I believe there are 5 essential qualities (or building blocks) that need to be present to successfully navigate conflict and disagreements.  Without these five qualities, it is extremely difficult to let down one’s defenses in a conflict, see your common goals and work together to tackle the problem. 

Building Block #1 ~ CONNECTION

Connection is so difficult to achieve, especially when we are in conflict or disagreement with someone else. 

When I talk about connection, I am referring to a sense of emotional connection – an ability to relate to one another from our heart.  It is important to create quality of connection because connection builds a sense of trust and safety. 

This quality of connection is often shattered in and through divorce, yet it is critical to rebuild if you are to have a successful co-parenting relationship.  Not to mention that learning how to rebuild connection after it is broken in any relationship is a great life skill that you will carry on to future relationships.

There are many ways to rebuild connection when it is broken.  It is important to focus on both creating a connection in the moment AND rebuilding connection over time. 

Here are 5 things you can to do create connection in the moment and to rebuild it over time.

     1.  Be honest in your conversations and actions.

     2.  Begin conversations by focusing on people and experiences that are important to both of you (e.g., your children, memories, things you both enjoy).

     3.  Take responsibility for your part in your interactions (both recent and past).

     4.  Really listen – not to the words that are being spoken but the meaning behind the words.

     5.  Ask the other person what they need to have a sense of connection and trust.

When connection and trust are broken, it takes time to rebuild it.  You build a house from the bottom up – beginning with the foundation.  To help rebuild connection with your former (or anyone else), you also need to start at the very foundation. 

Ask yourself what YOU can do to begin to contribute to the building blocks of  a healthy post-divorce relationship.

In service ~

 Cat J. Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.

building blocks photo by renjith krishnan

As a mediator, collaborative lawyer and conflict resolution coach, I feel sad, disappointed and confused when I struggle to be able to transform conflicts in my personal life into connection and understanding.  I value embodying the practices in my daily life that I teach and share with others in my work.  Yet, I’m aware that differences are inevitable and that there is struggle in life.  I am not perfect and while my Virgo tendency is to expect perfection, I constantly work to find peace in my imperfections.

I once read that a Japanese baseball player, of the Babe Ruth stature, said that when he gets up to bat he sees the pitcher as his partner – serving up an opportunity for him to hit a home run every time.  So I’ve been trying to embody this in my life.

As baseball players and teenagers, my sons often throw me curve balls. Sometimes I strike out and sometimes I hit a home run. Most often, it is somewhere in between! But now, instead of dreading these interactions, they have a light and playful energy to them. Can I hit home run? How about a triple? I laugh when I strike out and feel grateful when I don’t! I’m improving – sometimes slowly other days more quickly. Just like the real game of baseball, each interaction is a practice and opportunity for growth and learning.

When your former spouse/partner, your child, spouse/partner, colleague, or parent throws you a curve ball, how do you respond? Can you use those moments of dis-ease and dis-comfort in your life as invitations to deepen your growth and learning? Can you find a lightness and playfulness to those moments so you can find peace in the face of conflict?

The choice (although not always easy) is YOURS!

As always, I welcome your feedback and thoughts. Please share a comment below.

In support and service ~

 Cat J. Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.

For my blog today, I want to share with you a video of me talking about my work and how I integrate Nonviolent Communication into my work.  (This is Part 1. You can go to youtube to watch Part 2 and I will be posting it here as well at a later date.)  

The video explains the process I rely on in my work as a Collaborative Attorney, Mediator and Coach.  In case you are wondering, no, the candy was not put there as a prop for me, it was just there and I used it as an opportunity for demonstrating a point!

If you are interested in learning this approach so you can apply it yourself in your life or work, please go to www.parentingwithyourex.com/power to register for my upcoming Live Workshop in Bellingham, WA. 

If you are unable to attend in Bellingham but are interested in participating either in a live workshop or teleseminar, please send me a note at clientcare@parentingwithyourex.com and let me know.  I’d love to support you.

