 Welcome to Dare to Dream. This is Debbie Daschinger. And on today's show, Pamela Pasetti is here. And this is a subject I'm so excited to share with you because this is her book. This subject is about divorce. And maybe some of you don't wanna hear about it. You've been there, you've seen someone go through it. But what about the spiritual aspects of divorce? How often does somebody have a conversation with you about that or even know how to guide you through that? So there is a whole healing. So Pamela is here to talk to us because she is a healer, very certified and very proficient, but she's also a legal lawyer. She assists with the trauma, the emotional, the financial, the legal trauma that surrounds separation and divorce. And Pamela shares the hidden love story of divorce, which includes the soul family and the soul contracts. So if you're somebody who's been through it, about to go through it, knows someone going through it, send them this show and let them know about Pamela and her book and her work. And we're here to help you specifically today. This is Dare to Dream. This podcast won the COVR award for best radio and podcast show listed in Welp Magazine as one of the top 20 best podcasts to listen to. Thank you, Welp. And we are one of the top. It's like remembering all the different thank you God awards and goddess. It's beautiful. It's also listed as top self-improvement show in Apple Podcasts, nominated for two People's Choice Podcast Awards and for a Webby Award. Done. I thank the sponsors of the show that's Dr. Dean here in Access Consciousness. They do energy work out into the world. So if you'd like to become a facilitator or take one of their classes online or in person, go to Dr. Dean here, H-E-E-R.com or accessconsciousness.com. I am Debbie Daschinger and I teach spiritual messengers, coaches, entrepreneurs and speakers the action steps so that you can write a highly engaging book. I also have a company that takes your book to a guaranteed international bestselling status and I do all the work for you. And last, I teach you how to be interviewed on radio and podcasts and how to get massive results. If you would like a gift, so you can shift into that direction. Finally, write that book that is yours to write or become a bestselling author or learn how to be interviewed because it is a skill everybody needs these days to be appearing as a podcast guest and a very successful one. Please let me show you how. Go to debbiedaschinger.com slash gift. It is my pleasure to teach you and there's tons of great videos there and templates. It's D-E-B-B-I-D-A-C-H-I-N-G-E-R.com slash gift. Enjoy and I look forward to your visibility. So today I'm speaking with Pamela Pasetti. She's known for her holistic approach to family law and rather than just being a regular healer and coach Pamela offers something totally unique because she is a seasoned attorney who's also a powerful seer and healer for a woman's separation and divorce journey. She integrates her legal career to help clients through the emotional and spiritual aspects of the experience using her training in collaborative law and mediation as well as her healing abilities to help clients through the more difficult times. And she's skilled in shamanic healing, energy healing, mediumship, mediation, meditation, quantum healing hypnosis, Q-H-H-T, and transpersonal hypnotherapy. Pamela received her Juris Doctorate cum laude and concentrated on divorce and family law for 25 years, trained in collaborative law and mediation today. Pamela is an intuitive medium and a certified life and spiritual soul coach using her intuitive gifts and legal training. Her coaching program, Divorce in the Age of Aquarius, The Way of the Divine Feminine, provides women with legal insights as well as the spiritual insights that shift the drama of divorce into a sacred journey. Pamela is the author of the book, Divorce Holistically Yours, Learn Essential Knowledge of the Legal Process and How Divorce Can Be a Catalyst for Your Soul's Evolution. Her mission is to take the mystery out of the legal process and to show women how to reclaim their sovereignty, shift their perspective and repeated relationship patterns and finally find true healing. You can learn more by going to her website, PamelaPassetti.com and it's P-A-C-E-T-T-I dot com. And with that, I welcome the esteemable Pamela Passetti to Dare to Dream. It's great to have you here. Thank you, Debbie. It's wonderful to share this time with you. Thank you. Oh my gosh, I was reading that bio and I was just like, oh, I want her to do something. I want her to see something or heal something. I was so excited by all of your skills. So I'm just gonna start with my biggest curiosity. How did you get involved with shamanism? What kind of path did you take to get there? Oh, thank you for that question. You know, my spiritual journey started young in life but moving fast forward, my mother's passing really created an awakening for me and from there, I have just been on a journey of sponging everything that I can learn. And on that path, I ran across several different healers and I wanted to learn about shamanism. I went to a couple of healers and it was a profound experience for me and I wanted to learn more. So I studied and whether it be soul fragments or just journeying itself, I think the journeying itself for me and now helping others through the journey has been the most healing and the most rewarding experience for me. So that's how I got involved. It was truly by happenstance that through all the healing modalities that I was learning, that just became one of them. Amazing. And do you use, because I know the profundity of soul retrieval. That is no joke. Yes. Do you use soul retrieval when you work with somebody? Yes, I do. In fact, it's one of the most interesting and transformational experiences that my clients have. Just one example is, if you are hurt in your childhood, we anchor, part of our soul is anchored in that space and that experience. We carry that with us. And at some point in our journey, we need to regather all of those soul fragmented pieces that we've left in these places. So when I'm able to help a woman go back and reclaim these pieces from whatever events took place in her life, it's the most healing and releasing for the people, for my clients. And it just helps them move forward. It just clears the slate. It clears the slate and it answers a whole slew of questions that they've had about why certain events have happened or why they're carrying such energy with no explanation and now they feel whole. Yeah. And I love what you're saying. And it's so true because I've experienced it. And I think what's beautiful is you don't need to know. Like I wouldn't need to come to you, Pamela, and say, this is what happened. This is a trauma. In fact, you often don't know. There's sort of an amnesia experience that's something in you got disconnected. And there are pieces you don't even remember. So that's your job, right? You find those pieces to reintegrate that and make us whole again. Can I ask like a little behind the scenes, what is it like for you doing that work? What is it you see? How is it you like shift into somebody's not linear time, lifespan in order to see that? I'd love to know. From the journey perspective, it is a guided journey that I take them on. And frankly, I'm guided on where we're going. I don't know either in the beginning. So it's easier for me to explain if I made through a hypnotherapy session. During a hypnotherapy session, my client's soul and