Pete Wright:
Welcome to How to Split a Toaster, a divorce podcast about saving your relationships, from True Story FM. Today, why do you make the choices you make?
Seth Nelson:
Welcome to the show everybody. I'm Seth Nelson. Joining us today is organizational psychologist, Laura Gallaher, to talk to us about being intentional and other wise thoughts that she is going to share with us today. How are you doing Laura?
Laura Gallaher:
I'm doing great, thanks. How about you Seth?
Seth Nelson:
Doing really well. I'm always very focused when I speak with you because I know you want people to be intentional. As a lawyer, I really try to be interntional in what I say and I'm hyper intentional when I'm talking to you. I'm a little nervous actually.
Laura Gallaher:
Wow, so you step up your game even more for me?
Seth Nelson:
I will share with you that sometimes I think I make my best legal arguments walking back from the courthouse, which is never a good time because the hearing is over. We don't want that to happen today.
Pete Wright:
We don't. When we talk about bringing guests on the show, and starting this part of our process, you were one of the very first people that Seth brought up. He said, "We got to have Laura on the show." I am curious as you think about... because when you talk to me, when I hear, why do people make decisions that they make, it doesn't start for me with the divorce process. It starts for me with the, why did you get married process in the first place.
Seth Nelson:
Valid question.
Pete Wright:
I know we're here to talk about divorce, but what is it that... What is your framework for your thinking about this intentionality, for seeking intentionality in leading up to dissolution?
Seth Nelson:
Pete, before we get there, I did read a study that we should talk about. The leading cause of divorce is marriage.
Pete Wright:
Seth.
Seth Nelson:
Just wanted you to know.
Pete Wright:
Somebody, we got to put that article in the notes, 100 percent of the times.
Laura Gallaher:
Very profound.
Pete Wright:
People who are divorced got married. That's staggering.
Laura Gallaher:
Wow, maybe they should stop doing that.
Pete Wright:
Staggering. Doc it hurts when I do... Okay, tell me. Give us a sense of your place in this.
Laura Gallaher:
We look at choice as a tool, a very pragmatic tool. One of the first ways that we break down this idea of choice is by recognizing that some of the choices that we make as human beings are conscious choices. A lot of them are subconscious choices. In my work, really broadly, I focus on helping people become more self aware so they can seize some of the choices that they've been making and how they're actually creating the situations that they find themselves in. If somebody fails to do that, then they really lack self accountability. They start to play the blame game. They start to play the victim. Most importantly, they feel really powerless to actually create anything that they want for themselves. Helping them, first look at, okay if I'm really honest with myself, what choices have I been making that lead me to where I am today.
Pete Wright:
There seems to be a position in what you're saying here that could lead you to either in stagnate in a frustrating, loveless marriage, or accelerate toward divorce.
Laura Gallaher:
Yeah, it could definitely go in either direction. The main thing that we like to focus on, we talk about subconscious choices... well there is really two things. One is that as humans, we tend to make a lot of choices that become almost our personality from when we're really, really young. That's a piece of it.
Pete Wright:
Right.
Seth Nelson:
How do we even know? How do I know if I'm making a subconscious choice?
Laura Gallaher:
It can be as simple as choosing to reflect, even over the last five minutes of your life. One of the exercises that we do, for example, is depending on if it's virtual or in person, is we give people about two minutes, not even two minutes, to try to make a decision in a group. Then we have them come back to main session. We have them close their eyes, and I list out dozens of different choices that they just made in those two minutes. If I'm asking you all, "Hey I'm going to give you two minutes to figure out whose the new leader of your team," that's your decision. So many choices that you make, do I start the conversation or do I follow the conversation? Depending on who starts the conversation, do I respond or not respond? If they're making a decision really quickly, do I notice if I have a preference about that? If I disagree with what they're saying, do I speak up or choose to go along with it? For each one of those, what's that about? Am I deciding to go with the flow because maybe I like they're all older than me and want to respect that, or maybe I'm the only person from my ethnic group and I feel awkward speaking up.
Seth Nelson:
Or I avoid conflict. I'm just going to do it.
