Is the story you created true?

I have a story. A while ago, I represented a woman divorcing her husband of 14 years. Let’s call her Jill. They had 2 children, one in elementary school and the other in middle school. During the marriage she was the family’s homemaker and her husband worked as a patent litigator making substantial money to fund their bay area lifestyle.

Jill decided to end the marriage but wanted things to be amicable with her husband even though they would be getting a divorce. Fortunately, Jill and her husband were still on speaking terms. She informed me her soon to be ex wanted to make a deal with her on an issue. She told me the deal was fair and made sense to her. Of course I was happy for Jill, and so I asked her the details of the deal.

She informed me that he would divide the community portion of his 401k retirement account equally, deduct her one-half share for taxes, and transfer the remainder to her in a rollover IRA. “Simple and straight forward, does not need lawyers,” Jill said to me. I let Jill know that the offer he made was NOT fair, and that she gets her one-half share as a gross amount, as a 401k transfer between spouses during a divorce is a non-taxable event, only taxable when you eventually draw the money. This is very standard knowledge in divorce practice. Him deducting her share for taxes was actually a really bad deal.

She questioned me, saying I must be mistaken, because her soon to be ex is a very intelligent man, and that he knows finances, researches, and remember, he’s really smart. He’s a patent litigator making a lot of money. While that might be true about him, he was wrong about his method to divide the 401k. I reiterated myself and provided her with the legal authority to support my understanding of the law.

My client continued to let me know I had to be wrong even though I showed her the law to support it! I did not waver and had to repeat myself several times to have her look up the rules on her own.

She finally did the work and looked up the rules herself. She learned that my understanding was accurate and her “brilliant” husband was wrong. This confused her: how could I be correct and her soon to be ex be wrong on this?

The answer is simple but complicated: Jill created a story and closed the door. She did not keep space for the story to develop. She had it fixed in her mind that her soon to be ex was firmly knowledgeable in all things money. This fact she created was so concrete that when we found a crack in her story, it caused Jill layers and layers of confusion, grief, and questions. An insurmountable amount of stories now were up for question and she had to face this reality.

Is the story you create about an event, a person, a situation, a belief, true? Does the story develop? I think the beauty in divorce is watching people grow. They grow because they gain information. The people that grow even more question their realities and ingrained biases. The more questions and discussions you engage in the more you learn. While it can get super annoying and difficult, asking questions and being willing to question concepts keeps a healthy checks and balances in place for any aspect in your life.

Jill and I finished her divorce and her new found intellectual independence brought her great freedom and power. This new awareness caused a developing positive shift in her. She continued to grow and gain independence. Jill gets all the credit because she did the heavy work to achieve it. And, her rollover IRA continues to perform, gaining in value, waiting for when it’s time for her to draw on it in her retirement years.

This blog about creating stories is important because during a divorce, individuals carry all kinds of assumptions of who is what, it just is, and what outcomes just are. Divorces are so complicated in emotion and change by the day, just like life. Clients that are willing to keep doors open, ask questions, flow with situations or have the ability to maintain flexibility, working in the derivative at times, fare more peacefully. Being fixed can get really tough in divorce, and tough in life.

Question the stories in your world. Give space for being wrong. Most of the time, we do not have all the information. Over time we learn, and the story continues to develop. Have space to learn and develop on your story, that you thought was true, but it turns out, was not. Cross check what you know and/or are learning. Relish in this freedom to develop on the stories and have space to learn more, giving space for the story’s details to unfold.