Is your ex evil? The key to a successful divorce, one in which the family isn’t destroyed financially and the children emotionally damaged is the ability of both spouses to see each other as flawed human beings, not as evil beings.
There is a human phenomenon psychologist’s call selective attention. It’s this selective attention that may have you wondering if your ex is evil.
Human beings have a natural tendency to pay attention only to data that support their pre-existing points of view or desires. Information that contradicts their beliefs or wishes is filtered out of their awareness. Obviously, this practice can lead to severely distorted notions of people and events and to making very poor choices and decisions.
I see this selective attention “phenomenon” in many of my divorce coaching clients I work with. Once it is decided there will be a divorce one or the other spouse will begin to rewrite the history of the marriage and especially the biography of the person they married and are about to divorce.
Is your ex evil or, are you just rewriting history?
The husband becomes evil and this sort of thinking is most prevalent in the one seeking a divorce. Why? Due to guilt, shame and a way to justify the desire for a divorce. You feel better about yourself if your husband is evil and you had no choice but to leave.
What is wrong with this kind of thinking? It takes away any chance of a civil divorce. It damages any children of the marriage and God forbid an adversarial divorce attorney become involved with the selective attention thinker. You can kiss a large chunk of your marital assets goodbye if this happens.
I remember my ex as being a kind and loving man. He was a great father and as long as he had us, up until the day he left we never wanted for anything. If we did, he made sure we had it. Being able to remember him in this way enables me to see him as human…someone who makes mistakes but isn’t evil.
It helps me to continue to attempt to have a civil relationship with him. Something we should all strive to have with an ex-spouse especially if we share children.
He, on the other hand, remembers me as being the cause of all his misery. An abusive shrew that kept him from living the life he wanted to live. According to him I was abusive during the marriage, controlled his every move, drove him into debt; just an all-around bitch that made his life miserable from the moment I uttered the words, “I do.”
His revision of who I was in the marriage and who I am as a person keeps him from being able to see me as human. I have to be seen as the evil one in order for him to continue to feel good about himself and the destructive decisions he has made since leaving the marriage.
Decisions like defying divorce court orders, cutting off contact with his children and turning a blind eye to the damage his behaviors have caused.
Because of this, he will never be able to have a civil relationship with me. His guilt and shame have grown exponentially since our divorce, so much so that there is no way my ex could ever see me as anything but the evil ex-wife who still, 14 years after divorce continues to cause him misery.
Just as our marriage failed, so has our divorce. The key to a successful divorce, one in which the family isn’t destroyed financially and the children emotionally damaged is the ability of both spouses to see each other as flawed human beings, not as evil beings.
Is the way you process data about your ex keeping you from having a “successful divorce?”
My ex husband is completely rewriting history, it’s destroyed our finances, parental alienation and now another woman living inside our family home. The kids caught in the middle it’s a disaster.
Yeah, sounds like he might very well be evil. Some people go completely crazy when faced with any kind of adversity in life. So sorry!
Wow! I finally understand after 15 years why I’m supposedly this horrible person according to my ex. It’s actually all about him. He did & continues to destroy & dismantle everything that we built during our marriage (construction business, investment properties, financially, etc). Myself & many other people haven’t been able to figure out why. What he’s done to the four kids has been unbelievable. Three out of four don’t want anything to do with him after all he’s putthem through & done.
Thank you for writing the article! You have helped me & in turn my kids.
Vinette, it is eye opening isn’t it? I remember when I was doing research about high conflict divorce and came across this information, it helped me to finally stop struggling to understand why my ex behaved the way he did. I’m glad to hear that you’ve been helped also. Good luck! Keep yourself and your kids happy and healthy regardless of what he does. Cathy Meyer
Cathy I would agree with you. It would be a prayer answered to have an ex who was amicable and could coparent our children together. That is not my situation. My ex is evil.
It is unfortunate we live in a world that makes “tolerance” a priority and topic of political agendas. We’ve become a culture numb or fearful to judge right from wrong. This has seeped into our court system and certainly family court.
The truth of the matter is this, some people are just evil. Enough said.
I agree, Jen. Never more than now have we seen evil excused and excused by the minority. The majority of us are having to live with the repercussions of this insistence that we tolerate evil, too. Doing the right thing seems to be a laughable concept for some. The good news is, we don’t have to give into it, we don’t have to be “tolerant” when we hear or see wrong being done. If enough of us raise our voices and fight against it, it will be defeated. No way in hell will I ever condone or tolerate wrong done to me or my children. Just ask my ex. 🙂