because we work with people who are

going through a really

important time in their life and a very

stressful time in their life at a very

personal time in their life i like to

think of it as a partnership they know

what’s best for their family they know

what’s best for their children and they

have a lifetime or often decades of

experience with the person that we’re

negotiating with so it’s very different

from a commercial transaction even

though it may be the case that we’re

talking about

tens of millions or hundreds of millions

or billions of dollars to be divided up

we’re still talking about a very

personal relationship and so i view it

very much as a partnership as as me

telling my client what the law is how

the law works what the benefits are in a

particular course of action what the

drawbacks are in that course of action

the different paths that we might take

forward a mediation path an arbitration

path a litigation path you know a

do-nothing path kind of depending on

what the case calls for and then i want

to start a conversation with my client

about

what they think might work best for

their family and then we do it together

and we make the next decision and then

that opens up another set of decisions

that need to be made and we’ll go

through the same process again okay

here’s how we can approach this we can

do it this way or this way or this way

what do you think is going to work best

for you what do you think is going to

work best for your children and what do

you think is going to maximize

the life that you anticipate living once

this marriage is over

[Music]

i find myself asking my clients a lot to

just take a breath and think about it

just think about it we’re talking about

people

who have been married for a long time

and they know how to push each other’s

buttons in a very very unique sort of

way so you could get a letter from your

opposing counsel and it could be full of

things that to me

seem not particularly inflammatory but

to my client are we have really crossed

the line and that’s because their spouse

is actively looking to rile them up or

to really get into a place where they

know it’s going to have the most impact

so let’s just take a breath

let’s sleep on it let’s wake up in the

morning and decide what we think the

best way is to deal with this because

often an angry response is just going to

ratchet things up or increase the

acrimony when my client’s long-term goal

is actually to decrease that acrimony so

i find myself saying a lot like just

think about it take a breath it’s all

going to be here tomorrow and we’ll

figure out the best way forward together