Advice During Your Separation

When people are separating, there are many different professionals and others willing to give advice about the individual’s rights, and what to expect. When given by friends, advice is often based on personal experience, in an attempt to validate or support, but might not be realistic. It is invariably given as an act of love or support, and just as invariably given from only one perspective. Professional advice might also be unrealistic but for other reasons, the main one being that it is usually given on the basis of only one person’s perspective.

 

Don’t Let Expectations Become Beliefs

During the separation process the risk to a separating person in setting expectations about outcomes is that an expectation can become a very powerful belief, leading to a sense of entitlement.
People’s expectations are a major source of escalating conflict because investment in a belief or entitlement is often greater than the attachment to other things. We all hold tenaciously to our beliefs, so the chance of agreeing about facts gets smaller and smaller as our personal investment in the problem grows in a dispute.
Unmet expectations lead to disappointment and anger. That is the opposite of the goal that most people have for their life after separation. In collaboration, the professionals on the team are aware of the red flag that is raised by fixed expectations, and will start out with the aim of helping a person to manage or rejig their expectations, in line with what is possible in their personal financial and emotional circumstance.