higher self knows what they need to know, where they need to go, what do they need to see? So it's easier to explain in that sense because in that way, I am facilitating the hypnotherapy or the journey I combine the two. And I allow her soul to take us where we need to go. And when we stop at that place, what's interesting about it is it's not just me, I see what's happening, but she's also expressing verbally what she's seeing. And it is a dance with the both of us with her higher self leading her, my facilitation. So that's the best way to explain it, Debbie, is it's just fascinating because I can see what's happening, but I'm also getting confirmation from what my client is saying. And from the client's perspective, when they hear the recording afterwards and they hear their own voice, can't make that up. Wow, okay. And that, you know, I'm super excited because you know, I'm moving into this starting next month. So I can't wait to experience, hopefully what you experience and be able to help people that way. Beautiful, beautiful. So here you are a divorce attorney. And you know, I'm moved by what you do. I can say, when I went through a divorce, I went through a divorce, right? Mine wasn't ugly at all. Was not, I'm not that way, not contentious. I've never been, something's over, it's over, I move on, never gone after somebody. But I know, cause I hear the stories out there, heart breaking what humans do to each other. Especially after, whether it's a year or 30 years. Anyway, it happens and we all hear it. But I'd like to hear from you and your expertise. Why is divorce such a life changing experience and event? You know, when we think of our, when we think of our life in general, we know that we're here for a purpose. We know that we have a pre-incarnation plan and that our life is gonna carry out certain themes and certain sub-themes. We know that one of our biggest teachers is our relationships. When we get involved in a relationship, such as a spouse, right? That is a, like you said, rather it's a short term or long term. We become very rooted in that. And with, as you use the word amnesia of our pre-incarnation plan, we forget what we're meant to learn. We forget what we're meant to do. So as a role, as a teacher, as well as a student for our spouse, we don't think of that as we're living our lives. We're just living our life. And then something happens and we're triggered. And it's those triggers, it's those moments that if we are conscious, we say, wow, I'm being triggered by this. What does that mean? Because if I trigger something, if I'm triggered by something wonderful that you do, that's just telling me and confirming to me that that's something beautiful within me that I need to express more of. If something is negative and I'm triggered negatively, clearly that's something that I'm meant to work on. That's something within me that's unhealed or wounded. We don't think of that when we're living our lives and our marriages. So when a divorce comes, we're taking it from the human perspective and the programs that we've had about divorce, it's gonna be violent, there's resentment, there's anger, there's a stripping of the family and the friends and the whole life is thrown up and the poor children, the trauma for the children. That's what we think of. We don't stop and think that there's another way of viewing this, that we're living both a spiritual journey as well as our human journey. As our great philosopher Chavin said, we're spiritual beings having a human experience, not the other way around, we forget that. So that's why it's traumatic, is because we're stuck in the human experience and not allowing ourself to broaden out and ask the questions, what more could there be here? What is meant for me to learn from this experience? Yeah, absolutely. And there's also this aspect, I've always been curious about that when you get married, I don't care if you go to Vegas, I don't care if you have a wedding with 350 people and an Italian villa. The point is, you're doing vows. I think there's a potency, there's a magic to a vow. I almost feel like it harkens back to fielties, chemilties, right? Very old binding spells almost where you're giving your loyalty over to something, someone. And in a sense, you have witnesses, whether it's just the person marrying you, there's people there, there's something profound I feel that happens in that moment. And then it seems to me, because I just find all of this fascinating human behavior and when it doesn't work out and people make another choice to end the marriage, to separate, to divorce, that there's a brokenness that is felt. And that sometimes there's this shame, you could be ostracized from your family. Also, my goodness, what I've heard sometimes happens with friends, your friends suddenly decide, well, I'm going with that other person, you guys are done, that's my choice. There's also that loneliness, there's a lot of breakups that occur. You could be madly in love with somebody's family, but still not wanna be with them. And so how do we negotiate that? How do we find the spiritual healing to an inner peace even amidst all that, not just the profound loss of a dream and a love and the vows you made and the witnesses, but on top of it, all the other loss that comes about and all the other people impacted. Right. Well, it is very true that divorce shatters everything. Let's face it, it's hard, it's a feeling of abandonment, the shame, the guilt, all the things that you mentioned are absolutely true and each client, although each situation is different, we all feel that. And that's why it's really important to understand that that is all still part of the human experience, right? So if we elevate our perception and we look at our divorce from a spiritual perspective, from our soul's journey and understand that all of these players, whether it's our friends, our family, our mother-in-law, father-in-law, whoever it is, we're all part of a larger soul family. And in that larger soul family is a larger intention, a higher intention for that relationship. Because we're all, again, we're all teachers and students for each other and we're all working independently in our soul's journey, but we've also agreed and contracted just like the bond of matrimony or the value you mentioned, we made a vow to each other prior to incarnating what we were going to do to help each other. As an example, if my spouse said, I wanna learn how to be more patient, right? So I must have agreed that I'm going to trigger my spouse to a situation where he's going to have to learn patience, right? That's part of my agreement with him. So if we look at it from that perspective and we know that our soul only deals with love, right? There's love and then there's fear. Anything that doesn't fit in this love box is fear. So what I tell people in the very beginning is broaden that perspective right away and look at it from the perspective of your soul and the soul family. Because if you're looking at it from that perspective, then all the stuff that happens in our earthly journey, that's just a play, right? It's just characters in the play that are really serving our higher self, our higher purpose and why we're here and helping us play out the themes in our life and the lessons that we wanna learn. So if we can just, again, turn our attention from the human experience and say, I'm gonna deal with this from a perspective of love and I want everybody around me to join me in that pursuit. And so the most important thing is I understand there's a higher