Lawlady's Divorce Blog

I Institute the Cultural War of Improved Social Skills

Powerful times right now, astrologically speaking.  If you disbelieve then I ask you, are these powerful times in your life or for the world?  Maybe what is important is that we all agree that things feel rough.  The planet is suffering from a bit too much modernization and could use a step back in gas emissions, and other causes of global warming.  Maybe we should all be focusing on finding solutions to sustainable living.  Do we really need to throw out so many computer parts and other debris of advanced civilization? 

On my personal wish list is a cultural war of peace on the middle east and at home.  As Americans we made coke, McDonald's hamburgers and movies household worlds just about everywhere in the world.  Couldn't we also export beneficial psychological and social principles as well?  What about, "When you feel angry, use 'I' statements!"  Or, "When you want to kill the other person, maybe what you are feeling is a projection and you do some things that aren't nice too." 

Ken Wilbur, the social philosopher, says we are always evolving and everyone is at a personal edge.  I'd like to see all those Oprah-and-Dr. Phil-watching-people ship oversees the knowledge they have been accumulating for decades.  "Hey Terrorists, I hear you are hurting.  I hear you don't like our way of living.  If I were in your shoes, I can imagine myself feeling angry too.... When I'm angry, I like to look underneath the anger to find the hurt.  Do you hurt?...."

Politicians too could learn a few things.   In collaborative law we learn how to start up a meeting putting an issue on the white-board.  "Today we want to find a win/win resolution to _________."   The group fills in what they want to work on next.  They assume there is a win/win outcome and roll up their sleeves willing to contribute their unique gifts and skills to make it happen.   It's assumed everyone has something valuable to contribute, and all concerns are legitimate concerns.  When the option of fighting is taken away, that's when the creative juices flow and people find the new, and formerly hidden, way out of the problem.   

My voice sounded hokey or canned to me as I typed this last paragraph.  As if I've said those words a few too many times. 

That's my dilemma tonight.  Big things are in the air. We are called to be our best right now.  Am I being my best? 

Would the world be better served if I got out of this lovely office house at 68th and Roosevelt and hit the road to report on things I see and cross pollinate ideas across many different segments of the population?  Do I get married and move to a smaller town and teach college?    Is leading the wonderful Kithe meeting this morning pushing other lawyers to collaborative excellence enough contribution, and the best donation of my gifts and skills to the collective good?

Do we hunker down here at Lawlady Inc for the long haul, and work on the next phase of expansion into low-income client services. That who has been calling us lately seeking advice.  People who can't pay much with serious conflicts.  I imagined a legal clinic way back in 1997 when I first thought of the brand.  Is now the time for that?

Are you thinking things like this tonight?  I tell you somethings in the air over here.  Are you breathing the same air?

Many blessings to our troops oversees.  Particularly Officer McCaffrey.   I miss you.   

Rotary's Four-Way Test for an Excellent Life

Here is some language to ponder, taken from the Rotary International website. 

1. Is it the TRUTH?

2. Is it FAIR to all concerned?

3. Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?

4. Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?"

In 1932, Rotarian Herbert J. Taylor who would later serve as the group's president, outlined the "four-way test" as a guide to ethical standards for professionals in their work lives.  I think this is an excellent policy for anyone to live by. 

Valentine Sentiments 2007

Happy Valentine's Day 2007.

I just talked a client off the ledge of telling his wife he wanted a divorce tonight after work.  "Do you want a fork in the eye at dinner?"  I asked.  "She is a hot-headed woman," he replied.  "Valentine's Day is a bad day to announce divorce," I advised. 

He's decided to wait a week.

Meanwhile, we hosted a client lunch today at Lawlady Inc and presented our eligible bachelor of the year award.  I'll reserve telling his name here, to protect his privacy, but when possible we ladies at Lawlady Inc like to help foster new love along. We actually toy with the idea of starting a second branch of Lawlady Inc.   The dating segment of our practice.  Our motto:  we get you in, we get you out.

Valentine's day is an anecdote for divorce.  Too much divorce can result in a jaded attitude toward love.  I know it is hard for a divorcing person to hold on to the idea that love cures and makes life worth living for.  It's easy to fall into the mental trap that love is an accident waiting to happen.  With break up and divorce, it is easy to think of love and marriage as a hollow promise. 