Laura Gallaher:
I want to avoid conflict. Maybe I come in with a certain intention and I think I'm going to do something, but oh my gosh, that person seems to have a really strong opinion. I don't think that I want to jump in and throw my hat in the ring. I just take them through this series of questions to highlight, whoa how many choices did you just make and how many of those were you thinking about consciously at the time, and how many of them only just occurred to you now because I asked you to stop and reflect? Then of course, it can get deeper from there. Let's take your example. Somebody is avoiding conflict. Okay, what's that about? This is where it comes back to our defenses. We all want to avoid pain. That's part of how we're programmed as humans. We want to try to avoid pain.
Seth Nelson:
People are going through a divorce, unfortunately I see it all the time. It's all about, not all, but a lot of it is about pain. It's about fear. It's about not seeing your children again, not having money, having to move homes, maybe having to go back into the work force. I haven't worked for 15 years. I've been raising the kids, and they're just scared. When you say it's about avoiding pain, I always tell my clients, "You can't go around divorce, over divorce. You got go through it."
Laura Gallaher:
That's so true.
Pete Wright:
This gets to exactly what's running around in my head. How do you go through it when we're conditioned to avoid it? The entirety of the experience you're about to go through is pain.
Laura Gallaher:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
Even people who are really seeking a divorce, how many people are going through that and not experiencing some level of pain?
Laura Gallaher:
Loss is painful.
Pete Wright:
Seth, yeah right. Even in general, even if you are in a terrible marriage, for whatever reason that is, it's painful.
Seth Nelson:
People will say something to the effect of, "I can't believe I wasted ten years of my life." I'm like, whoa whoa whoa. This is more if you had kids, but I also say it if you don't, "There had to be some good times within those ten years. Let's not just block it all as bad."
Pete Wright:
How many people, when they're going through a divorce, are able to make that pivot? I guess that's where I'm leaning here, the level of introspection and self reflection that is required when you're in a place of great stress, is extraordinary. To be able to come back and say, "I'm going to build this entirely new muscle and pivot so that I'm not focusing on just the horrible things that I experienced in the last ten years, but there was some good. I'm going to have something to look forward to, that there are some silver linings." We've talked before on this show about some of the silver linings that come out of divorce that you may not be anticipating. My question is right in the middle, how do you teach yourself to start to pivot in this new direction, to start to see that you might be stuck in the negative?
Laura Gallaher:
Being able to lean on our prefrontal cortex is really powerful. We're obviously still going through this fabulous pandemic, this COVID-19. I've worked with a lot of my clients on how can we adapt and deal with this difficulty? Now it's become our new normal, but in the beginning, it was like, we're losing a lot. This is super painful. When I talk about this whole idea of change, to pull on your point Pete, there's loss with every single change. A divorce, even if I was the person saying, "I would like to have a divorce," I'm the one that's bringing this change into my life, there's going to be things that I'm losing. There's going to be things that I'm gaining. That's always true. The same is true in a choice to get married. I could be marrying the man of my dreams and I'm gaining things and I'm losing things, because that's part of change.
Laura Gallaher:
The prefrontal cortex is this cool thing that we have as humans that actually lets us choose, intentionally, where we want to put our focus. They have to want to. They have to want to. There is a payoff for a lot of people who are going through this kind of potentially traumatic event where they want to let themselves sit in their anger, or sit in their sadness, or sit in their pain. If they want to do that, then that's where they're going to be. If they feel ready to feel different, then they get to do that. They can choose to shift their focus at any point in time to what they're gaining, the times over those ten years that were beautiful. The things that they're still carrying with them from those ten years, the time is never lost.
Seth Nelson:
To put that in the divorce context Laura, are you saying that if you're going through this process, you'll certainly be grieving. There will be some loss. You can make the choice. If you slow down, you can make the choice and say, "I am going to focus on this weekend, I can do anything I want that I haven't been able to do before because I always had to check with my spouse."