purpose to this. I may need help to figure it out and that's what I do as a coach. I may need an attorney and the physical, you know, go through the physical steps to get the divorce. I may have to come up with a parenting plan and learn how to divide property. That's again, human. But the most important thing is to remember the higher purpose and that once we can connect with that, what happens in our human experience always ends up for the best interest of all. And so if like you said, I wanna don't want to ruin the relationship with my mother-in-law, but now I'm divorcing, can I still be with her? Absolutely, because if the two parties can communicate, really it only takes one, but if the two parties can communicate, that unity, that unity is what we're looking for. No, we are divorcing, but the rest of the family, we want your support, we want your love, we're going in our individual ways, but if we have children, we're gonna be co-parenting, we're gonna have to build another relationship, redefine the relationship. And I wanna make a quick point here that it's real important to remember that a family is not dissolved, the bonds of matrimony are dissolved in a divorce, but the family isn't dissolved. And so we need the help and the love of our family and our friends and everybody around us to help us to make these shifts so that I'm whole, my husband's whole, my children most importantly are whole, and we want the support of everyone. That's not what's happening. What's happening is people get sucked into the drama and they have to take sides, but what would happen if the husband and wife said, no sides, no sides? This is a choice that we're making. And lastly, Debbie, the children, the children in that situation are the ones that are going to benefit and the cycle of trauma will cease to exist if we can just shift that mindset just enough to say, look, we're still a family. And even if you're not a family, you don't have any children, there's still a higher relationship that must be honored. So if we honor the souls relation or the human relationship with the vow of love and marriage, then we need to also honor the higher relationship of our soul's journey that's gonna go on and may have gone on for many, many, many lifetimes, whether we look at it as a parallel or past and it's gonna go on in the future. And so I love you as part of my soul family. I just don't wanna be married to you. Oh my gosh. So much came up listening to that. I don't talk about a lot of this stuff, but first of all, I'm gonna totally pull back the curtain. I am a child of Doris. So I can speak to that. It's hugely tremendous. And I can tell you in my upbringing was not handled well at all. So I definitely suffered a lot, had a lot of years of healing to do for what was passed down to me, very messy. And then there's my brother who was married, is married still. So thank God they didn't divorce because they're an amazing couple. But he married my best friend from college, lucky me. And but they had a huge bump when they had us, their first child, small and she was very small. And it was a big bump and they moved out, separated and it really didn't look good for a good six months. They were definitely headed for divorce. And I remember the panic I felt. More than anything, don't take my niece away from me. Do not, because I was madly in love with her. And that I was such a huge panic that it actually caused me to do something very positive. And it's exactly what you're speaking to. So rather than me taking my brother's side or she's the bad person, this and that, I realized if I do not connect with this woman who is, was my brother's wife, was my best friend in college right now, I may lose seeing my niece and at least as much as I'd like. I didn't know how it was gonna go. And I immediately forged relationship with her, listened to her and her side of things. I was just there. And thank God, just intuitively I did that because what a payoff. I mean, here we are decades later, she is my best friend. They do have a beautiful marriage. They did figure a way back to each other. My niece is in my life, but I remember those months just like, what a nightmare thinking, don't take her away from me. Don't take that baby away from me, you know? Yes. And that was my choice. And if that helps anybody, I can tell you, I know my sister-in-law years later would speak to what that meant to her, that I was Switzerland. I was just, I was not gonna take sides and I was just there for her as lovingly as I could be. Let her rip, go ahead, I'll just listen. I'm there for you too. And I'm so grateful all the way around, but we can do that for one another. We can and we have to understand that anything in nature, anything in the universe is looking for equilibrium and balance, right? Which in a situation like divorce, it's neutrality, right? Everything wants balance. And if we take sides and start engaging in the drama and what that actually does is pushes the parties in to the ring because now I'm expected to do this. I'm expected to get full custody. I'm expected to take this item. I'm expected, there's so many expectations. And really all we have is our real basic needs. And if we think about that, we all deserve love. We all deserve respect. We all deserve dignity. We all deserve to be able to go on our soul's journey whichever way that may lead to or what it leads to. But most importantly, we need neutrality in a situation like that because if we're truly looking for the highest good of all and we set that as the intention and everybody works in that direction, that I wanted to say that's why I love collaborative loss so much Debbie, because the two attorneys who are trained in mediation as well as having the legal knowledge and their experience and wisdom from their cases, we work together. Everything that I know, everything that they know is focused in on what is the best result for this family, right? And that's what I'm talking about. It's what is going to be tailored for you that's gonna help you, help your mother, your mother, the children, the friends, colleagues, whatever it is that's necessary, let's figure out a solution that is going to best serve you. And we have to start that discussion with neutrality because if we're looking back at he did, she said, he said, if that's the energy that we're working with, it's position-based and it's important to understand the difference between position and an interest. My position is I want the house, period. My interest would be, the interest I wanna stay here because fill in the blank, it's a totally different energy. And if somebody can truly explain what their interest is so the family understands and I'm loving how you're bringing in the in-laws because it's so important, particularly when there's children and their aunts and uncles and everybody else, children don't see it from the perspective that we do. That's Nana, that's grandma, that's uncle, that's aunt. They look at everything as their whole, a big family. When we split that and show the divide where it's evidenced and they see it, they can feel it, they're so intuitive. What does that do to their psyche? I can't trust, I can't love, I can't depend on this. My world's falling apart and just because two adults have made a decision to split their relationship for whatever reason, those children don't understand that. Family's still family, mom's still mom, dad's still dad. And so if we can focus on neutrality and what is gonna be in the best interest for everybody, I promise you, I promise you that the