Parents who enter the family law courts in order to resolve their conflicts and concerns about their own children have a profound misunderstanding of its function, capability and power. It is two-dimensional; heads or tail; yes or no; right or wrong. It is driven by rules and forms. Its purpose is to decide, not to transform. It cannot care about our dreams and values.

When parents enter into the legal system, they surrender all they know about each other and their children in the anticipation of justification or victory. Neither exists in family law. It cannot give us the values that we cannot or will not find in ourselves. To ask that of it is an illusion. What is gained is experience and, hopefully, wisdom. What is lost is incalculable and lasting.

Love is not the question. Parents love their children. Even the most broken say, truthfully, that they love their children. Not only are they an extension of our biological selves, but in our children we can see what we have hoped for, protected and cherished in ourselves. They are the future.

Consider: Without blame or judgment upon yourself or another consider the question: When I tell the story about the time of my life twenty years from now, how will I feel about my role in these events?