Laura Gallaher:
Yeah, absolutely. Focus on a gain. Part of the reason we focus so much more... There's two main reason we focus on loss disproportionately. One, it's an evolutionary strategy for us. Evolutionarily speaking, loss might mean I won't have the resources I need to literally survive. Most of the time, we're not actually faced with that anymore, so our brains give us this massive overly emotional response to the idea of loss. That's a part of it. The second reason we focus disproportionately on loss is because it tends to feel more tangible. It's like, hey this is a thing I had. I know what it feels like to have this thing. Now I'm not going to have this thing that I've got specific experiences with. To your point, Seth, about being able to slow down, if I can slow down and actually allow myself to imagine what those gains are and I can start to picture them with more specificity... I love how you said that Seth, "This weekend I wouldn't have to," that's very specific. This weekend I wouldn't have to ask. Very cool. What else?
Laura Gallaher:
We don't often allow ourselves enough time to really think about and imagine all of the gains and all of the benefits for all the change.
Seth Nelson:
It's interesting you talk about focusing on the gains and not on the losses. Whenever I'm talking to anyone about a settlement and they're trying to make the decision on whether to settle their case, I am very clear in stating, "You will never settle your case if you focus on what you're not getting. You will only settle your case if you focus on what you are getting." Is that kind of that same concept?
Laura Gallaher:
Exactly, yes.
Pete Wright:
This gets to a question on equity, right? So much of the divorce process, and Seth, catch me when I start lying. So much of the divorce process starts, it seems, with this adversarial approach towards equity. "It's not fair. If I don't get this, that's not fair. He's getting more than I am," or, "She's getting more time than I am." It's not fair, it's not fair. It seems like it's hard wired in us, when we deal with this combative approach to getting into litigation, and to litigate a divorce. It becomes, "It's not fair. I got to get more. I got to get more. I got to get this out of it," or to find balance is so hard. I interviewed a doctor once, Bill Dodson, and he said something that stuck with me, as a mantra. He said, "I have to say this every morning. I am the grateful recipient of life's unfairness." It changes the way your brain approaches this argument of equity. I wonder if there isn't some of that that you would guide us through toward approaching a separation like this? How do you reprogram yourself to adapt to the fairness, unfairness, calculation in a divorce process?
Laura Gallaher:
That one gives me some pause, and I think it's because... Does this show have an E rating? I'll be gentle.
Pete Wright:
What do you want, we got it.
Seth Nelson:
Don't be gentle.
Pete Wright:
It's just a box. It's just a check box. Go ahead.
Laura Gallaher:
Something I say all the time is, fuck fairness. Life is not fair. I think that it's a flawed standpoint from which to operate. If that's my basis for wanting to make decisions or if I'm looking at that as my primary criteria and for success, I think that I'll experience pain my whole entire life. It gives me pause, your question gives me pause, because I think I've had that mentality for a very long time and I'm not sure I'm well equipped to guide somebody away from that. I've just long recognized how unfair life is.
Seth Nelson:
On the fuck fairness, I don't deal in fairness.
Pete Wright:
Right, you are programmed not to deal in fairness.
Seth Nelson:
I deal with the legal system in Florida. Check your local jurisdiction. Check with your lawyer. In Florida, family law courts are a court of law and equity. You have the legal aspect, but then ultimately this judge can do what they believe is equitable, which people say is fair. If I'm in court arguing equity, everybody in that courtroom knows that the law is not on my side, because I'm already falling back to equity. If I'm arguing the law, I could also argue equity, "Judge the law is fair in this case," and all that. I never deal with fairness. Even if it turns out at the end of the process it's very equitable, it's still quote, unquote unfair because you had to go through that whole process to get there. You had to go through discovery and depositions and a trial. That's just not fair. I don't deal in fairness. I deal in, what are the problems? How do I get you through this process? What are my responsibilities as a lawyer to you? How can I help you try to make the best decisions when you're faced with, here are some choices?
Seth Nelson:
That's where I think a lot of people going through this process will make choices that are not in their best interest? They struggle and I think intuitively they know it, but they just can't get past it.