result will be the best for everybody and it's all, it's like anything else. When we surrender and ask for the highest good to be served, the highest good is served for everybody. Can you explain a little more about collaborative law because you are a pioneer in that. I'd like to understand it more. Thank you for that. Collaborative law was developed by an attorney in the 90s, my pioneering was helping it become more well accepted on the East Coast, particularly DC Washington and Virginia. But the focus is how can we use our mediation skills or negotiation skills, which are interest based when we're dealing with families in separation looking for resolution, whether it's parenting, a financial distribution, et cetera. Let's use our mediation skills and see if we can work as a team so that each party has their own individual counsel. So they're not left without the ability to ask advice from their counsel or to feel the comfort, right? When we're in a situation like that, it's nice to feel the safety of a lawyer versus sitting in a mediation with just the mediator. So you have the benefit of your attorneys but the difference is you have the attorneys with a common goal and the common goal is to help this family. So we take an inventory of what's going on. So you're saying that the lawyers as opposed to being against each other and trying to one up each other, they're actually saying in agreement, we are working together for the better good of all in this situation. Like that's amazing, that's very unique. And just to follow on with that thought that if the couple needs extra financial help, we can bring other people in so we can bring a financial advisor in, we can bring a realtor in. And if you think about a litigation case where every expert is separate and it's my expert against yours, here it's a collaborative team saying, we're gonna bring in a neutral and that's why I keep wanting to raise that word neutrality, a neutral financial, a neutral child specialist to help us with our parenting plan and our financial plan agreement. And that is the beauty of collaborative, it's we are a team trying to help your family reach a resolution that's gonna be enduring and serve the, in my words, the higher good of all. And you told me a story and I wanna go back to that because you just said something about, I want the house. And you had told me a story about a woman and that was the case. She was really set on, I wanna stay here but it was actually the husband's home. Can you tell us that story and how that resolved? Well, in that particular case, thank you. In that particular case, the husband's family allowed my client and her husband to live in the house and they had two children and they weren't married for very long. And when it was time to divorce, by then my client had built roots in that house. That was her home and the school was nearby. So she really wanted to stay in that house at all costs. And that was a real bone of contention. So what happened in that case that made it interesting was her grandmother actually came through after one of our collaborative sessions. As in you're a medium and you were able to receive the grandmother, yeah. Her grandmother came in and from an evidential mediumship standpoint, we were looking for evidence. And so she presented evidence in the form of Tinsel. And so when I told my client, she gave a name Agnes. I said, who's Agnes? That was my grandmother. And when I mentioned the word Tinsel, it brought her to tears because she recognized right away that was her grandmother and her grandmother gave her the message of low down. And I said, I'm not sure what this means but low down is something that you're to pay attention to. Well, that weekend, she was going to look for rental properties with her mother and they got a call from a realtor that there was a house available that she wanted her to look at in Loudoun County. So she walked into this house with the realtor and her mother and knew she was at home and they made an offer. She won the deal and she came back to the next collaborative session, a whole different person. So that is a really important message here. If I may add this at this juncture is we have a spirit team, right? We have an entourage our whole entire life. We have spirit help. And so that's one good incident to prove that when we ask for help and we're willing to listen and to be open that we'll get the help. So Loudoun County and low down even though we didn't understand what that meant it resulted in a home that she loves. It was a newer property. It didn't have all the kinks and the loud hardwood floors and all the things that she may not have liked about the first one. It was better suited for her and better suited for the children. Oh my God, I got goosebumps. I love that story. It's really profound. And I like when you take the onus off of something like I have to have this, I have to have this. And you relax a little bit. Something way more magnificent can come in. That's such a good story, an example. And when you talk about, because nobody says this the hidden love story behind divorce. That is super unique. So what is that exactly? What is the hidden love story behind divorce? That is very simply is the recognition of our larger soul family. So if we can just appreciate that we are souls having journeys, right? We're here to learn. We're here to share our gifts. We're here to help each other. And we're here to support each other's themes and sub-things, as I said. So what creator love story is there? That this is not our only expression together. That part of this was pre-planned and predestined and it may be a continuum, right? So when you're looking at relationships, it's not just the human relationship. It's really admiring and having a curiosity about what is the higher connection. That's the love story. Because we all are based, right? Our essence is love. And we're all on these journeys individually, but we are all united, right? So we understand that there's no separation. So if there's no separation, then how can I walk out of a divorce or any other relationship without respecting and honoring that this may, we may have kind of messed up down here, or did we? Or did we just play the role beautifully? You know, I've many times said to my clients, you know, just bid namaste to the guy in Garb that helped you evolve. They helped you awaken. That's the love story. It's, yeah, that's the love story. Bid namaste. I love that. So I hear you saying that this is an opportunity, that divorce is right with opportunity. And then that begs the question, so how is the energy body a secret weapon in divorce? Well, that's a great question, Debbie. As we know, what we perceive is our physical body, which is just a denser form of the energy. Our energy body plays a role in everything. Our physical body, our emotional body, our mental body. So just like anything else, when we're aligned, we make really good decisions. And a really good example of this, to make it real simple, is think of the root chakra. What is the root chakra? That's our grounding. That's our foundation. It gives us our security. It helps us understand, you know, how we fit into the world. And in that situation or in the situation of divorce, what happens when our root shot, what happens to our root chakra? It's the first thing that's affected. We feel that our foundation is collapsing, that we don't have any support. And with that in mind, there's no way to make aligned decisions, right? So the energy body is really important. And it's important to know