_________

I am curious about the origins of Valentine's Day.  I see shades of Valentine's day in the more ancient Celtic/pagan tradition of Imbolc, traditionally celebrated on February 1 honoring the return to light and Brigid, the Goddess of healing, poetry and smithcraft (working with metal).  What does healing, poetry and metal work have in common?  I can see the relationship of poetry and healing to Valentine's Day.  Secret admirers, friends letting you know they care, romantic love given poetic voice. Those are things of traditional Hallmark Valentine's day.  But ironwork?  A grill for your front gate?   

Wikipedia speculates ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentine's_Day) that the origin of the Valentine's day holiday is related to the law courts for the rituals of courtly love.   According to that on-line dictionary,

a 'High Court of Love' was established in Paris on Valentine's Day in 1400. The court dealt with love contracts, betrayals, and violence against women. Judges were selected by women on the basis of a poetry reading.

The earliest surviving valentine dates from 1415. It is a poem written by Charles, Duke of Orleans to his wife. At the time, the duke was being held in the Tower of London following his capture at the Battle of Agincourt.

It is probable that the various legends about St. Valentine were invented during this period. Among these legends:

• On the evening before Valentine was to be martyred for being a Christian, he passed a love note to his jailer's daughter that read, "From your Valentine."
• During a ban on marriages of Roman soldiers by the Emperor Claudius II, St. Valentine secretly helped arrange marriages.

Somewhere lodged in my brain (which makes me believe I heard it somewhere, sometime) is the idea that in older agricultural times (possibly in Celtic areas) February was the time of year when weddings occurred.  The season was dark. Not much was going on. The planting season had yet to begin.  It was a time sweetened with the promise of new love.  Families, less stressed with work, could prepare and celebrate a wedding.  February 14th would have been a typical day for marriage.  A good day to celebrate love.

I still believe it is... 700 divorces later.  The promise divorce gives you is that you will love again.  Through divorce you create more room to love someone else-  better, deeper and richer.  Therapist Jeff Shushan says that a law of human relationships is that your next relationship will always surpass your former ones in terms of maturity, integrity and quality. You get a new relationship equal or better to the one you last left.  You know more now and hence you can go deeper into commitment and relationship than you did before.  Your capacity for intimacy has been honed by the previous relationship. 

So, for those of you who are divorced, divorcing or caught in a relationship that feels stifling this Valentine's day, you can still celebrate love. You can celebrate it's amazing power to flow regardless of external circumstances and it's ability to expand your heart's capacity for good, if you will simply acknowledge this river of emotion that flows through your heart without effort. 

On Valentine's day if you don't have a particular romantic  partner, you can still practice the art of caring by connecting to an inner urge for compassion and then acting in that impulse.  Allow yourself to have a crush on someone.   Foster a secret dream.  Notice what attracts you and take a step forward to it.  We can all smile and radiate an essential quality from our core that respects others and shines a hopeful attitude into the world.  Beaming good vibes (to quote 1960s language) is the equivalent to sending an anonymous valentine to the world.  What you give, comes back to you. 

Happy heart day to you. 

If you don't like this day; don't like cake, chocolates and mushy blog entries, you too can celebrate the tradition:  Be thankful you aren't getting divorced and your spouse has hired the best attorney in town.  We know that can mean.

   

Picking a Divorce Attorney (or mortgage lender)

This is a long blog entry.  Prepare yourself. 

I love talking shop with my buddy the mortgage broker (Chris Coggeshall-- Homestone Mortgage. Give him a call, 206-713-9580, the finest divorce mortgage specialist in the Puget Sound.  He's never not closed a loan on time, except my loan.  I can be a pissy, annoying customer.  I hate customers like me.  But he processed my "emotions" about  feeling vulnerable and exposed during the mortgage process, and turned me into a stark, raving fan.  If you need a mortgage, don't call anyone else or you are crazy, or know one hell of a good lender.  But I digress). 

So as I was saying.  I love talking shop with Chris.  Tonight after work we were talking about ... oh dear, I forgot what I was saying...  Oh yes,...  before the mini-commercial for Chris Coggeshall and Homestone, I was talking about divorce law artistry. 

