Conflict Management Skills help ease people through divorce

In today's world, one of the most fundamental skills that every child should be taught is the skill of managing conflict. While I believe that more programs are arising to educate our youth on conflict resolution, our society still has a very long way to go. So, why conflict resolution skills?

First, the better couples manage conflict, the more likely they are to avoid marriage breakdown. Secondly, there will still be inevitable divorce, but with strong conflict management skills, divorcing couples can tap into that skill set and utilize it to move through all the steps needed to get a divorce. Third, it's not divorce that damages kids, it's how the parents handle conflict that can impact the children negatively or positively. Mediation is a great alternative for many people, and most come in with basic skills around being cooperative. However, what is sorely lacking in most cases is an understanding of the rules of how to play "fair" in mediation, how to manage one's internal self-conflict, and how to keep the big picture in mind that maintaining healthy relationships should be the first goal.


Becky Shook-Wotzka
To the development of earlier conflict management skills in kids

What I've Learned about Relationships from my work w/ Divorces, Part 2

As discussed prior, 3 extremely important lessons I've learned about relationships from my work with divorce are:

1) Aligned values are critical
2) Relationships are work
3) Take action, don't just complain

But, there's more. These are lessons learned, Part 2.

4) Acceptance is the key to long-standing relationships: Acceptance means that you can look at your spouse, understand his/her challenges, leverage his/her strengths, and learn to walk in his/her shoes. Acceptance is not about "tolerating" bad behaviors. It's about accepting where your spouse is, and challenging areas of growth where appropriate. Without acceptance, relationships cannot last.
5) Make time for the relationship: Who isn't so busy nowadays that they can't find time to even breathe at times? Okay, not literally, but really it's a world of so much busyness. Relationships today are about quality time, not quantity. So, when you actually have a little time to spend with your spouse, make it count!
6) A relationship without self-care is like a car without an engine: So, now you are telling me I have to find quality time with my spouse, and yet still take care of myself? Yep. Self-care can be such simple things like a massage once a month, a walk in the neighborhood, 10-minutes of downtime doing what you want to do when you get home.

This does not conclude all of my lessons learned, but hopefully adds a little more dimension to how we must consciously design our relationships. For example, make sure you and your partner capture your aligned values and what they mean to your family system. Have you built time in to your schedule for self-care and time with your spouse? If it's not scheduled, it doesn't happen. And what about conflict? Have you and your partners set rules around what happens when conflict erupts?

Conscious design: that's the biggest key of all to making relationships work!!!

Becky Shook-Wotzka
Making Relationships Work (even as an "Ex" or as a Co-parent)

Coaching Through Transitions

Being a life coach is such a gift and it has allowed me to make so many positive changes in my life. Chief among them, is the ability to manage and organize myself around transitions that occur in my life. Strategies around change and how to manage them effectively is the gift that my education has granted me. I am now pleased to be able to offer my services to anyone who needs a coach to help with the brainstorming around solutions, the organization around roles and responsibilities, and the re-framing of challenges into manageable goals. We all need to remember that we in fact act on life also when life decides to act on us. We have a symbiotic partnership with everything around us. The one area that we can control is the effect that change has in our lives by how we respond to it. I choose to respond with an open mind and hands ready for action!

Blessings!

Nicolina Cahouette
Life and Relationship Coach
ncahouette@gmail.com

What I've Learned about Relationships from my Work w/ Divorces: Part 1

I typically believe that the best way to learn anything is to look at successful models. However, a lot can be discovered in the depths of despair, as well as in those handlings of amicable couples who really want to work together.

Let's start w/ a moment of reflection on Carl Jung's profound statement: "Nothing effects the life of a child so much as the unlived life of its parents."

Wow! If that doesn't inform people of the damage done to kids who watch their parents idly stand by and "try" to make a relationship work, I don't know what does.

So, what have I learned about relationships?

1. Values Alignment: Partners must start out with the same values. If you think it's exciting to have philosopical differences about how to live life,then be that person's friend. Don't let the initial excitement of something new drive you in to a relationship.
2. Relationships are work: there's no way around it. But the work should be fun and something to look forward to. Hearing about my partner's new ideas and dreams, listening intently to what he needs from me to strengthen our relationship, discussing past baggage that gets in the way of NOW! There's no bigger destroyer of relationships than accumulated baggage with no landfill big enough to fit it all.
3. Action after a Complaint: If you spend more time complaining about your spouse to others then you are not keeping your relationship in an intimate and respectful light w/ your spouse. A little complaining w/ others who can hold you accountable to action is more than okay. But, complaining w/out action only reinforces the problem at hand.

More to come...Part 2 of Lessons Gleaned through Divorce Work about what makes Relationships Tick!

Becky Shook-Wotzka
To new beginnings through old ways of being.