that it doesn't take very long to align ourselves when we're conscious, but in a divorce, most times, we like percentages sometimes. Say 80% or more of the people right now who are going through divorce have spent zero time energetically getting prepared for meetings with their lawyers, for settlement negotiations, for trial, for anything that they have to do. It's all robotic. So if we wanna be aligned and make good decisions, if we want to shift the energy of something in a settlement room or otherwise, we have to pay attention to the energy body and we have to understand what a critical role that it plays. It's just like with disease. It comes into our energy field first. And if we ignore the signs and we fail to take action, it ultimately gets closer and closer and closer to our physical body and becomes disease. Now, that's a simple way of saying it. So that is one of the most important things is to be energetically aligned when you're going through a divorce so that you can make aligned decisions so that you don't run the risk of learning after the divorce is finished or the separation agreement is signed that you've made decisions in haste and in fear because you didn't take the time to learn how to use the energy to get you through the process. Yeah, wow. You don't want that for sure. So what is the insider truth straight from the mouth of a legal eagle about divorce litigation? What is the good? What is the bad? What is the other? We'll see ugly. Yes. It's ugly. I'd say there's good in one occasion. The good is we need the litigation, we need the court system and our judges when there's tremendous abuse or the parties are just so far gone that there's just no way and they need intervention. Other than that, the bad is it is a system that is designed with duality, right? So immediately going in, I'm right, you're wrong. Plain if defendant, we are against each other automatically. So in order to come back from that if somebody starts with litigation and they don't understand what the process is and that's why I went so in detail in my book about litigation because I want people to understand what really is that process. Just hearing somebody went to trial or they had a divorce that was litigated. You can't possibly understand what that is or what that looks like until you walk through it. So the bad is once you start in a process that has the energy of fear, what does that do? That puts the parties in fear, puts me against you and then you have the lawyers that are representing the parties in litigation and they have two things against them. One is a duty to represent their client or zealously represent our client. Well, what does that mean? That usually means positions, right? This client has this position, this one has this position and our job is to figure out a way to develop a theory and push forward in litigation so that our client receives their desire. So there is no room in that situation for collaboration or unification or even when mediation becomes a potential. The parties are so stressed by the time they've answered discovery and they don't really understand what's going on. They're just following the lawyer's side here, do the show up here. What do you think? What do you think? Trying to make quick decisions again that's in a completely imbalanced state because all of that's fear-based. And then right at the end, right before trial, there's usually, oh, let's offer a settlement. And the person is just get me out of this any way you can. Anything, oh, do anything, just make it go away. So it doesn't take much to understand that those agreements are not enduring. The child parenting schedule that was created in a situation like that is never gonna work. And it's certainly not gonna be something that's equitable for everybody. But in any litigation case, even if you win, what did you win? You lost many, many, many months of your life in a horrible emotional state. Your bank accounts are stripped. So what could be there for your children's college or anything else? Or for the two of you to separate and use ongoing, that's stripped from you. So there really isn't, Debbie, unless there is something egregious. There is no reason why families should be in court. And it's because of the way we've been programmed. And we've seen how other people handle the divorce and the movies. And there's nobody that you can, nobody that we know, nobody I know that doesn't know somebody that's gone through a very bad divorce. So that's what people expect. But that's the good is it could be used when necessary. The bad and the ugly is it's just not, families are not contract disputes. They're life human beings that need specific care and the courts are very limited in their ability to tailor to the family. There's just no time for that. And there's no law for that. So you can codify a law and then you have case law that follows. But it's really difficult to hone in on what is gonna be best for this family. So you're basically choosing a box for this family. Let's give them that solution. And now let's just give that solution. And in no way is that, is that tailored to the uniqueness of a family. And I'd like to, if I may, I'd like to share a quick story that would help you understand that. I call this story, the long road home. And my client, when she came to me, she was highly professional. She worked an hour away from the house. She was a go-getter and they had a little girl and husband, he worked at home. So she, my client was really never at home. She was gone all the time, between the travel time and work time and the hours. Her husband did all the child rearing. He did all the shopping. He did all the cooking. And so he was really rooted in that house. The first thing she said to me when she came in was, I want the house. No, remember our discussion about positions? That's a position. I want the house. So once we talked about what we talked about, what they had, their financial picture, there really wasn't enough money in any form. Cause sometimes we do trade-offs with retirement and et cetera, but there was not enough money in this family for either one of them to buy the other out. So if this case were to proceed to litigation, there would be no, no, there would be one option, sell and divide the proceeds. So over the court would divide it. So when I shared that with her, she's angry. I don't, I'm the mother. I want the house. So what I suggested to her is a few options of creativity that she can communicate with her husband and let's just see what it's worth asking. So they had a discussion. And in that discussion, surprisingly, she realized because her husband was the one who was there with her daughter all his time. And what was most important in that family, they agreed together was to provide some stability for their daughter. So that was a coming together, what is in the best interest of this family. And it was the stability for the daughter to stay in the house. And because the father was the one who was the caretaker that it would be best for him to stay there. Although this just didn't sit right with her, she knew that that was going to be best for their family. So what did she do is she decided to rent a condo closer to her office, but one that had amenities, a tennis court, a swimming pool, and some other things so that when the daughter spent her parenting time with her, she'd be excited to come and have somewhere for her friends to play. And it wouldn't be, I want to stay home. No, that mom's house was actually exciting to her too. So how did they deal with