"Conscious Uncoupling"? It's still the painful death of a marriage

“The real cause of failure, ultimately, in marriage is always self, and the various manifestations of self.” D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

  A couple of months back, Gwyneth Paltrow and her husband, Chris Martin, announced that after ten years of marriage they were separating. But rather than a divorce, it was a “Conscious Uncoupling.” Personally, I’ve never seen a painless divorce, yet I want to be sensitive to the fact that Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin are, in fact, real people who are in distress and working hard to be loving parents. There are also recent signs that they may be resolving their marital difficulties. And whether you're a millionaire actress married to a rock star, or the neighbor down the block, none of us can begin to know what’s going on inside someone else’s marriage. So this isn’t about trash talking “gp,” as she refers to herself on her website. It’s about exploring what her now infamous “conscious uncoupling” message gets wrong about marriage.

  In her defense, Gwyneth Paltrow didn’t invent the term “conscious uncoupling.” Therapist, Katherine Woodward Thomas first came up with it. It’s not meant to be a synonym for “divorce.” Instead it’s supposed to be a process by which divorcing couples can attempt to be as peaceful and gentle with one another as possible in an impossibly tricky time. 

  Our culture is infamous for taking what is horrible and seeking to somehow sanitize and soften brutal realities. For example, it’s not the violent death of innocent victims; they’re collateral damage. It’s not an addiction, it’s a disease. It’s not murder, it’s abortion. And “conscious uncoupling” sounds so clinical, so clean cut, like somehow Gwyneth Paltrow is above all of the brutal bloodiness of splitting up. In other words, if you wear $20 Wal-mart tennis shoes, you get "divorced," but gp can slip on $500 sneakers and is "uncoupled."

  Personally, I’ve never been able to wrap my brain around “no fault divorce.” It communicates something like someone walking down a sidewalk, making a misstep, that results in a fall and a broken limb. Divorce is always intentional. It’s messy, painful and often brutal. It’s the death of a marriage that must be grieved, not only by the couple who once entered into marriage together, but also by all who love them: their children, friends, their extended families, communities and churches. Divorcees use words like shattered, broken, or devastated to describe what they feel in the wake of a separation. Divorce is often a savage act.

  Yet, a healthy marriage is messy, too. Not only is divorce very difficult, at times, so is a healthy marriage. Marriage takes lots and lots of hard work. Weddings are a cakewalk; a healthy marriage is one of the most difficult responsibilities you’ll ever volunteer for. Even childrearing is easier, in that it only lasts eighteen years. Marriage is for life. God never intended marriage to have an expiration date.

  Continually, I counsel young couples to invest more time (and money) into their marriage, rather than their wedding. Most of us love weddings. Brides dressed in white; Grooms in nice suits. A wedding is like a wonderful vacation. Eventually though, you must come home and go back to work, to the routine…mundane. You can choose to dread going to work, grit your teeth every day, or you can choose to enjoy the job God has given you, work hard as to Him and thank Him even for the irritants because you know that He’s using even those in your life for His glory and your good. Enjoyment and fulfillment in marriage always begins within our own attitude. It’s a personal choice each of us must make.

  Take for example another celebrity marriage. Perhaps you remember all of the attention Ben Affleck's Oscar speech received in 2013 when he took home the golden statue for Best Picture for his film Argo. The father of three, addressing his wife, Jennifer Garner, said, “I want to thank you for working on our marriage for ten Christmases. It's good, it is work, but it's the best kind of work, and there's no one I'd rather work with.” Yet, people were up in arms. How could a Hollywood icon acknowledge that he and his movie star wife have to work at their marriage? How dare he? Yet, to thinking people, to those realistic about marriage, it was a breath of authenticity that the Affleck-Garners were making a real go of it. We were glad for them – and for their children! May their tribe increase!

  Recently, I was talking to a couple who will have been married forty years this year. After I congratulated them, I asked how they were going to celebrate. They weren’t sure they would. They have an adult child currently going through a horrible divorce, and they didn’t want to increase their child’s pain with their celebration. I urged them to celebrate, not just for their adult child, but also for the many other young couples out there. I encouraged them to communicate by their celebration that marriage is a lifetime vow of commitment, and that if your marriage doesn’t quite fit or you’re not happy, you can’t just return it to exchange it for another one.  

  On our wedding days, we blithely promise to love our spouses "for better or worse, in sickness and in health…” It's easy to speak these words when your biggest concern is that you received three crock pots as wedding gifts. As the years wear on, real life and its challenges hit, all marriages weather what we politely call “dry spells” or “rough patches.” Jane and I have referred to it as “our tide being out or in.”

  If your marriage has chronic issues – DO SOMETHING! If you had a chronic cough for more than a few days, you’d see a doctor. I’m constantly amazed at the foolishness of those who have chronic marital issues in that they won’t go see someone or take proactive steps. Their naïve denial often results in a terminal relational cancer destroying their marriage.

  At the very least, without finger-pointing, pray together about the condition of your marriage. Discipline yourself to read Christian books together about marriage. Two that I’d suggest are: When Sinners Say "I Do" by Dave Harvey or Sacred Marriage by Gary L. Thomas. If your marriage doesn’t begin to improve, seek help. There are godly couples in our church who will gladly come alongside of you. For more serious situations, seek out a Christian counselor. Please don’t rationalize, “we can’t afford that” – you can’t afford not to. Not to mention for the relational cheapskates, the average divorce costs between $5,000 and $10,000. Marriage counseling is very inexpensive in comparison.

  No one can see into another couple's marriage. There’s no point and no grace in judging someone else’s marital commitment or choice to break it. The rich gifts though of doing the hard work that it takes for a healthy marriage are immeasurable. I don’t know about you, as for me, I plan to keep consciously coupling. Will you make that same commitment?