As Chris said, "clients don't buy a legal result. They buy an attorney's service. They get a whole package and sometimes the work isn't perfect but it's a ballet in motion with many variables.  They buy the entire package of legal knowledge, gut instinct, passion for paperwork, sensitivity in a client session, good practical advice, business acumen, ethics and price.  The recipe varies with each professional.  It's wrong for a client to pick one aspect of your legal work and use that to evaluate your entire performance.  It's the entire event that you must be judged upon, not one aspect."  To put our conversation into perspective, we were talking about clients who are unhappy.  Typically they are forgetting the 9 other things you did that made them happy to focus on just one thing that didn't go so well. 

I like his  idea. I so often find fault with my own performance (I'm a ruthless critic of myself), forgetting all the things I did extraordinarily right. Take today for example. 

I was sitting in the final four-way where we settled the whole case.  I had a hunch we would settle so I had my paralegal start drafting the final papers so that we would be able to sign them before the meeting was over. I had her do a separation agreement with exhibits in the back, a very efficient way to type up the settlement.   Most of the language is boiler plate with a few places to fill in the blank. 

Here I was giving the client efficiency and a reduced legal bill by streamlining the process.  Then the other lawyer says, "A whole separation agreement?  Why not just  some exhibits attached to the back of a Decree?"  This is the way the elite family lawyers are handling non-maintenance settlements these days.  I like doing it the other way for a variety of reasons, but my way isn't wrong, it's just not the "cool" way to draft up the settlement at the moment in our industry. 

Then I felt flustered or annoyed inside.  I wasn't doing the paperwork like the elite family lawyers.  For a brief moment I was self-critical and embarrassed.   But why?!

Why would I wipe out all my good feelings about my performance during the morning (which was good)...and forget all the right moves I had made, to focus instead on this one less-than-superb choice? 

____ 

This blog is not about my self esteem or the quality of my work product.   The important point here is that with lawyers, you are getting a collection of qualities. What is important as a person looking to hire a lawyer  is that you know what you are getting.  What qualities?  What bundle of perks, benefits and price?

If you select me, or Lawlady Inc., you will get a bundle of skills, talents and proclivities that look something like this.

• Old fashioned customer service.   
• Stylish flair-- we like to wear black in winter, white in summer.   
• 100% focused psychic and emotional support if you need it.   
• 75% wisdom, unless I'm having a bad day, in which case, you get to share yours with me.
• An extremely fast pace, unless it's a day for meandering wisdom.
• An irreverent attitude about what the courts will do.   
• Fast paperwork if we choose to help you with a more litigated-oriented case.   
• Good humor.   
• Heavy reliance on email.
• Heavy customer-participation in your case to keep costs down, unless it's a flat fee.
• A very mindful eye on not overworking the case, in fact we may underwork it just a hair.
• A fabulous flat fee option with a nice treat for you at the end of your  case.
• Divorce ritual advice if you ask for it.
• Collaborative law services that have been honed over 7 years of training, arguably longe than most collaborative attorneys. 
• A heavier reliance on mediated and collaborative resolutions.
• A tendency to talk clients off the litigation ledge.
• Heavy involvement of allied professionals, but not litigation-oriented professionals.
• An extremely large database of excellent referrals and contacts that I share with you.
• Opinions that draw  from psychology, spirituality, marketing, organizational         development,  ritual and office efficiency principles.
• A profound optimism that hard times in life lead to good times in life.
• Family law practiced from an outsider's viewpoint looking in, although my years at the start of       my career at two large law firms give me a heightened since of how to provide good legal work.      
• A cavalier attitude to court rules. I'm one to try new strategies and take a novel approach.
• Beautiful court paperwork at times when we choose to rise to the occaision. 

Another lawyer's legal dance might look differently and it may be no better than mine. The question is all about fit.  What are you looking for?