it financially? One of the options that is available, not by a court, but between the two parties is they would keep the house, husband would live in it, he'd be responsible for all the expenses until the daughter graduated from high school. And mom would be responsible for her leased condo. And if at any time has been decided to move, then wife could perhaps try to buy it at that time or they would swap, right? She'd stay in the house, but the whole focus was this daughter would stay in that school district with her friends in that bedroom, that was the most important thing to them as a team until she graduated high school. So that's a great story that describes the limitation of a court, the house would have been sold versus if we can communicate and if we can determine what is gonna be in the best interests of our family, there's always a solution, always. What a huge shift. And I'm so proud of all of the parties to go from these stances to somehow mitigating this whole situation and finding the peace, the capacity are widening back enough to be able to see a solution that really was a win for everybody. And I love that the win even extended into the future. This is the choice today, but should you make another choice, I have options and we keep having options that create a win. That's right. That's very beautiful. You know, Debbie, if I can just add something, if a case like that was litigated. I know, right? We know what the result would be, but I just want to make that point when you were talking about the good, the bad and the ugly, just want to go back there for a second. Those cases where a court makes a determination or one that the case has settled right before trial, those are the cases that come back again and again and again. Why? Because there's no communication. There's a winner and a loser feeling. And many times before the ink is dry on the court order, somebody's already asking their attorney to appeal. So, oh, and let's say it's a child custody situation. The person who didn't receive the custody that they wanted, what are they doing? They're looking for ways that they can prove that the other parent is not doing something right. So that's the difference. However, if we're working together and we tailor a solution that works for us and like you said, provides options, it's all about communication. I want to shift this because I'm getting married and so I want to shift this because it's more likely that the parties are going to work together going forward when they hit a speed bump, rather than immediately resorting to having an attorney file something in court because they can't resolve it themselves. That makes so much sense. You're setting up the energy now and for going forward. That's a beautiful container to be in. I know somebody who it's a man and he is very gun shy to, he was married once upon a time. I don't believe he had a contentious report, but it's a divorce. But what I think is so fun, interesting is that he definitely doesn't want to get married because he's heard so many of his friends be raked over, literally just because they're males and they've lost their assets, their homes, they're paying for a home that somebody else is living in while they're living in a hovel, so to speak. But it's, you know, the impact is huge. One of the, and I know he owns several homes and one of the things I've said to him is, you know, just to keep it even Steven, I gotta say, I know a lot of women this has happened to. It's not just males. I know women who are still paying the price tag for a man and the place where he lives. And, you know, when he's not working so hard and she's still working her tail off, it goes both ways. So what do you say to somebody who's gun-shy, not even their experience, but they have heard so much horror around divorce that they're like, I don't think I want to go down that road again. Become educated. And that was one of the inspirations for writing this book. Great example is get educated because what you hear from somebody else is never gonna be the same result that will be for you. And each case is different. The fact patterns are different. The time together is different. The income levels are different. And there's so many different factors that goes into a determination such as what you described that there is no one size fits all. And so anytime you hear somebody say, well, my friend, when she got divorced, this happened, if you're in that situation, just acknowledge it, thank you for the information, but get your own, you don't have to do your own research because you're right, it happens. There is no gender when it comes to, there used to be, right? But as we are growing and evolving, the court has a lot to do in its evolution, but we are evolving to, there is no gender. So whether it's parenting or support or any other issue that may arise, it's genderless. So the best thing that you can do is educate yourself, the best that you can before you make determinations. And like I said with my book, that was the reason why I wanted the first half of that book to be all about explaining what a divorce is, what's the process, the different processes, how to choose your attorney, what do you need to know? And then of course the truth about litigation so that you can, you know, whether it's from that book or some other book or going and having a consultation with an attorney before you make any judgments, take any steps before you do anything, you never get the information from a friend or from somebody else's experience. Always do firsthand research yourself. I hope it's okay for me to share this, but it's coming up so I'm gonna share it. Oh, Debbie Daschinger with zero filter, but I need to. And I had no idea this was gonna come up. You know, I lost a friend because she was going through a divorce. In fact, I lost a very best, best sister friend. And I still to this day maintain that she lost her mind during her divorce because it was meaningless, the strangest experience. We were honestly, when she was going through her divorce, we were both going through a very difficult time in our lives, extremely. I had just discovered my mother had Alzheimer's. I was the only one on the West coast. So I was handling physically everything and there are no words because that's another subject caring for somebody and finding a place for them and cleaning out their apartment. So there was that and there were about three other major things for me at the same time and I only had so much capacity. And at the same time, this very best friend of mine who I loved like beyond, soul, soul was going through an extremely difficult divorce with a husband who ex-husband who was not pissed off. There was some prior infidelity. He was very angry and he wasn't gonna let go. He was gonna give her a really, he was gonna rake her over for something years ago. She had a mistake she had made and we counted for but he truly could never forgive. And so it got our connection got less and less and I tried so much in my world to be there as much as I could for her to keep checking in how was she to give love? And I'm sure had I been a hundred percent it would have been very different but her resentment built and it culminated in a 42, this is a true story, 42 minute voice text like please people do not end relationships with a voice text. We are mature adults, we can communicate one on one and things can often be repaired when there's love there. That's all that matters. But that I had never had anybody do that to me but it literally was a 42 minute voice text