Conscious uncoupling is more than a celebrity catchphrase: Modern Family

Author and coiner of the “unconscious coupling” catchphrase Katherine Woodward Thomas talks about how to handle divorce with grace and kindness.

I like to refer to my unusual living arrangement as “conscious uncoupling before it was cool.”
Of course that’s a reference to the phrase catapulted into popular lexicon when Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin announced their well-publicized split in 2014.

But I’ve been living next door to the father of my children for six years now, long before the actress and rocker announced their split on Paltrow’s lifestyle website, Goop. It’s a situation that allows our two boys to have plenty of access to both their parents, and it’s how we attempt to have the next-best thing to a happily married life for the sake of the kids — even now that he’s remarried.

The woman who really coined the phrase has been helping people find a peaceful way forward through a popular online course of the same name since 2011.

Bestselling author and marriage and family therapist Katherine Woodward Thomas has just released a book detailing that approach. It’s called Conscious Uncoupling: 5 Steps to Living Happily Even After.

Given my own belief that it’s possible to end a marriage without the kind of harmony-destroying animosity that poisoned earlier generations of divorcees against each other and left their children to bear the weight of that hostility for years to come, I was keen to read the book and speak with Woodward Thomas.
Here’s some of what she had to say.

How did you come up with the term conscious uncoupling?

It actually emerged in a conversation I was having with a friend who had also had a very mindful divorce. He was trying to be very responsible in how he was talking about the end of his marriage. It popped for me. I said to him at that moment, “That’s a book that I need to write.”

It was very heartwarming to me when Gwyneth and Chris used the term and people caught it. The thing that I love about the phrase is that it kind of opens up a whole new paradigm for people. It really names the experience that people like you and I are having in how we’re looking to (divorce), which is very different than maybe our parents’ generation.

What did that look like?

Nobody knew how to divorce then — all that fight-or-flight biology and all that history of the antagonistic legal system was kind of in our DNA and they did it so badly. And you and I have spent so many years on the couch trying to sort through the shrapnel of that. We’re the ones saying, “OK, we’re going to find a better way to do this.”

What do you say to somebody who just can’t see past that blame in order to find a way to be OK for their kids?

You can’t deny those feelings. They’re like tidal waves and they’re big and they’re scary and nothing any of us ever want to feel. But I liken it to planting seeds in your garden. If you indulge the knee-jerk negativity of anger and rage and you lash out and hurt the person you feel hurt by, those are like planting bitter fruits right in your backyard. Those are going to turn into a garden and you’re going to be going to be eating the fruits of whatever garden you plant for many years to come.

So what should you do instead?

Rather than lash out when the impulse strikes, try pressing the pause button instead. Take a deep breath and ask yourself the question, “What am I feeling right now?” See if you can name each feeling one at a time: “I’m sad. I’m humiliated. . . ” Once you put a name to your feelings, they begin to diminish in intensity so that they no longer overwhelm you. This practice will help put you in the driver’s seat so you can choose to respond to whatever is happening in a way that is reflective of the wise, mature adult that you are — with graciousness, goodness and fairness.

In the book you mentioned that it can be a good idea to arrange to meet to clear the air. How does that work?

Each partner offers a sincere apology for behaviour, even if you did not intend it to be hurtful, an open-hearted acknowledgment of the negative impact and a sincere offer to make amends. While it might be challenging to drop your insistent efforts to be understood, taking responsibility in this way can disappear years of resentments in one conversation, and leave everyone free to move forward.

Tips for conscious uncoupling:

Do no harm. “Don’t pick up the phone, don’t send the angry email,” says Woodward Thomas. “There are things that we can do in those moments that we can actually never take back.”

Clear the air. If possible, arrange to chat, not to win an argument or to change anyone’s mind, but to listen to each other state the hurts you’re each still struggling with and to make amends for those.

Speak kindly of one another. It’s tempting to play the victim when relaying your breakup story to others, but doing so diminishes both of you.

Expand instead of divide your family. Give your children a sense that you’re one recalibrated family instead of two separate units they have to switch between. It’s up to the parents to “accomplish the necessary growth and emotional maturation” required.

Source: https://www.thestar.com/life/2015/10/22/conscious-uncoupling-is-more-than-a-celebrity-catchphrase-modern-family.html