Thanks and, as always, looking forward to hearing your feedback.  Please post comments below.

In support and service ~

Cat J. Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.

WHAT do you see in this picture?  A young woman, an old woman, nothing . . .?

 Depending on how you look at this photo, you may see an old woman, a young woman or maybe you can’t make out either.  Perhaps it is easy for you to go back and forth between the two of them and when you do that you realize how your perspective can change simply depending on where you are standing, the angle at which you look at the picture, whether you are looking with both eyes open or only one eye, etc.  Do you have glasses or contacts on? 

When you look at this picture with someone else and she sees one thing and you see another, do you become curious and inquisitive? Do you turn the picture around or tilt your head differently? Do you stand where he is standing and try to see it from his perspective so you can see what he is seeing? Maybe you ask to borrow her glasses so you can see it from her perspective.  

Or do you begin to argue that you are right and he is wrong? 

 When we look at this picture, we can begin to realize that what we see and how we view something has much more to do with a matter of perspective than it does with what is really there or not there.

Here’s my invitation, when you and your former are disagreeing over who is right and who is wrong, turn the picture around, view it from the other person’s perspective, become CURIOUS, ask questions about how she sees it that way. 

Can you see what he sees? 

When you can do this, you can begin to uncover the commonalities and shared visions you have (i.e., dark places and light places, curves and straight lines) and you can then build agreements from there.

As always, I LOVE your comments, PLEASE share your thoughts below.

In service ~ 

Cat J. Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.

Today (January 18, 2012) we are snowed in.  It is 18 degrees out (even colder with the wind chill factor) and there are 8 inches of snow out my front door.  I did manage to bundle up (with motivation from my 13 year old!) and take my dog for an hour and a half walk.  It was beautiful. (Here’s a photo I took while on my walk.)

Earlier in the day I made myself a yummy brunch of home potatoes and eggs.  And as I was cooking and enjoying some peace and quiet, I was thinking about my work and supporting parents who are co-parenting with their former spouse and began to wonder what my morning of cooking breakfast could possibly have to do with that.

And then I realized it – EVERYTHING and NOTHING. 

WHY?  Because when I am really present in the moment of what I am doing, whether it’s cooking myself a tasty meal, walking my dog, playing with my sons, visiting with a friend, or reading a good book that is all I am focused on and thinking about.  My energy is focused on those things and not on some interaction I may have had earlier with my former husband or a conversation we will have later. 

When I am really present with whatever is right in front of me the other stuff is not there.

I realize this is not easy to do.  So here is a suggestion to help you:

When you find your mind going on and on about your former, bring it back to your breath or what you are doing in the moment – even if it is just sitting somewhere – and focus your attention there. 

This gets easier over time and with practice.

Give it a try and let me know what you think please.  I love to hear your feedback.

In support ~

Cat J. Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.

I often have clients argue about the amount of time their child will spend in each parent’s home. Instead of fighting over hours and days, I try to get them to focus on what type of relationship they want with their child. When they do this, they begin to talk about wanting to help their child with school work, to be involved in their extracurricular activities, to do what we all know parents do – BE A PARENT.

I know it is difficult to have your child spend time away from you. Whether you were the full-time stay-at-home parent or work outside of the home, this is the usually the hardest transition for everyone – parents and child.

You miss waking up in the morning with your child, putting your child to bed, being there when she comes home from school, and cuddling up with a good book. This is a loss you all share. If you are able to connect with your shared experience, you will find ways to support each other so you can both continue to play a meaningful and engaged role in your child’s life.

To help you do this, you can focus on the quality of time you have with your child, rather than getting stuck in counting days and hours.  Over the course of your child’s lifetime, memories are made by moments, interactions, and experiences, and not by hours or days.  It is more important to children to be truly present and involved in their lives in a meaningful way than to be there for an extra hour or two.

