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The famous philosopher Groucho Marx once said, "Marriage is the chief cause of divorce." It's hard to argue that logic, particularly given the current U.S. divorce rate, which hovers at just below 50 percent.
Which means that among your core group of friends almost half the couples including you and your spouse could wind up divorced.
But Fairfield-based therapist Caroline Temple wants you to know you are not alone. She says, "Women can be empowered when they take charge of their own divorce, regardless of whether or not they initiated the process."
Temple is a holistic psychotherapist who incorporates traditional and spiritual approaches, as well as Reiki and life coaching, into her private therapy practice. After an early career in advertising, followed by several years raising her three sons, she earned a master's degree in social work in order to pursue her passion for working with women in a therapeutic setting.
For the past nine years, she has overseen a divorce support group for women in her Fairfield office. "To connect women with women, particularly when they have this life experience in common, is powerful. They learn to make decisions from a position of knowledge rather than from one of fear, which is the best way for them pick up the reins and take control of their lives," she says.
Now she and her collaborator, Lisa Jacoby, have written a book that helps women pick up those reins and assume control. Temple says the book, "What I Know To Be True," empowers readers to feel safe and secure in themselves and the world around them, and suggests they imagine choosing to live easier, happier lives that are filled with love and compassion.
That message, she says, carries throughout her therapeutic practice: From helping women follow their hearts out of an unhappy, abusive marriage, to dealing with stress and anxiety from life's daily ups and downs, large or small.
Temple says her objective has always been to encourage people women in particular to listen to their wise inner selves. And, she says, What I Know To Be True is a simple, practical tool to do just that. She adds that the book acts as a personal GPS to tap one back into that place where we feel at one with ourselves.
Additionally, Temple and Jacoby conduct all-day experiential retreats in Chester, Conn., that allow participants an opportunity to experience their work firsthand. The day is progressive in nature and includes mindfulness teachings, meditation practice, group and individual reflection time, as well as hands-on teaching of the practice of What I Know To Be True, says Temple.
Imagine choosing to live an easier, happier life, filled with love and compassion, secure in yourself and the world around you, says Temple. You are the gateway, she adds.
And understanding what you know to be true is the key, Temple says, regardless of the divorce rate.
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