Laura Gallaher:
A big part of this comes back to, how do I feel about myself? That's what happening for each person. How they feel about themselves has everything to do with how they're going to make choices in a process like this. While I can't make you feel any kind of way about yourself, I can treat in such a way that I might make it easier for you to feel good about yourself in my presence. This is, I think, really, really hard for couples who are going through a divorce. There's probably, like we've already talked about, a lot of hurt. There could be potentially betrayal. At some point in time they theoretically thought, this is going to be forever, and that's not happening now. Even something as simple as, if I treat my spouse or former spouse with kindness in this process, how might they make different choices about me. What I get to do for myself is pay attention to, if my former spouse is being unkind to me. They're not listening well to me. They're name calling or they're trying to drag my name through the mud or whatever it may be, in what ways do I find myself then choosing to do something that's not in my best interest, just because I'm hoping that it screws that person over too.
Seth Nelson:
The race to the bottom.
Laura Gallaher:
That's where we start to really lose it. It's the thing, again, I want somebody to be as intentional as possible. If I understand that I'm doing this and it's not in my best interest financially, it's not in my best interest for what might happen with custody of the kids, and I'm choosing to do it anyway because my interest in vengeance is that high, okay. I think most people, when they really come from a conscious place, they're not going to make those kinds of poor decisions. A lot of it is about being able to slow down and check out, what am I feeling so triggered about? Why am I feeling so insecure in this person's presence?
Pete Wright:
I hear you say things like that, and I'm always careful to check, how much of that is a real life thing and how much am I living in a movie trope? You see this all the time. There's a divorce and she gets custody of this thing he cared about all this much. She's just going to burn it to the ground, just because. That's a movie. That's season one of Ted Lasso right now. How often do you see people making decisions like that, that are based from this lizard brain part of us, for vengeance? How often is that a real thing?
Laura Gallaher:
I'll come back to your fairness example. I had an example with my former spouse actually. We had tenants and it was difficult. We were renting out a house. It was really difficult and they were not meeting their requirements. We offered him a deal and blah, blah blah. Essentially we were going to withhold their security deposit because they didn't meet the terms that we had set out. They threatened us with legal action. My former spouse was very focused on fairness. He was ready to be like, "Let's go hire a lawyer. Let's go battle this out." I'm like, "Hold on."
Seth Nelson:
Love that guy. I like that guy.
Pete Wright:
I knew it. I was just waiting. A dog whistle just went off somewhere.
Laura Gallaher:
Sorry Seth, but that sounded awful to me. I was like, "That sounds awful. It sounds expensive. I have no faith that it's going to go in our direction. What if we just offered them 500 bucks back? What if that was all it took?" He had to work extremely hard. My former spouse is intelligent and amazing in a lot of ways. He had to work really hard and with a lot of coaching and urging from me to get past his own anger about the unfairness of the situation. He was ready to go spend a lot more money and put them in a situation where they were spending a lot more money, just because it wasn't fair and it wasn't right. This is a very even tempered person, but because we were going through our divorce, he was feeling all that loss. He wasn't feeling good about himself, so he was far more likely to get into this, in my world we call it, red zone. He was defensive. He wasn't thinking clearly. It was about winning. It wasn't about actually finding the best solution. I think it happens constantly.
Pete Wright:
That makes me sad. Humans, right?
Seth Nelson:
Here's the good news Pete. There are good lawyers out there, that when that happens, and they call you, they'll say, "Let's do the math. How much is it going to cost to hire me to go to court to make this argument versus just give the guy $500." Along with that, sometimes I will get the call and say, "It's not about the money. It's about the principle." My response to that is, "I will never ask you to negotiate away your principles. That's the core of who you are. That's a fool's errand for me. You're not going to agree. What doesn't make sense to me, why are you going to pay me all this money to go in front of a neutral third party who you do not know, called a judge, that's a government employee, to see whether they agree with your principles? If they do, who cares? They're your principles. Why do you need someone else to validate that? If they don't agree with your principles, you're not going to all the sudden say, my principles are wrong, let me re-evaluate. You're going to say, the system screwed me."
Pete Wright:
Right, the system is broken. They didn't see it my way.
Seth Nelson:
Right.
Laura Gallaher:
Yeah.
