There are a number of things that are at the core of what I believe and that are at the core of my coaching. These five points are the pillars behind my approach to how a divorce can be handled successfully.
Have a plan!
The very first principle is to have a plan: going into divorce with your eyes wide open. Knowing how you would like the divorce to unfold, but also thinking beyond that about how would you like your life after the divorce to look, having a plan for what you’re trying to achieve by getting divorced. This is incredibly important because it provides you with an objective. If you think of divorce as a marathon, your plan is the road to the finish line. It is what’s going to keep you going and it’s what you’re going to use as your finish line when making all the decisions that you have to make in the context of your divorce.
Put your children first
Having a plan is really one of the cornerstones to having a successful divorce. The second one is also very important to highlight: putting the children at the center. Everybody will always say that they have their children’s best interest in mind, and that’s usually true. But, what happens, is that during our divorce, we go through extremely strong emotions. There is such a roller coaster of feelings that, sometimes, we lose that child-centered perspective. We want to fight over something just because we want to get what we think we deserve or we want to fight for it out of principle. If we take a minute to think about what’s best for our children, though, we usually find that the key is thinking about a solution focused on them, not on one parent or the other. Having the children at the heart of your considerations is going to be extremely helpful in helping you manage your emotions and try to remain clear-headed when deciding what’s best for your family.
Think long term
In that same vein, thinking long term is a very important element of achieving a good divorce. The agreements you reach are agreements you’re going to have to live with for many years. You are going to have to live with the financial arrangements and the split of assets that you’ve agreed to. You’re going to have to live with the child arrangements you’ve made. So thinking beyond this actual moment and really trying to project your life in the future, referring back to your plan, is going to help you make sure that the agreements you’re coming to are sustainable and allow you to live the life you want to live way beyond the final signing of the papers. This is another lens that I always emphasize with my clients and that I will help you, as a client, to work through and think through every time you have to make a decision.
Keep conflict to a minimum
Keeping conflict to a minimum is my fourth guiding principal. There is nothing to be gained from extensive conflict. It increases lawyer bills, it makes everything take a lot longer, but most importantly it takes a huge emotional toll. There is a lot of research that shows that it isn’t divorce itself that hurts the children, it’s the parental conflict they witness. Seeing their parents argue, feeling that tension, is what really affects the children and it affects the parents too. It really is a no-brainer that keeping conflict to a minimum is always beneficial.
In order to reduce conflict, you will need to collaborate and communicate with your spouse. Speaking to each other doesn’t mean you have to be best friends. Amicable divorce doesn’t mean that you’re friends, all it requires is to be respectful of each other and to want to achieve a settlement that isn’t a decision made by a judge who doesn’t know your family. In order to maintain control over the terms of your divorce, and to be able to obtain agreements that are acceptable to you, you need to collaborate and to communicate with your spouse. Once again, you don’t need to be best friends, you just need to be able to speak to each other and to make decisions together. If you have children, there will be many other decisions to be made for many years after the divorce is finalised. You will need to continue to leverage the communication and collaboration skills that you acquire during your divorce in the long term.