and we all know those disappear from my phones how do you listen to them so you better listen? And I listened to this recounting of all her resentments some of which were really out there. They were projections, they didn't some of it I got like I really got and could have been worked out and I took ownership, but it was never, she was not open to repairing. She was done and she moved on and years and years ago but the impact so her divorce, right? Which I had nothing to do with still the whiplash reached out to me and I still to this day think how sad what a crime that this contention my God it was ugly between the two of them and what happened with the kids and I think everybody's okay today but massive and it didn't, it didn't have to go down that way. So I wish Pamela listening to you this is why this comes up. I wish so much back then I had known you and known of you and that at a time like this I could have told this beautiful loving individual who I cherished about you because I think she really needed you. And I think she was doing things we'll call them crazy because we all get crazy when it's just too much and we don't have somebody in our corner and we're dealing with legal things that are not really our area of expertise and doing the best we can but I wish I had known you and I would have pointed her to you and it might everything my relationship with her her relationship with her children herself, her ex how they landed eventually I'm sure would have been different. Yeah, well, thank you for saying that and it's a great example of when we start a process with fear, how the ripple effect just it's a path of destruction and that's one of the things we do when we're fearful is we project and we sabotage and there's no way for us to look within because somebody's got to be responsible for this and it's not me but had she started that journey from like from a perspective of love and understanding and she had some support she may have seen things differently and that's also a great example of when we're not willing to do the work when we're not courageous enough to do the work that our soul is leading us to do that's what happens. So I'm hoping not but that lesson whatever it is or many lessons in that timeframe that were available to her will just continue it's like hitting the repeat button bring me some more that'll help me do the same journey, right? So that would have been a perfect opportunity for her it seems like there was a lot of healing that a lot of healing that could have taken place in that situation. Let's see that's the norm what you're explaining is the norm destructive path that has no limits. And that's why it's so important that people understand that there is another way there is a holistic way to handle divorce and whether you have children or not there's a higher love story that's still here that just because human love changes regardless of how it changes or why it's not relevant in the larger scheme of things what really is relevant is that our relationship continues on a level that we may not consciously know right now but we will. And the sooner we respect that and we want to engage in it and know more the human stuff can we really realize how minor it is? And I always laugh because sometimes in a settlement conference with clients they're fighting over the microwave they don't realize they're paying these high hourly rates that they can buy five microwaves and the time it takes to argue over the microwave that it's so petty. Once we elevate expand their view and raise their consciousness and broaden that scope let's look at it from a much broader our bigger perspective the microwave doesn't matter you take the microwave because I've the blessings that I've received going forward buy me 50 microwaves right? It's not true that every breakup I've ever had especially when you live in the same home divorce or just living with somebody cohabitating I've always been that person you need this piece of furniture take it and it's interesting because there's I'm sure people think God will I want that in the future I have never looked back on anything that I happily gave to I literally have never looked back on it and said damn I shouldn't have given that to those bookshelves I just didn't I moved on so I'm so curious when I hear you talk about this because it's you have such a peaceful feeling about you I love hearing about this collaborative law I've never heard about this before and I've certainly never heard of a true legal lawyer who deals with separation and divorce and is also a profound healer what is it like when some first of all I assume when somebody comes to you I wanna hire you they already know you're gifted right? They know it's not just legal legal that they're also gonna get this other side of gifts should they need them or want them so what is that journey like with you how do you holistically work with somebody? It's interesting you ask that because no when somebody hires me as a lawyer they don't know they don't know unless they were referred to by somebody else Wow so when I'm working with somebody from Surprise Yeah the legal head on and that's what made it interesting from the very beginning because at first I used to see settlements as soon as I would talk to somebody I could see their settlement and I realized later that was just my intuitive ability to be able to see patterns and how things were going to work out and I had a really good success rate and people would say how do you know how can you see things so quickly with all these different parts? It would just be clear to me and so you progress from there to other areas that you squeak in a little bit of this healing maybe a tarot reading and it started very slow and I noticed that spirit was bringing me more and more clients that were open to that so later in the later years most people are pretty open when I'm coaching somebody because that's a different business when I'm coaching somebody they certainly do know and because they're coming for my legal knowledge is available and very important but I help them bridge the human experience of the legal divorce with the spiritual divorce so in both aspects to answer your question it's they sometimes don't know and they're surprised if it's a legal case but if it's a woman in a coaching capacity they definitely know. Can you share another story? I kind of love the stories about somebody wherever they were and what happened and especially using your healing skills how you were able to facilitate them both legally and to the internal healing that they required. You know, I think the best story for you on that is to address that would be one on infidelity. Okay. Okay. Because infidelity is one of the hardest triggers to overcome. I'll bet. That must be big payback. That's hard. That's hard. And so when my client, I'm gonna call her Susan came to me when she learned about her husband's infidelity she was angry, she was bitter she felt unworthy, she felt abandoned and she wanted retribution. I'm not the attorney and hire for retribution, right? But that retribution or that feeling of retribution that's all the fuel that a litigation key needs to start a path of destruction. After working with me, fortunately she was open and after working with me she realized where she had failed to erect boundaries where she failed to speak up for herself. And the many times that she yielded her power to her husband's will unconsciously and how she ignored the many, many, many signs in the relationship or during the marriage where her soul was