Pete Wright:
We're talking about the law now Seth. I think we need to do that and we're going to have Laura help us navigate that very sticky court room. First we need to define a term.
Seth Nelson:
Here we are back at Black's Law Dictionary, page 579, because Laura mentioned fairness. We know her views on that. We thought we would work with equity. Equity, a noun, fairness, impartiality, even handed dealing. Number two, the body of principles constituting what is fair and right, natural law, reflects the influence of equity on the Declaration of Independence. It just means what's fair, but the question is court is, do you really get that? We're going to talk about how to talk with your lawyer next.
Pete Wright:
Okay, we were talking about you working with your lawyer in this case. Seth, you were taking us down this road of the white hat lawyer let's say, who comes into the rescue, to give you a dose of reality when you may be seeing things from your lizard brain. How does one expect to be communicated with by their lawyer when they're in a place of maybe not making choices that are in their best interest?
Seth Nelson:
Very rarely will a client come to a lawyer and say, "Here's my problem. Please fix it." They just start telling the story. It's the lawyer's job to figure out what, if any, legal problem there is, and what, if any, legal solution there may be, then to discuss with the client the process, how much it will cost to get there, what are the different potential outcomes based upon the information the lawyer is receiving. I think we should talk more about how you communicate what you want, what you're afraid of, where you're coming from, because that might then drive different, more broad based solutions other than, let's go to court.
Seth Nelson:
Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about.
Pete Wright:
This is important, just as a footnote, because it feels like, we've talked about how important it is for me to become best friends with my lawyer and you have told me time and again, that I'm not going to be best friends with you. You're going to have to pay me more. That thing doesn't exist. It seems like all these stories are stories that I would tell a lawyer that I want to be my best friend.
Seth Nelson:
You might be communicating the same information. When you say I want to be my best friend, you want to tell me your story.
Pete Wright:
Right, right.
Seth Nelson:
Which is fine, you can say, "She does this. He does this." You can go on and on and on, but what I am going to do is try to redirect you about what do you want? I work hard on that. By way of example, when you're getting divorced, there might be a house. Whether you have kids or not, there's a house.
Pete Wright:
Sure.
Seth Nelson:
Your name is on the house. Your spouse's name is on the house. My question is, do you want to keep the house? The answer I frequently get is, "I don't know if I can afford it." That wasn't my question. My question is, do you want to keep it? If the answer is yes, then the next question is, can we afford it? I don't have to talk about whether you can afford it or not, if you don't want to keep it. You don't want to say, "I really want the house. He'll never pay me enough alimony where I can keep the house," and blah blah blah. If you go step by step, but you get so wrapped up into it that you might convince yourself, just to tell your lawyer, "I don't care about the house." Maybe you do.
Laura Gallaher:
Helping people get clear about what they want is extremely powerful, underrated and wildly important.
Pete Wright:
It strikes me that when you're talking about your legal team that's not a thing that all lawyers are equally good at. Is that a fair statement?
Seth Nelson:
There's good podcast hosts and there's bad podcast hosts, right? There's good lawyers and there's bad lawyers.
Pete Wright:
Right, right right, but I just mean, a lawyer that has imbued with a drive toward intentionality, that's a gift. That might be something that I'm saying, you should be looking for in looking for your lawyer.
Laura Gallaher:
Yeah, I'm all for being very intentional, for sure.
Seth Nelson:
I think if your lawyer is not pointing you in that direction, and Laura correct me if I'm wrong, when you're going to talk to your lawyer, you're going to want to have a reason why you're calling your lawyer. What are you trying to get out of that conversation? That forces you to be intentional. Is that accurate?
Laura Gallaher:
Yeah, I would say so.
Seth Nelson:
Otherwise, if you're just calling to complain, that's where I say, I'm not your best friend. I'm not your friend at all. I'm your lawyer. Don't call me to complain. Go tell it to a friend. I'm here to solve a problem. Sometimes, it's hard for the client to even articulate what problem do they have that they're asking you to resolve?
