Divorce - Is It Worth How It Effects Your Life?

According to science (and my family relations teacher) the stages of divorce are as follows:
-emotional
-legal
-economic
-coparental
-community
-psychic

Now I think that most of those can speak for themselves, so you can see here what a process divorce is. And I'm sure no one goes into it thinking that it really can be just a split second decision and a signing of papers and then you're free to move on with your separate lives! It is a very long and hard milestone that affects you for the rest of your life, whether or not you think it will. That's a lot of the last stage of divorce, psychic, where you may be separated from them and living different lives but especially if you have shared children you will still always have to think about them and route your life in a certain way because of them when you have to take the kids over to their house for the weekend or consider if they would want to be at that recital and such.

I mentioned this statistic at the very beginning of my blog, I think it was in the first post I ever wrote, but it's so significant that I want to emphasize it again...

--Most couples who are on their way to divorce have 10 significant areas of incompatibility.
But then... couples who are in happy marriages, get this, have 10 significant areas of incompatibility as well.--

Seems like you just can't win no matter what happens huh?
But actually, for me it's rather obvious. I think its entirely based off of your attitude and how you view things.

-It's about doing the little things. Whether you and your spouse are in a huge rough patch, if you continue to do the little things for each other, there's no way the other can say that you've given up or lost hope and vice versa. If you do that, there will still be giving and caring going on between the two of you and expressions of love in the midst of struggle.

-It's about you attitude, respect, and effort. It's so easy to just say "eh it isn't working anymore so I'm done. He's not trying so why should I bother?" Well if that's the case, when working my butt off in school to graduate college, maintain a job, and plan my own wedding at the same time didn't work well...I should've just given up right? But I didn't. Because I knew the outcome would be worth it and that things would work out.
But you also can't do this without respect for the other. It may be very easy to slip into criticism battles with each other but I think the only thing that can turn those battles around if you do not lose your respect for each other.

-70% of people believe (after their divorce) that they could have made it work and would have been better afterwards.

I think the main problem these days is that people don't exactly know what they're getting into when they get a divorce. Now I'm not trying to say that everyone should stay together and that no matter what, you can always make it work. In some cases, I think divorce is a very viable solution and may be the best thing to do to help someone have a better life.

But I also think that too many times, good couples who really loved each other, just give up too easily and can't see that there is a path out of the tension and out of the rut that they're in. Too many couples get divorced, only to regret the way it turned their lives or only to find themselves getting back together again years later. I think that a lot of heartache and a lot of split up families could have saved if they followed these principles and if they could see what the outcome would be in the end.

Get More Out of Your Role as a Parent

To protect and prepare children to survive and thrive.  That is ideally why most of the world spends their time and energy being a parent. But what's the importance of it? Yes, parents help kids grow up and learn the ways of the world. But why is it so important?

Well, I think it's easy to argue that parents actually end up benefiting an equal amount from raising and teaching as the children do. Think about it this way... Have you ever had a teacher in a class that made you plan and prepare to do a peer teaching session? That's because of the general rule that you learn more when you teach. Sometimes the teacher is even getting more out of the subject than the people who are being taught. So if we view parenting as more than just "I have a kid so therefore I have to raise them... and that makes me a parent" and as an opportunity for us to learn as well, while we teach our kids everything about the world, the difference between good and bad, how to handle things that life throws at you, and how to love and use their brains it becomes a bigger matter of importance.

An experiment that I once learned about in a class had a group of baby monkeys in one cage and another group of baby monkeys in another. In the first cage, the scientists placed a fake wire "mother" in the cage that was built to have the nutrients inside of it that the babies would need. In the second cage they created a fake mother but instead of being made of wire, it was made of soft terry cloth. Then the scientists observed the difference between nature and nurture. Both groups of babies were able to get the nutrients that they needed for growth and survival. Neither of the groups suffered any dangerous situations or environments. However, what they were amazed to find was that the group of monkeys that had a soft, warm cloth mother not only survived but they out lived the monkeys with a wire mother (who died very soon after) by an immense amount.

Think of relationships that kids that you grew up with had with their parents. From what I remember, my friends who had parents that were not so affectionate or were gone 24/7 seemed to feel distant from their parents, they felt they didn't understand them, and they tended to be the ones who broke a lot of rules. But then I had friends who had parents that they felt very close to. They felt like they could talk to their parents about anything, they always knew what was going on within their kids' friend groups. I remember feeling envious of my friends who viewed their parents as friends.

 Parenting is about contact and belonging. The difference that I think between these parents, isn't how strict or lenient they were. It's the contact and sense of belonging that they gave their children. They knew everything about their kids' lives because they took the time to talk with their kids. They spent time with them, they were affectionate with them and showed them that they mattered.

Parents, don't view your role as a parent as a right because you have a kid. View it as a skill to be learned, an experience, and a purpose. Provide support and encouragement, contact, teach them, and learn WITH them. That is how you can get more out of your role as a "parent".