Maria Shriver Visited A Convent After Filing For Divorce From Arnold Schwarzenegger

Maria Shriver was searching for advice following her divorce from Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2021. On Monday’s (February 6th) episode of the Making Space with Hoda Kotb podcast, she shared that she ended up “sobbing” while visiting a convent.

After filing for divorce from the Terminator actor, Shriver said, “I went to a convent, a cloistered convent, and to be in silence and look for advice.”

While there, she said the Reverend Mother gave her “permission” to be herself. “She says, ‘You can’t come live here, but you do have permission to go out and become Maria.’ I was like, sobbing. I was like, ‘Who is that?'” Shriver recalled.

“I think the word permission … I had never given myself permission to feel, to be vulnerable, to be weak, to be brought to my knees, and the world did it to me,” she added. “And then I was like, ‘Okay, God, let’s go. I’m gonna take this and learn everything I can about my role and what I need to learn.'”