If you want to know what a particular judge will do in a particular case, there are more educated minds than mine to answer that question.  I like the psychological drama and the subtlety of finding the win/win position more.  My legal practice is a more sophisticated practice of peace-making.  I'm not into the blunt practice of law.  There are  plenty of old-style litigation attorneys out there doing that.  We  serve legal divorce services with a philosophical flair and an attention to the underlying process at play.  I'm/we are modern, yet rooted in a very traditional legal upbringing.  My dad was a hard-core litigator and I grew up being forced to play Hearts against him for fun.  He NEVER let me win.  I ALWAYS hated to lose.

What you really want to know is how we dance as lawyers?  What do we do better and differently than any other lawyer?  Every lawyer has a special way.  Just like you as a client are unique and special. 

Just like Chris and mortgages.  You won't see him passing out the most business cards at a networking event.  He'd rather study the nuances of the deep clauses in the bottom of your mortgage contact so the deal always closes. My kind of  mortgage guy.   

It's all a dance.  Who do you want for your dance partner?  Pick the right one and the outcome is artistry.  Legal work done right is pure mind, body, spirit in motion.  Movement for your best interest. 

Absent-Mindedness

I walked to the store at noon with the office dog.  I tied her up outside.   After shopping,  I walked home without her.  QFC called me at 6:00 to say she was now in the manager's office. 

I've been busy. 

Obviously. 

Stories for Work

I was investigating the idea of stories. Here is what Penelope Trunk, The Brazen Careerist, says about the usefulness of weaving story into your professional life. 

Early in my career, I interviewed for a job as a user interface designer. The hiring manager asked me how I got involved in UI design.

I could have said, “I thought it looked interesting so I gave it a try and I was good at it.” But anyone can answer the very standard how-did-you-find-your-career question with that answer.

So instead, I told this story: An old boyfriend was a programmer, and he worked from home, while I was in school. He plastered designs all over our bedroom wall and our living room floor so that he could think them through. Finally, I told him if he was going to mess up the apartment then he had to be the one to clean it, and I handed him the toilet scrubber. We argued about who had extra time for cleaning and who didn’t and finally he said, “Fine. I’ll clean, but you do the UI design.” And to his surprise, I did.

I got the job. And every time I have been able to tell stories in interviews, I have gotten the job.

She goes on to say, quoting someone else, that there are essentially three plots to a story:

1. The creativity plot that involves a eureka moment.
2. The challenge plot that involves overcoming hurdles.
3. The  team or connection plot of coming together.

I'd add a few more-- and maybe these are not the ones you want to tell about yourself at the workplace.

        4.  The erotic love story.
       5.  The tragedy.
       6.  The murder mystery.
       7.  The comedy. 

The Brain Cancer Story

    I ran across most accidently a website where a woman posted the eulogy the father gave for her nephew. Eulogy   You may need to scroll down to January 24th. (I still haven't mastered TrackBack).  The father describes how he met the mother when they were in journalism school.  When he asked what she wanted after graduation, she said, "To be a mommy."

    People have romantic ideas about how people enter marriage.  Sometimes it's more like a joint venture between people headed in the same direction, and the couple crafts a deal or partnership that meets both needs. In this couple's case, from what I gleaned from this endearing eulogy, the  discussions about the decision to marry centered around having this child. A child who lived until age 16 when he died of aggressive brain cancer.

    Sometimes in traveling around the blogesphere, you can stumble into amazingly raw and lovely stories.   This simple blog contains a tear-jerker.   

    Stories have been greatly denied to us as a culture.  We get fatuous ones from Hollywood often.  I don't know if the average person knows how to tell a story.  I like to think of myself as well read and I don't really know how to tell a good story. 

    If I had a gift to give the world, it would be for us all to tell each other really good stories this year.  The world needs it.  Some say the story is the best way to lead and educate.  Others have said a story can cure.  I think stories can connect us and close the distance we perceive ourselves having from one another. 

Hatred

    I've got several clients dealing with extreme hatred over their spouse or the other party in their dispute.  Raging, hateful anger.  With each action, each side begins to hate the other side worse.  There isn't movement occurring to reconciliation.  In each case, I actually see that one side is acting with more dignity and taking reasonable positions.  The other side is acting like a jerk actually.  That's from an objective side-line view. 

