Too bad about Gwyneth and Chris... But the article she attached to her announcement called "Conscious Uncoupling" was quite intriguing. If only all the players in our lives were following this doctrine... Imagine how much nicer things could be!

Some of the points that stood out for me:

Sooner or later, the honeymoon ends and reality sets in. This is usually when we stop projecting positive things onto our partners and begin to project our negative issue onto them instead. Unfortunately, this creates a boomerang effect as these negative issues always come right back to us, triggering our unconscious and long-buried negative internal objects, which are our deepest hurts, betrayals, and traumas.

A conscious uncoupling is the ability to understand that every irritation and argument was a signal to look inside ourselves and identify a negative internal object that needed healing. Because present events always trigger pain from a past event, it’s never the current situation that needs the real fixing. It’s just the echo of an older emotional injury. If we can remain conscious of this during our uncoupling, we will understand it’s how we relate to ourselves internally as we go through an experience that’s the real issue, not what’s actually happening.

It seems ironic to say that a marriage coming apart is the cause of something else coming together, but it’s true. Conscious uncoupling brings wholeness to the spirits of both people who choose to recognize each other as their teacher. If they do, the gift they receive from their time together will neutralize their negative internal object that was the real cause of their pain in the relationship.

This process allows us to begin projecting something different into the world because we’ve regained a missing part of our heart.

Naturally, divorce is much easier if both parties choose to have a conscious uncoupling. However, your experience and personal growth isn’t conditional on whether or not your spouse chooses to participate. You can still receive the lessons he or she has to give you, resist being baited into dramatic arguments, and stand firm in your internal, spiritual support system. By choosing to handle your uncoupling in a conscious way, regardless of what’s happening with your spouse, you’ll see that although it looks like everything is coming apart; it’s actually all coming back together.

Here's the full article: http://www.goop.com/journal/be/conscious-uncoupling