I hope you and your former are able to be gracious and spacious in these situations and do the best you can to support both of your involvement in your child’s life because there is nothing kids want more than engaged, loving, supportive parents. Having that will help ensure that they not only survive your divorce but thrive.

Here are some examples of how to be more engaged and present with your child, even when they are at the other parent’s house.

1. Participate in your child’s events and activities
2. Volunteer at your child’s school
3. Join the PTA
4. Talk to your child daily and ask about his/her day (not about how things are at the other parent’s house!)
5. Listen to your child rather than talking at your child

As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts, please share them below!

In service and support ~

Cat J. Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.

I have had many conversations with various people about what to call the other parent of your child(ren).  One friend of mine, Monica McGuire (of Family Culture Coach), has spoken of the term “wusband” and “past wife experience”!  

The term “ex” seems rather harsh (I realize that’s the name of my business, but you gotta admit, it gets your attention!) as if you are “x”ing him/her out of your life   Yes, you may want to, yet you can’t.  And really, xing your former spouse or partner out of your life is (in the vast majority of families) not best for your kids.

Calling your former spouse/partner “ex” sends a strong message to your children that connotes negativity, anger and resentment.  Try this out.  Say the term my ex-husband or ex-wife or ex-partner.  Look in the mirror when you do it.  What is your facial expression?  Is it Open?  Receptive? Neutral?  Or is it filled with bitterness, hurt, or anger?  

Now try saying “my former [husband, wife, partner]”.  What is your facial expression now?  Is it neutral?  Less burdened?   

Whatever the facial expression is, that is what is conveyed to your child(ren) and what your heart holds. One of my favorite Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. quotes is “I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.”  

Even small adjustments in your vocabulary can create positive changes in your experience and your children’s experience and can lead to a healthier co-parenting environment. 

I will use the term former (without attaching a noun to that term, e.g., wife, husband or partner) because I think it is more respectful and more fully captures the tone and energy I want to convey in my work.

As always, I’d love to hear your feedback and thoughts.  What do you call your former? 

With Curiosity ~

Cat Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.

For some reason I’ve been thinking a lot lately about learning to walk.  This theme keeps coming up in my life so I’ve decided to explore it and write about it.  Here’s the thing, when children are learning to walk we don’t laugh at them or tell them how they’ll fail.  In fact, we KNOW they will succeed.

We stand by and cheer them on.  At first we hold their little hands as they try to walk and, in the age of facebook, we probably post on our page how far our child walked or the fact that she took her first step or that he made it across the room.  We are at least as thrilled as they are.  

They are simply doing exactly what drives and motivates them – to walk!  They want to move and experience freedom and success.  It is amazing how completely unafraid they really are.  And they KNOW they will succeed.  The thought of failure NEVER enters their minds.  They fall down and we smile and say “great job”, “look how far you made it”, “you can do it”, “try again”.

So what does this have to do with parenting with your former spouse or partner you ask?

EVERYTHING. . .

Because you will learn to move on in your life.  You will succeed in whatever you put your mind to.  YOU CAN DO IT.  

This is an opportunity for you to trust yourself just as you did when you were learning to walk (or crawl, or read, or talk).  You will likely fall down and scrape your knee.  It may hurt at times.  You may need someone there to cheer you on and give you a big hug along the way.

But you will not only survive and walk, but pretty soon, you will be running and thriving as well.

If I can support you on this journey, be there to cheer you on, remind you that you CAN do it?  Please feel free to contact me, I’d be honored to be of service.

In service and support ~

Cat Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.

Photo by:  David Castillo Dominici / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Sometimes life can be hard and sad and when it is, I want the weather to cheer me up!!  I am feeling a bit melancholy and the weather is not doing her part to cheer me up.  It is a gloomy, windy, very rainy day here in Bellingham, WA and I am angry at the weather because I want her to shine her glorious sun and warm up my weary body, soothe my sad heart, and bring a smile to my face.  But instead, she is matching my energy.  Rather than creating inspiration and a sense of playfulness and aliveness, she has chosen to offer me dreariness and cold instead.  