    What I gather is that there are people functioning in survival mode who fail to look inward and see the reasonableness of the other side's position.  They fail to look at themselves and see where they have contributed or how they could modify their position to leave the other side with something.  Going after "everything" for me  rarely leaves room to explore the position where both people benefit. 

    Resolving conflicts where there is one winner and one loser is attracting bad karma in my book.  Sometimes things don't even out in the present moment but that accumulation of poor behavior adds up.  It eventually begins to compromise the quality of life that the other person experiences.

    Unfortunately, we don't always live in a world that operates on principles of fairness.   Our President has supported statutes that eliminate a person's right to defend himself in situations where he has been accused of terrorism.  He agrees to torture.  Chief executives rob employee pensions and don't get very stiff sentences.  A clueless substitute teacher faces 6 years of prison because she didn't know how to block the porno sites popping up on the computer screen the day she was substituting. 

    Sometimes the world doesn't run on rules of fairness.  Criminals in Texas get a $3,000 defense if they can't afford a lawyer and high numbers of accused persons on death row are proven to be innocent via modern DNA testing not available before. 

    I assume there is some greater evening-out of the score.  But does that really happen?  Do the bad actors really suffer their choices somewhere along in life?  I believe these principles very deeply.  But have you seen it?

     Do the bad guys and bullys really win?  I like to think that they suffer within the tortured prison of their own soul and personality.  Portable prisons, so to speak.   

What do you Say?

Fear.  Hatred.  Dread. How do these words make you feel ?  Now try: softness, eagerness, smiles, chocolate.

The neurolinguistic programmers say that the words we tell ourselves shape the direction of our lives.  What are the words you say daily?  Weekly?  Rarely? 

Do you use words like "exemplary" or "failure?"  Would you pick "hope" over "rejection?"  Would you say the word "challenge" or would you use "impossible?"

What words do you use to describe your divorce?  I suggest you think "launch" rather than "trouble,"  and  "eye-opening"  verses "difficult." 

Culturally, we have a lot of pressure to think negatively.  I'm not sure where this all came from.  Experts disagree.  Sour pilgrims.  Cold weather.  Bad parenting.  But if the nonlinguistic programmers  are right, and our thoughts control our moods which control our behaviors, doesn't that give you incentive to pick words with the greatest likelihood of leading you into a rosy future of wellbeing?   

I'm not working late tonight...

I'm embracing  my fortunate employment. 

This I Believe

Well, here is yet another plug for TEC, now known as Vistage, the CEO/Entrepreneur support group. It acts to support business leaders lead with confidence, courage, and integrity while avoiding costly mistakes and decreasing decision making time.  You meet monthly with your group and get the type of assistance that a private Board of Directors could offer you  if you were powerful enough to have a private Board of Directors. Here's the link if this kind of group sounds interesting: Vistage.com.

Last night I was writing about what you would say, if you knew the whole world was listening to you for ten minutes.  I thought, "wouldn't it be great if we could assemble all the stories together to find out what humans know to be true."

Well, synchronously, today at my Vistage meeting, the leader suggested I check out "This I Believe," an NRP show.  Well, I just logged on. Here is what the program is about per the NPR website:

This I Believe^® is an exciting national project that invites you to write about the core beliefs that guide your daily life. NPR will air these personal statements from listeners each Monday.... By inviting Americans from all walks of life to participate, series producers Dan Gediman and Jay Allison hope to create a picture of the American spirit in all its rich complexity.

This I Believe is based on a 1950s radio program of the same name, hosted by acclaimed journalist Edward R. Murrow. In creating This I Believe, Murrow said the program sought "to point to the common meeting grounds of beliefs, which is the essence of brotherhood and the floor of our civilization."

In spite of the fear of atomic warfare, increasing consumerism and loss of spiritual values, the essayists on Murrow's series expressed tremendous hope. ...

..."As in the 1950s, this is a time when belief is dividing the nation and the world," says Allison about life today. "We are not listening well, not understanding each other -- we are simply disagreeing, or worse. Working in broadcast communication, there's a responsibility to change that, to cross borders, to encourage some empathy. That possibility is what inspires me about this series."

For the full text:  link here: npr.org/thisibelieve/about.

I'm going to enter a submission before my next meeting.  I think you should too.