You, Your Intuition & Your Lawyer
Newsflash: Lawyers may know everything about the law, but they don’t know everything about you (and your life).
Like it or not, if you’re getting a divorce — you’ll likely need (and want) a lawyer on board in some capacity. Even the most amicable of dissolutions through mediation need a lawyer to sign off on the final court filings. Besides, it’s prudent to have a stamp of approval from someone who has YOUR best interests at heart.
And while I’m a huge fan of mediation (when it’s possible and when you have a mediator that keeps the process on track), a mama needs to be able to read the room and act accordingly.
When mediation is carrying on endlessly without progress, give yourself permission to abandon the process. When the mediator feels ineffective at keeping the two parties on point, give yourself permission to walk away.
If you were about to head into surgery and had a pre-operation meeting with your doctor and got a really bad feeling about him/her...would you still carry on?
Remember that you have hired these professionals to protect and guide you, but that doesn’t mean you don’t pay attention to your own impressions, intuition, inner gut (call it what you want) — in fact, you need to pay MORE attention to it.
Constantly check in and ask yourself, is this aligned with me?
There is a lot of comfort being represented by someone who is making sure that you are being protected, that you aren’t missing something or leaving anything on the table. It can be reassuring to defer to their expertise and get your questions answered and be advised on strategy.
But it’s really important to convey your objectives to your attorney. Yes, they are the professional. Yes, they have a lot of experience in this arena. Yes, they may surprise you with strategy or present you with ideas you hadn’t considered.
But you know what they don’t know? YOU.
They don’t know what is important to you in the long run — and they need to because you are the one who will live with the ramifications of your choices.
Ultimately, always remember that your attorney works for YOU. You are paying the bill (and speaking of bills — those bills can be a lot less if you approach your attorney with clarity).
Now I know this is all new territory for you. I know it’s hard to trust anyone when the person you committed to having a family with, building a life with and spending your life with betrays you. But you need to lean into your intuition here.
You need to get clear about your objectives and your heart — and then you need to declare it.
How do you want this divorce to look and feel?
How much time are you willing to have your life stuck in limbo?
How much are you willing to drain your bank account and life savings?
How much are you willing to sacrifice your self-care and overall wellbeing?
What do you want your children to witness?
How do you want the energy of your house to feel, even now during the divorce?
How can you walk away from this negotiation with your head held high?
The best way is to figure out what is most important to YOU, not what someone else tells you is important — what do you ultimately want to achieve here? This is why we help our clients craft something we created called the Divorce Declaration. It provides a template and methodology for getting crystal clear and provides guardrails to stay on track.
There is no one way through divorce and the first permission slip you need to write yourself is the one that allows you to pivot and make a different choice.
I’ve witnessed (and encouraged) plenty of mamas change attorneys or abandon their mediation because it was going nowhere fast.
While you can only control your side of the street and while you can’t guarantee any outcomes when a divorce lands in court — you can make sure you are in the most grounded, intuitive, trusting place so that you can make the tough decisions.
How?
It’s actually not rocket science — it starts with taking care of yourself.
When was that last time you made yourself a priority in this way? As a working mama you probably fell to the bottom of the laundry basket attending to the needs, agendas and desires of everyone else from your spouse and children to your boss, family and community, etc.
The list goes on.
Simply put, a frazzled mother really can’t be on her A-game for anyone, least of all the big decision-making she is being called to. But I also understand how that sounds like a lot of blah, blah, blah when you are feeling broken open, vulnerable, sad, enraged, isolated, worried, confused, etc.
Self-care usually isn’t at the top of the priority list for a triggered mother in the midst of a divorce. But honoring your wellbeing, needs and desires will change the trajectory of all that is come.
So much of the work I do with mamas is helping them reconnect to their power when feeling disempowered — and it changes how they move through the world from that day forward.
Did I mention how glorious it is to witness?
I don’t know if you ever saw the movie Sliding Doors (1998) with Gweneth Paltrow, but it exemplifies how life is predicated on the choices we make. Each door provides a different outcome. I think about this film quite a bit because the work we do with our mamas helps them avoid reacting and responding in the heat of the moment and creating more chaos.
Consider it this way — when we become aware of our triggers and the feeling beneath them, and when we witness ourselves about to go down a path we don’t want to walk — we can make a different choice. We can board a new train car.
I see this in motion every day.
Just the other morning, I got a text from one of the grads of our program. She had found herself back in court (as one will with small children negotiating ever-changing custody situations does). She wrote me, “I have a mind-blowing update.”
Mind-blowing update?
Don’t leave me hanging!
It turns out that in finalizing some last pieces, two things happened: a totally unexpected move of civility was underfoot, and a scheduled court date was cancelled at the last minute because suddenly her ex agreed to her proposal.
Now as a little background, this hasn’t been an easy process by any stretch of the Imagination for this mama — and she endured some pretty rough decisions made by the court. It went on too long and cost too much. Lawyers were involved, court dates were set, disappointing results were had.
Suddenly, my client really pushed back on her lawyer and kept insisting that she be heard. At first, he tried to talk her out of it but then relinquished. She wrote a few thoughts and ideas down for a proposal. Initially, her attorney was placating her. But after reading what she wrote, he responded by saying, “You know what? They may actually go for this.”
And go for it they did.
THIS is why we work to get mamas back into their intuitive power. There is nothing like pairing a woman’s intuition with strategy!
This is what it means to become the CEO of your divorce. This is how you divorce differently. This is how you heal through the hardest moment of your life.
And you don’t need to do it alone, you just need to have someone walk beside you to help you reclaim these lost pieces and parts of yourself.
This is what the mama I was telling you about wrote me after the fact:
“After exhausting every aspect of communication I know (asking, explaining, clarifying, raising my voice), I humanized myself and my four-year old and connected how a legal document impacts our lives. Then I employed accountability and asked my attorney if he represented me or not.”
Silenced no more. She no longer took a back seat and made her voice heard — and together they achieved her desired result. That is something to feel really good about — and you can do the same, mama.
How does this resonate with you? Where could you lean into your inner voice and then take action to tip the scales in your favor?Please leave a comment below and let’s continue the conversation!