship energy.

The first three to six months, everything is in the honeymoon phase.

Your whole life revolves around each other.

And then something happens because the chemicals in the brain, they stop producing.

And then it's reality.

Why do you think for, you know, six months to one year, the most divorces, look at the celebrity divorces, they get married instantaneously, have huge weddings.

And then a year later, they're divorced because the chemical, the love chemical in the brain stops producing.

And real relationship works happens between three to six months, usually after six months mark.

And that's when you're like, okay, do I really want to be with this person?

Can we grow through this together?

Oh, that's so nice.

So what would you say for people out there that have dated so many of the wrong people and they're frustrated and they're like, I can't do this anymore.

There is hope for everyone or do you think we should just give up at some point?

There are so many people discouraged right now

Yeah, totally.

It's time to look at yourself because if you keep attracting the wrong kind of man, that means you have some inner work to do.

There's some sort of childhood wounding.

There's some sort of unmet emotional need that you have in you that's repeating this pattern of the wrong men being attracted to you.

So I would be looking at what happened in my childhood around my beliefs around men.

How did my father figure show up up or my main, you know,

male caretaker?

How did he show up?

What was my relationship to him?

What is my neediness?

Okay, so everybody wants love.

That is the foundation.

We all want to be love.

And how am I going about getting that love?

What kind of man do I keep on attracting?

Make a list of those qualities.

And then you have to go back to your past experiences because the brain works on past experiences.

The brain can't predict the future.

It goes always to a past memory.

So then you look at what happened in the past where I was just like, it's safe to be with this type of man because that's the brain works on safety too.

And that's why you keep attracting that same man.

Even though it's not what you want, the brain's like, oh, this kind of man is safe.

And you're like, why do I keep attracting this unhealthy, toxic man?

Go back to your past experiences.

Be like, why?

What is my needs here?

What is not being met?

Why do I think it's safe?

And then you have to train your brain to understand that something new is actually safer.

Wow.

This is very powerful.

And I mean, I will take this advice to heart

because I know that some I've had a pattern of attracting bad people.

And you are right.

Usually the answers are within us.

It's not like completely the other person's fault.

This is amazing.

So much information.

I can't believe it.

I have 10 gazillion more questions and we're almost out of time.

Let me see.

Let me pick another one.

Do you think two girls ask the same question?

So let's pick this one.

Do you think we can have it all?

A great career, make good money, be independent, and also have a wonderful, loving, supportive partner?

Or do we need to give something up?

First of all, I'm going to ask you, who told you that you can't have it all?

Who told you that?

Was it society?

Was it your parents?

Was it your friends?

Because that's just a limiting belief to think you can't have it all.

So you have have to look at yourself and be like what is we have these either or i can either have a happy marriage or i can have a successful career right i can either have kids or you know whatever it is look at your beliefs where you're like i can only do either or and just know it's not true and how do you know then it's not true i always say go find real world examples go online and go into you know if you want to be a successful uh you know ceo with amazing family google it be like who has that just to to prove to your brain again that it is possible.

Because truly anything is possible.

So just look at who told me that it wasn't possible.

What do I want to believe?

What can I see out there in reality that is actually true?

And then be like, okay,

all right, she can do it.

I can do it too.

That's fantastic.

I'm so happy you said that because I agree with you.

I think, and I even made a tattoo of that, believe it or not, that we are our only limit.

We can do whatever we want.

Nora, I have 10 million more questions for you, so I'm going to have to ask you to come back for a second episode.

In the meantime, we haven't even reached, like, we didn't even do half of the questions I have here, but your content is so rich.

People get super interested.

In the meantime, if somebody wants to talk to you more, you offer courses, right?

Yeah, I have a few different courses.

I'm currently in launch for my course called Conscious Communication for Couples, and that's for women in relationships.

I'm for the upcoming course, which is, you know, heal your heartbreak.

How do you kind of get back to who you are after a relationship has ended.

And then I have another course, which is all about magnetizing your man.

So how do you prepare yourself and how do you get ready for the man of your dreams to come into your life?

And then I have a whole bunch of other courses.

I also do one-on-one-on-one coaching.

Just send me a DM.

Honestly, the easiest is just start chatting to me.

I love talking to people.

I'm a relationship coach.

I love building relationships with anybody who wants to chat to me.

Come to Bali.

I mean, you know, I run retreats in Bali.

I want to come to Bali.

By the way, speaking of Bali, you said that things there are pretty nice, right?

Not as panicky.

I mean, you know, we do wear masks when we go out.

But, you know, there's no lockdown.

We live in nature.

You know, the beach is open.

It's a great life here.

Sounds fantastic.

So, guys, if you want to go to Bali, make sure you say hi to Nora.

If you cannot go to Bali.

In the meantime,

her Instagram is at Nora Wendell.

I'm going to put it here.

She's there on my Instagram too.

I'm going to do a post about this podcast.

I'm going to drop it right away because Cat on the Luz is not edited.

There is no, we don't cut anything off.

We don't fix it.

It is what it is.

So I'm going to drop it it right after Spotify, Google Podcasts, and eight more platforms.

Nora, Wendell, thank you so much.

You're fantastic.

I wish we could chat for like another hour, but hopefully you will come back for another episode.

You are amazing.

Thank you so much.

Have a wonderful Thursday and we'll talk to you soon.

Bye, guys.