I recently left a mediation with this song playing in my brain. The mediation did not end in a signed agreement… and that’s okay. One of the parties was absolutely not ready to complete the division of their property. “She does not deserve anything!” he repeated. “She had an affair!”
My co-mediator and I would cycle him through the tough emotions, thinking he was ready to move forward, then BAM. The wife would say something like, “I am willing to give you the chair for the two bedside tables,” and he would dive back into that emotional feedback loop of pain and sorrow (it looks like anger on the outside). Sadly, he thinks he wants to punish his wife- to make her pay for her misdeeds with couches and chairs. I wish I could waive a magic wand like the ghost of Christmas so he could see that it is his own thinking is holding him in bondage… not her past acts but his present thoughts about them! But I can’t.
What I know is until we have the space and support to process the feelings, our thoughts will highjack us. I hope that this young man has a support system that can hold the space with him while he feels the pain of this loss. The feelings live in his heart, and if he can feel safe enough to feel them, the healing will begin. The pain is the gate, and when his heart is ready to feel the pain, he will.
Trust the process. My hope is that he will get the empathy he needs and come back to the table… when he is ready to move forward.
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