January 1991

Subramuniyaswami, Sivaya

Last month we ran a quiz about divorce on the Women's Page. It was short, but the subject struck a nerve among readers. Here's a question that resulted about coping with divorce.

Question: My mother and father got a divorce, and I really resent it. It happened seven years ago when I was sixteen, and almost every day I regret what I missed by not having my mom and dad together in a loving home. How can I deal with the resentment, Gurudeva?

Answer: It's not easy experiencing the separation and divorce of one's mom and dad, at any age, sixteen or thirty-two. There is a feeling of emptiness - something is lost, never to be regained. The feelings and thoughts of blame grow, they do not diminish, as the years go by. But look at it this way. Any marriage, yours maybe, needs a loving, strong support group that wants to make the young couple, or the older couple, work out the problems rather than avoid them through separation and finally divorce. Basically, when there are children involved as a result of a marriage, there is no divorce - only separation. Every marriage is truly irrevocable, carved in the akashic records when their first child's umbilical cord is cut. Thereafter there can be no separation without a great deal of pain.

Upon whom should the children put the blame? Put it where it truly belongs. Put it on the support groups - the mothers, the grandmothers, the grandfathers, the aunts, the uncles, the cousins, the next-door neighbors, the business partners and friends of the family. Everyone in the community shares the tragedy of the home's breaking up - the members of the temple society, the marriage counselor, psychiatrist, psychologist, the hairdresser, the gym instructor and the attorney were all responsible to become part of the solution rather than part of the dissolution of the marriage. Put the blame on them, not on your mom and dad.

An extended family that loves one another and looks for the good of all, a religious group of loving souls who pride themselves on a low percentage of divorce in their community or congregation - these and more are all the people that can or should see the tension growing between husband and wife and have the ability to diffuse it at early stages. Don't blame your mother and lather. II blame is to the cast. Blame all those people that surrounded your family who were not alert enough, good souls that they must be, to help diffuse the tension between your mother and lather

Obviously, the support group has failed their marriage. You must admit that failure, lest it drag you down to its own depths. Be part of the solution. Don't perpetuate the problem. Don't make them feel guilty. For your own peace of mind, transfer the blame, the hurt feelings, the pain and resentment over to the relatives, the community and national value system. Become an agent of good will. Have kind words to say about dad to mom and kind words to say about mom to dad.

If you do take sides, you are creating bad karma for yourself to be faced later. So treat each one the same. Maybe, just maybe, you can help them to understand and reconcile their differences. Maybe, just maybe, time and the forces of nature will come to your aid, and they will remarry and you will all become a family again. Don't perpetuate the problem. Be part of the solution. Work with it. You, their child, may be their very best hope.

Article copyright Himalayan Academy.