So what I am to do with that?  I can scream at her and get all bent out of shape.  Blame her for my sorrows and for not lifting me up. But that would not get me very far because she is not likely to change.  In fact, even though I wish I had the power to change her, I know I do not.  She’s going to do whatever suits her fancy and she’s doing it not to be mean, spiteful or manipulative.  No, she’s doing this because this is what she needs to do to nourish Mother Earth and all that lives on this planet (including me).  She’s doing exactly what is perfectly right for her at this time, in this place – it just happens to not really work for me right now!

So it seems I have a choice.  I can look at this weather as an opportunity or I can mope and be a victim.  I will choose the former. 

Because the only thing I really have any control or power over is myself – my reactions, my feelings, my thoughts and my heart.  And while I still feel sad, I am looking at this weather as an opportunity to nurture myself and to slow down and take it easy.  

When I leave my office today, I will be with my two teenage boys and I will take my dog for a walk in this windy, rainy weather, and I will smile and laugh and perhaps when I climb into bed tonight, I will cuddle myself and cry because just as the weather can let out water to release what is bottled up inside, so can I.  And when I do, I know that tomorrow will be a different day with different weather and different feelings.

Signing off on this dreary, melancholy day.  . .  Thanks for reading.

 You ask your former partner or spouse to do something that you think is completely reasonable (e.g., answer your calls, respond to your emails or texts, check your availability before leaving the kids with you on his/her time).  S/he refuses.  You feel exasperated.

You know the drill, right?!

So here’s the deal . . . just because what you’re asking for may be completely reasonable (in fact, even 4 out of 5 dentists, doctors, lawyers, therapists, etc. agree it is reasonable) does NOT mean it is REALISTIC.  

Expecting your former partner or spouse to agree to something when it is not realistic, can be maddening.

When you expect someone to agree with a request and you get upset when they don’t, two things are occurring. 

One, you actually are holding your request as a demand (even if it is a simple and completely reasonable request and thus “should” be or easily could be agreed to).

And two, you have an unknown or unspoken expectation. 

The problem with both of these is that when you are told no, you get upset, disappointed, angry, outraged, confused, etc. In fact, you may even feel righteous indignation – how dare he/she say no! 

This type of thinking gets you nowhere and is a complete waste of your time and energy.

To help you discern if you have an unspoken expectation that is likely to get you in “trouble” (i.e., make you upset), I suggest that you ask yourself the following three questions before you make a request of your former spouse or partner.

1. Is what I’m asking reasonable?
2. Do I have an expectation that she or he will agree?
3. Is it realistic to hold that expectation?

If you answer NO to any of the questions, then you may want to change your expectation so that you do not waste your life energy getting upset.

Notice, I do not say don’t ask. Go ahead and ask for what you want.  Just don’t count on or expect to get the answer you want.

When you ask for what you want and speak your truth without any expectations, you are honoring yourself. Honoring oneself is a GREAT way to spend your life energy!                                       

    In Service and Support ~             

Cat Zavis is an Attorney, Mediator and Coach for Divorced and Divorcing Parents.  As a divorced mother of 2, she deeply understands the challenges, trauma and opportunities divorce provides. She has been practicing Nonviolent Communication, Mediation and Collaborative Law for 7 years. She has conducted workshops and trainings in Nonviolent Communication for hundreds of parents, lawyers, teachers, students, spiritual centers and professionals. In 2009, she was awarded a Peace Builder Award for her business. She has taught at universities in Western Washington on diverse topics such as Women and the Law, Constitutional Law, and Communication. Her combination of personal experience and professional expertise give Cat a unique perspective and ability to help clients learn to communicate effectively and powerfully to transform their relationships and interactions with their former partner or spouse so they and their children can thrive.