bringing her to a point of learning and that it was her husband and her husband's behavior was the messenger. So during the therapy session with me we discovered or she discovered that her husband's paramour was actually her sister in another lifetime or parallel life. So immediately it rose up to the level of soul family ding ding and so that was initially shocking to her but further in that hypnotherapy session I was able to help her heal that sweet beautiful little girl that was in her that had experienced a very traumatic event when she was a child one that reached her boundaries and stripped her of her self-worth and she had been caring for years this shame and guilt. I was able to help her integrate those parts, heal and the difference from the moment she walked in to after this one hypnotherapy session was night and day. So that case ultimately ended up settling. She knew it was gonna take some time for her to accept this other woman if that woman were to stay in her husband's life because they did have children but she was okay with it. All of a sudden she had this curiosity and anticipation about her future. She knew, well, I'm moving on, I'm not looking back I now understand this from a different place and I feel good, I feel better. So she called me a few months later to tell me that she had met a man that she knew immediately was part of her larger soul family and she was excited for where that was gonna go and that the co-parenting relationship with her former spouse was going well. So it demonstrates, to me it demonstrates the connection of the larger family. If nothing else, just the acknowledgement are to learn that this woman who's come into my husband's life, we never blame the woman unless, right? If it's, we never blame the paramour but you can't help but blame the paramour. It's both of them, you're angry at both and she was angry at both, she wanted them exposed. But once she understood the larger story, right? We went from the paramour to now the larger love story with her husband. It was like, oh man, we're all in this together and this was pre-planned. In some way, I may not understand it right now but I accepted enough to move on and bless it with love and I'm going on with my soul journey. So a lot of healing. For Susan, what happened with the ex-husband? Because I'm curious because usually with infidelity, I'm no expert, but I just think as an observer of life, usually they don't work out so well. Those, the situation, whoever you cheated with, it's gonna resolve itself one way or the other. I think it's very rare, it carries on, obviously it does occasionally, but did it work out for the two of- In this particular case, they were still together, they were still together several months after their divorce. So that would have been a year and a half plus however long the affair was going on prior to the divorce proceedings, but so they were together. And what I didn't say in the co-parenting relationship, one of the things that I do, and I wait to hear my clients or I wait to get the smirk from my client and are you kidding me? Is especially for a mother. It's very important that a mother of young children creates somehow a bridge of communication and a relationship with the other woman because if that other woman does stay and becomes the stepmother of your child, you want to have created trust. And I'm not saying it's easy, but I watched a lot of women do it. At first, they're kicking and screaming and I'm pushing. Start by a barbecue and inviting them over. Start it however you are, start it by sharing the bench at your child's soccer game. But there must be communication because those families that are blended that start out that way, we already know the children benefit. Totally. But if we're looking at the relationship from a higher perspective, she was my sister in this case. As an example, she was my sister in another life. So now we're, what are we supposed to be friends? And I'm going to step parent her child. She's going to step parent my child. Oh, it's kind of like an aunt. I know it seems confusing, but when you think about it, it's in her interest to accept this woman. And if there's something that is unsafe for her children, oh yeah, we're going to respond differently because our mama instincts are going to kick in. But that's, that is the beauty and how a blended family can work is everybody. And when you say everybody, you can get one or two people to do it, but not everybody's going to join in. But it, again, with all of us, it only takes one. Yeah, it takes one. Absolutely. And it seems to me in that story, it's a lot like the story I shared in the beginning about my brother, his wife, their child, dire circumstances can force you into a level of loving humanity. You might not have chosen otherwise, but because you're really clear about the outcome you want, you'll make different choices, very healing choices to invite another being into your heart and your life. And ultimately, I mean, once you get, I'm sure, there's a very difficult time period in there. I wouldn't gloss over that, but I think ultimately once everybody is truly healed and on the other side, it's a great payoff. And there's even so many celebrities today that have blended families who are great examples of this and show how loving and involved they can all still be while making different love choices, but still very much involved and the kids turn out great. So this book, my dear, where can people get it? It's available on Amazon and you can order it through any one of your favorite bookstores. So just by the ISBN number or just the title, but it's easily available through Amazon. Terrific, so it's Divorce Holistically Yours by Pamela M. Passetti, P-A-C-E-T-T-I. Your website is PamelaPassetti.com. This is Dare to Dream, Pamela. What are you next, Dare to Dream? What are your future dreams and goals? I dare to dream that my mission to shift the way people perceive and handle their divorce will gain momentum so that many can experience a soul-based divorce when it's fueled by love and not fear and where it's recognized that the wisdom of the light is easier to carry than the denseness of our woundedness and that the children of these divorces will thrive and that the cycle of trauma will cease to exist from our conscious experience. It's my dream. That is so beautiful. Thank you. Thanks for coming on the show today. It's been an extraordinary conversation. Pretty amazing for me. Thank you for having me, Debbie. I end today's show with this quote from the Dalai Lama. Human beings are social animals. What brings us together is love and affection. Anger drives us apart. Just as we employ physical hygiene to protect our health, we need emotional hygiene. That means to tackle our destructive emotions if we are to achieve peace of mind. Subscribe right now to this number one transformational conversation. Dare to dream with Debbie Daschinger. Like, leave a comment. I read them all. Next week on the show, wow, the amazing Nora Herald is going to be here. She's a Pleiadian and fairy channel in Incarnate. Very excited to host her. If you're listening to the podcast and you'd like to see what we look like, please do go to youtube.com slash Debbie Daschinger and subscribe there. And remember, don't just dare to dream. Dare to turn all your dreams into your reality. And there's a way. If separation or divorce is in your imminent future past, there are people like Pamela out there to help you get through so you're intact and you don't have to create those patterns ever again.