Pete Wright:
Let's talk about how you build a plan for having that conversation when you're in a lizard brain space. Walk us through the way you want to set up a conversation with your lawyer about preparing for dissolution. I don't know, do you want to give me a specific challenge, a specific call you might receive Seth? What does that look like?
Seth Nelson:
The house example, Laura, what about that? Does that work for you Laura? You can give us an example of how you might coach someone to prepare for that conversation?
Laura Gallaher:
It could be really useful for people going through this process to also have a therapist.
Seth Nelson:
100 percent.
Laura Gallaher:
Right, if even just for that very temporary period of time, because I think that really good therapists, and potentially really good coaches, but therapy is probably the most effective route in this kind of case, part of what they do really well is they take that whole jumble and picture it in different balls of yarn all mixed together in this person's crazy brain. They nicely corral them into separate balls and the therapist can say, "Okay it sounds like this is the decision that you're struggling to make," or, "I'm hearing you say this is what you want and yet this is also coming up for you." I think it's probably worth investing in that, to your point Seth, if they're trying to complain to you, or you're trying to work out that piece of it. When you're like, wait what is the problem? I think that's really important. If someone is on their own, and they want to try to prepare, I think getting a handle on their emotional state is probably the most important thing. When we feel that strong, emotional pull, when the lizard brain is all activated, our IQ tends to drop about 20 points. We're not operating as the best problem solvers.
Laura Gallaher:
One of my favorite strategies is name it to tame it. Literally identify, what is the emotion that I feel right now? Do I feel angry? Do I feel hurt? Do I feel a sense of despair? The more specific you can be about naming, identifying, describing your emotional state, the more you're going to be able to actually process through it much faster. It helps you get back into that prefrontal cortex and away from the lizard brain. There's also a specific way that people can identify with emotions too. Instead of saying, I am mad, one step that's more effective is to say, I feel mad. Now I'm not over-identifying with my emotion. One step further is to say, part of me feels mad. Immediately what I've done is I've left space open for me to notice any other feelings that I have. Maybe part of me is mad and part of me is also sad. Maybe part of me is relieved. Maybe all these things are happening at the same time and there's an element of emotional security and sophistication that exists when people are able to make space for all that and see all that at the same time. Being able to separate and work through those emotional states I think, is a really important step to clarify, what do I want? I've gotten through that emotional part, now what?
Seth Nelson:
If I'm talking to someone and they're highly emotional, I have these conversations every day, one tool, if I'm hearing you correctly, that I can do to improve as a lawyer in communicating with my clients, is to say, "What are you feeling about this? Are you anxious? Are you angry? Are you a combination of those items?" Somehow ask a question that leaves space for something else?
Laura Gallaher:
Absolutely, and you probably have a story in your head about the emotion that they're feeling, so you can offer that and say, "It seems to me like you're feeling almost a sense of despair right now. Is that what's happening to you?" They'll either be like, "Yes," and feel so seen, heard, understood. Or it might be different and they'll say, "No it's really not despair, I feel," and they're going to correct you. Then they're getting themselves into a place of understanding that emotional state.
Seth Nelson:
Then that leads to better problem solving?
Laura Gallaher:
Yeah, it actually reduces the emotional intensity. It brings it down to a more palpable level and then we can work through it. It's all about giving people the skills that are necessary to collaborate. A piece of it is this interspaced negotiation and problem solving. When I think about people being really, really intentional and having all of these tools, I picture, imagine two people who are trying to make a lot of decisions together, about how they are going to separate their lives but keep them together to the extent they need to. Each person clearly understands what they're interests are. Then we get to look at those interests together and say, "What solutions can we come up with that will meet the majority of these interests or potentially all of them?" It gets us away from the, this is my position, this is my position, and now we're going to butt heads about it. Interests tend to be a lot more flexible and we tend to make much better decisions, we come up with much better solutions, when we're really, really clear about what those intentions are.
Laura Gallaher:
My favorite example, and Seth, this might be something that you're familiar with. Have you heard the little story about the two sisters that are fighting over the last orange?
Seth Nelson:
I have not.
Laura Gallaher:
If you had, I know you've got Kai, if you had two kids and they were fighting over an orange and you come in, what's your solution?
