with Lori Rubenstein,
Life Coach and Divorce Mediator

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Conscious Relationships

Transcending Divorce Listen to Lori read an exerpt on "Forgiveness" from Chapter 9 - Heal Yourself, in her book, Transcending Divorce

Life Lessons in Love:
Examining Divorce Decisions from a Spiritual Perspective

Tony Robbins, the famous life coach and motivational speaker, says that "the purpose of a relationship is to magnify the human experience. Unmanaged, nothing can give you greater pain. With loving focus, nothing can give you greater joy."

The purpose of relationship is our personal growth, and in all interpersonal relationships, there is growth. And if you were lucky enough to find your soul-mate, you KNOW it is all about personal growth!

As an 18 year Divorce Attorney veteran, Divorce Mediator and Life Coach, I have been witness to thousands of couples making life altering decisions. Are they the "right" decisions? Is it better to stay married or get divorced? We all want the crystal ball. Truthfully, from my perspective, what I see is that there is spiritual growth in either direction you take.

Let's use the example of a wife sexually cheating on a husband. Many people say that they would not tolerate a relationship in which one person cheated; that cheating is an absolute deal breaker. Let's look at the possible paths and outcomes to the decision to stay or leave the marriage.

Husband decides to stay in the marriage: If the husband decides to stay with the wife, they would most likely get some marital therapy. In therapy, they may learn that wife felt ignored by husband's building of his business, traveling, and not being home. When he was home, he was distracted with thoughts of building his empire. She felt ignored and unloved. He was doing what he thought he should do to support his family. He will learn, certainly, that he also had a role in the cheating episode, that he needs to be more thoughtful of the wife, that he needs to take her into consideration, even in making business decisions, and that they need to be partners. He may learn to respect her need for involvement in his life. Furthermore, he will eventually need to learn forgiveness and flexibility in a world that may have been black and white to him.

The leap to feel trust for a spouse who has cheated is mighty indeed! In fact, most, I believe I read 70% of couples who have discovered incidents of adultery in their relationships, do not recover. Trust means also trusting yourself, that if the spouse does cheat, that you can handle whatever comes your way. Oftentimes the spouse who was the "victim"* feels awfully vulnerable and does not trust their own judgment, blaming themselves for "not knowing". As a man, he may even have to deal with friends and family telling him to just leave, dump her, and get out of there! He may deal with some questions about his own masculinity and sexual ability and prowess. Examining his own life, his values, his ethics, and standing alone against society, is definitely a courageous and transformational undertaking.

Wife decides to stay in the marriage: To be the one who hurt someone, who risked losing her husband, perhaps even risking losing children and a standard of life built for those children, is devastating in itself. There is often shame and guilt involved, which are among the lowest vibrational levels of power and energy. In society's eyes, the cheating wife is like a leper. Friends think she will try to steal their husbands and she is blamed for the failure of the marriage. There is the talk and gossip to be dealt with. She may be ostracized by people who at one time were her friends. The climb out of this abyss is immense.

To stay married means to live her life in a glass house, with every move she makes being watched and analyzed. It means answering endless questions, it means not being trusted, it means having to prove herself over and over again, and it means living with someone who deems her untrustworthy. Staying married means having to examine her own actions under a telescope, learning to understand why this incident came up and learning how to be honest about these reasons with herself and her spouse. It means working hard on her own issues and not blaming him for the cheating. It means taking full responsibility for the possible break-up of her family.

Deciding to End the Marriage: In many cases, divorce is a gift. Using the example above, cheating is generally the result of an unhealthy or unhappy marriage. Oftentimes, people stay in an unhappy marriage because there is no real impetus to leave, and a cheating incident creates this impetus. It makes two generally compliant people wake up and take a long, hard look at their lives, where they are, where they want to go.

Dealing with the fallout of a broken marriage, the impact on children, financial or economic impact, and the societal stamp of "a failed marriage", leads one to examine their life closely. It is a gift because it is a time of transformation, a time to take charge of your life, of your happiness. The gift is in examining your life and making the choice to BE someone you admire. You get to ask yourself many questions, including, what was missing in the relationship, how was I not fully showing up in the relationship, and what changes do I want to make in myself before I get involved in another relationship?

What is the greatest lesson of divorce? To learn how to love again. There is great fear of getting hurt after divorce and it's easy to build big walls around yourself. The real courage is in learning to surrender and allowing yourself to feel vulnerable in love. Unfortunately, we all know people never get to that point.

Secondarily, the lesson is one of giving up being a victim or martyr and blaming your spouse for the divorce. It is learning to take responsibility for your part in the passing of the relationship, learning to forgive and accept what was and what is. Learning to love yourself and stop blaming yourself is also paramount.

What do I recommend to my clients? I almost always recommend that you do everything you can to save your marriage, and if it doesn't work, then you leave with your head up, knowing you did everything you can to make the relationship work. Don't insult your spouse by pretending to work it out. If you make the commitment to work through the issues, then really do the work. If you know yourself well, and you know, for example, in the cheating incident above, that you could never forgive, then leave. One caveat though, recognize that if you want to get into a healthy, conscious relationship down the line, your forgiveness work must still be done.

*In the spiritual context, there is no "victim". Both parties in the relationship chose to be in that relationship, and to learn from the experiences brought to them through the relationship. Oftentimes, the "victim" realizes, sometimes months or years later, that the incident was a blessing; that they grew from it, and they would not trade it for anything in the world.