Does the phrase “conscious uncoupling” ring the memory bell?

Did you see Gwyneth Paltrow’s Oscar-winning performance in the film Shakespeare in Love? How about the work she did in the box-office smash Iron Man?

And what about Conscious Uncoupling? We suspect that the central role Paltrow played in that media extravaganza will jog some readers’ memories.

Let’s go back to 2014 for a quick refresher. That was the year that Paltrow and musician Chris Martin (think Coldplay) announced their divorce. Paltrow did so by uttering a phrase that immediately went global. She stated that she and Martin were resolved to engage in the “conscious uncoupling” of their marriage.

Many people immediately understood Paltrow’s intent and meaning, namely, that she and Martin envisioned their family as an enduring element notwithstanding the end of marriage. Their conscious uncoupling of a no-longer-workable union would be – to the fullest extent possible – amicable, purposely intended to keep family bonds intact in the future, and ever-respectful of their children’s needs.

Some people didn’t get that, with critics relishing the opportunity to criticize Paltrow on the grounds of Hollywood privilege.

The years have passed, of course, as have recurrent front-page references to Paltrow’s chosen term. In hindsight, it might reasonably seem inexplicable to many of our readers that her words about divorce ever yielded the “backlash” recently noted in a CNN article revisiting the matter with the actress.

Paltrow told the publication that conscious uncoupling was really never anything other than an attempt to circumvent marital wounds and lasting enmity “and just go directly to the point where we’re friends.”

Legions of reflective spouses – especially loving parents centrally focused on their children – seek to do that all the time. Some manage to retain a solid front of divorce-linked civility, while others have deep-seated issues that must be resolved via a formal litigation process under the close oversight of a judge.

All divorces are different, which is a point we centrally note at the established New Jersey Law Office of Rajeh A. Saadeh. Paltrow has actually helped to endorse that important point with her own divorce story.

We welcome contacts to our firm and the opportunity to help individuals and families secure optimal results to the family law challenges they face.