Seth Nelson:
Divide it in half.
Laura Gallaher:
Cut the orange in half. Classic parent solution. That would be the position right? One kids wants the orange, the other kid wants the orange. They appear incompatible. If you dig a little deeper and say, "Tell me more about what is important to you about this orange. What are your interests here?" What you would find out is that one of the kids wants the orange to squeeze fresh orange juice. The other kid wants the orange for the orange peel to put it into a recipe that she's baking. If they took a little more time to get clear about what are their interests, they would actually see that perhaps they're not fully in conflict. Sometimes they are. It's not always utopian. Just an example that helps you see, cutting the orange in half, one sister would have only gotten half the orange juice and she could have had all of it.
Laura Gallaher:
Slowing down and getting clear about interests, while it may seem like we're overly formulaic or something like that, I think it can be really, really effective.
Seth Nelson:
This goes back, Pete, to what Dr. Gayes was talking about in the collaborative process.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Seth Nelson:
Where you focus more on interests and less on positions. Usually parents' interests are aligned. How they get there might be different. We want our kids to be healthy. We want them to have a good education. We would like them to participate in extracurricular activities. It gets sticky when which parent's location is going to be the better education? That's a position. How much is the extra curricular activity? Who is going to pay for it? That's a position. Ultimately their interests, when it comes to the kids, I think are probably in line, and focusing on that is probably not a bad way to talk to your lawyer. Instead of saying, "This is what I want," in a positional aspect, but, "How do I make sure my kids have a great education even though we're getting divorced?" That's really important.
Laura Gallaher:
From a human side too, a big piece of the work that I do is to help people understand, which of my interests really relate to how I want to feel about myself? I might have an interest, for example, to feel like I mattered. Let's say that my former spouse is already moving on, maybe he's already engaged to the next person, and we're still trying to figure out, maybe for me, it's vulnerable to admit and say out loud, but man it would be in my interest to actually hear this person say that I mattered or that I matter still. Those types of things, the human level, this is an interest to me, we don't always know what those are on the surface. That's where it tends to manifest as the blaming and the playing the victim and feeling like the world is so unfair. So taking that time to think through, what are the interests I have as it pertains to my own self concept, how I feel about me.
Seth Nelson:
I'm sure there is someone listening right now, "My ex is never going to tell me that I mattered," and I get that. I hear that. I will tell you that sometimes people will not share that information with you directly, but with others. What I mean by that, I've had opposing counsel say, "I just want to let you know my client was just telling me what a great mom your client is." I was like, "Great I really appreciate that."
Laura Gallaher:
I have some new information.
Seth Nelson:
Then when I talk to my client I'm like, "Are you sitting down? Are you not driving your car? I want to make sure, you good?" They're like, "What do you have something bad to tell me?" I'm like, "No, it's really good. Let me tell you what I just heard from opposing counsel that your former spouse said that you're a really great mom," and it's like, "Holy shit. Why doesn't he tell me?" I'm like, "Whoa whoa whoa, don't go to the negative. Accept it, just take that in." If they're telling their lawyer then you know it's going to be true. If they're saying something good about your to their lawyer, it's a true statement. Not all the bad things they say about you are true, but if it's something good, it's usually a true statement on how people are feeling.
Seth Nelson:
How you get that out of your ex spouse I don't know.
Laura Gallaher:
Vulnerability, which can be magic.
Pete Wright:
Right, it an be magic.
Laura Gallaher:
The flip side of that is how many people would go to their former spouse and say, "I noticed that I feel really insecure about this. I want to know, truthfully, did I matter to you?" That's vulnerable. That's super vulnerable. If I do that, I feel like it's extremely unlikely.
Seth Nelson:
God, what if they say no?
Laura Gallaher:
Vulnerability is courageous and courage is contagious. I don't know, can you picture, seriously picture one of your clients genuinely mustering enough courage to be that vulnerable and have somebody metaphorically spit in their face by saying, "No you didn't matter."
Seth Nelson:
Yes, I hate to say it. I deal with really good people through really bad times. I could see some people taking that opportunity to spit in their face metaphorically.
