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Mediation Tips: Your Attitude Will Make a Tremendous Difference

Come Prepared

Be Honest About Your Assets

Come Prepared

Come prepared to identify problem areas, consider options, and offer compromises. Mediators help clients reach a reasonable and fair consensus for a win/win environment. 

Think Forward

Be Honest About Your Assets

Come Prepared

 Try to focus on the future and not the past. If you stay mired in old wounds, you’re likely to remain angry and hurt, emotions that impede clear thinking. Learn to let go and focus on how to make a better future instead of re-living past injustices. 

Be Honest About Your Assets

Be Honest About Your Assets

Be Honest About Your Assets

If the mediator finds that either party is not being honest about their assets or income, he is likely to terminate mediation. 

Be Clear and Generous

Common "Interests" vs. "Personal Positions"

Be Honest About Your Assets

 During the marriage, most spouses feel like they have been required to give more than their partner. Relationships are not arithmetic; it often takes more than a 50 percent effort from both sides. When relationships are in turmoil, we must put forth even more effort and generosity. When both parties are willing to do more than they feel is required, cases settle and spouses are better able to move forward in healthy directions. 

You Still Have a Relationship

Common "Interests" vs. "Personal Positions"

Common "Interests" vs. "Personal Positions"

 You may have lost a spouse, but can you keep a friend or co-parent.  In our relationships, we must often wear many hats. Some may wear out, while others still fit. 

Common "Interests" vs. "Personal Positions"

Common "Interests" vs. "Personal Positions"

Common "Interests" vs. "Personal Positions"

 A common interest is providing a safe and healthy living environment for your children. A personal position is “I need the children at least half the time.” 

No Personal Attacks

You Don't Have to Convince the Mediator

You Don't Have to Convince the Mediator

 State your goals without making personal attacks. Personal attacks cause mediation to regress into a cycle of attacking and defending. A helpful tool in this regard is to make what are called "I" statements. "I am struggling with trust issues right now" sells better than "You’re a liar." 

You Don't Have to Convince the Mediator

You Don't Have to Convince the Mediator

You Don't Have to Convince the Mediator

The mediator is not a judge. The mediator is here to help the two of you reach a decision. It really doesn't matter if the mediator thinks one or the other of you is better, faster, wiser, funnier, fairer, or better looking. If you want to be the mediator’s buddy, or more importantly get your case settled, then facilitate problem solving,  be flexible, and be fair. Don't worry about what the mediator thinks. 

Consider Therapy if Needed

You Don't Have to Convince the Mediator

Share Feedback with Your Mediator

 If you are harboring a great deal of anger and bitterness, be willing to get counseling. The pain of divorce can also be a catalyst to making healthy changes. Therapy helps with that process. Although some venting in mediation can be tolerated, it is generally not the best place for it. Most mediators are not therapists, but because they see many families in distress they may recognize family members whom are depressed, overly anxious, or otherwise stuck in a place where they are not processing the divorce well. If the mediator recommends counseling, please take the recommendation seriously and remember that half of the families in divorce are in counseling (and the other half should be). 

Share Feedback with Your Mediator

Avoid Comparing Notes with Friends

Share Feedback with Your Mediator

  ome families feel like mediation goes too quickly and not enough attention is paid to details; other families feel like the process is dragging on more than necessary. Your mediator and your lawyer work for you. Just as you must be honest and open with your spouse, so too must you foster open and healthy communication with your lawyer or your mediator. 

Avoid Comparing Notes with Friends

Avoid Comparing Notes with Friends

Avoid Comparing Notes with Friends

 Avoid comparing notes with other divorced friends. Non-professional advice on legal matters is typically worth what you pay for it. 

Enemy of "The Best" is "The Good"

Avoid Comparing Notes with Friends

Avoid Comparing Notes with Friends

 Sometimes the enemy of the best is the good. While you may have a very good reason for your position, there might be a better reason to change it. 

Simplistic Assumptions

Be careful making simplistic assumptions too often made by divorcing parents:

  •  Any reasonable person would agree with me.
  • I am the victim. 
  • The other parent cannot be trusted to be fair. 
  • My child must have one  primary household. 
  • The court will validate my point of view.
  • A good mediator will promote my interests and goals. 
  • I just want what is in my child's best interest. 
  • My anger is justified. I'll spend what it ever it takes to fight for my children. 
  • Our children deserve to know the details of this divorce. 

Helpful Links

American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers

Kansas Child Support Guidelines (2020)

Johnson County Family Law Bench-Bar Financial Considerations Guidelines (2018)

​Johnson County Family Law Bench-Bar Parenting Guidelines (2015)
UpToParents.org

Mediate.com

Kansas Judicial Counsel Divorce Forms

American Bar Association Information for Divorcing Families

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