Pete Wright:
To twist the knife.
Seth Nelson:
I see a lot of people doing a lot of hurtful things to each other. Unfortunately that wouldn't surprise me. I agree with you, I think the majority of people would say, "Yes."
Laura Gallaher:
The thing to know, of course, about the person that would choose to metaphorically spit in the face of somebody who was being that vulnerable, is that that person is wrecked with self loathing.
Pete Wright:
Yeah.
Laura Gallaher:
They're only going to treat somebody like that when they are in so much pain themselves. It makes it a little easier.
Pete Wright:
In so many ways, you've heard all you need to hear, just by hearing them say that, because they are clearly symptomatic right now. They're oozing bile all over you.
Laura Gallaher:
Validation.
Pete Wright:
That's them seeking their own thing.
Seth Nelson:
The person going through the divorce, maybe they could think that to themselves. "As much as I'd love to hear this person tell me that I mattered, I know that I did."
Laura Gallaher:
Right. I think that working with a therapist or a skilled friend whose a good empathic listener, they could say, "Let's just think about it. What evidence could we gather in support of the hypothesis that you did matter. Probably a lot of things, let's come up with it."
Seth Nelson:
That sounds like a doctor. That sounds like someone with a PhD. What evidence can we gather to support your hypothesis? Those words never come out of my mouth.
Laura Gallaher:
I'm just a really big nerd. That's the thing to know about me.
Seth Nelson:
I'm the law nerd. You can be the psych nerd. We're all good.
Laura Gallaher:
Perfect.
Pete Wright:
This was really useful and I think if I'm just looking in terms of summing up. If you're listening to this and you're thinking, what am I getting out of this. I think this conversation about understanding when you or your former spouse are coming at the separation of the lizard brain fully engaged, is something to be able to build a muscle about. This idea to be focused on interests, to really look at deeper. The story of the orange and the two kids is fantastic. Maybe it's not, I want the orange just so you don't have it. I think this idea of collaborative compassion is really important in this process. Please take some time, make some notes. Journal with yourself if you need to. Make that list of reasons you mattered in this relationship as you wind your way toward the end of it.
Pete Wright:
What do you think? Anything I missed?
Laura Gallaher:
I love that summary.
Pete Wright:
That you very much. Look at that Seth. She said she loved my summary.
Seth Nelson:
It went through my head, wow Pete, you should be a lawyer. I almost thought you should be a lawyer. You summarized that so... That closing argument was phenomenal.
Pete Wright:
I have not been more proud since that one time that one guy said I could pass for a Canadian. How about that?
Pete Wright:
This has been fantastic. Laura Gallaher, where would you like us to send people who want to learn more about you and your work?
Laura Gallaher:
I think the best place would be to go to gallaheredge.com. That's the website.
Pete Wright:
Do you want to pitch your podcast on our podcast?
Laura Gallaher:
Oh sure, yeah. I have my own podcast. It's called The Evolved Leader. I primarily work with leaders on creating amazing culture and bringing these same kinds of ideas to help people do better problem solving at work.
Pete Wright:
It is great work. Thank you so much Laura Gallaher, for joining us on the show. You're fantastic, and I hope this isn't the last time we talk to you.
Laura Gallaher:
Thanks Pete. Thank you Seth.
Seth Nelson:
Take care.
Pete Wright:
On behalf of Laura Gallaher and Seth Nelson, I'm Pete Wright. We'll catch you next time, right here on How to Split a Toaster, a divorce podcast about saving your relationships.
Speaker 4:
Seth Nelson is an attorney with Nelson Koster Family Law and Mediation, with offices in Tampa, Florida. While we may be discussing family law topics, How to Split a Toaster is not intended to nor is it providing legal advice. Every situation is different. If you have specific questions regarding your situation, please seek your own legal counsel with an attorney licensed to practice law in your jurisdiction. Pete Wright is not an attorney or an employee of Nelson Koster. Seth Nelson is licensed to practice law in Florida.
This transcript was exported on Dec 16, 2020 - view latest version here.
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