I recently heard Joni Mitchell singing the beautiful “Both sides now”.

It accompanied the joyous ending of Ricky Gervais’ series on Netflix called After Life. As characters in his three-parter coupled up at the funfair, this lovely, wistful, music celebrated their togetherness. People who were very different united to create a happiness that was more than the products of themselves.

My own reading of the President of the Family Division’s thoughts on co-operative parenting kind of mirrors this picture.

At the end of a relationship, two very different people opting for a harmonious outcome. Both parties working hard to create happiness. Parents co-operating to find a solution for their children.

Sometimes it’s tough to co-operate. There may have been arguments along the way. There may have been individual acts of nastiness. There may have been selfishness or greed.

All of us know the experience of being disappointed by other people. It’s tough. It can fester, become onerous and weigh in the mind. It can get in the way of positivity and impair enjoyment of life. Most often, a form of forgiveness works best in these situations.

Some of our clients know these experiences very well. Especially at the end of a long relationship. Love turning sour. Both sides of a relationship. And then the rebuilding to be done.

I often think of these things while I advise clients round the table.

Above all, as a family lawyer, I think of the joy that comes with the having of children. And of the necessity of preventing by all reasonable means the impairment of children’s enjoyment of life.

We don’t have to be child psychologists to know for children that “theirs is the singing season” (I love those words, which also feature on the grave of my uncle Jock, who drowned aged ten - and I am named after him). There is no limit to the preciousness of a child. A preciousness that flowers into an adult as the product of that child’s experiences.

One of my best friends said that “there is no argument with your partner that is worth winning”.

I acknowledge that this wisdom does not apply to arguments between separating partners, who may peddle some unrealistic views about the way ahead.

So, collecting these thoughts, I know and teach our students that it is almost always better for our clients to find a co-operative way of parenting.

Sometimes I talk to spouses who have a view of their ex-partner as the embodiment of evil. We lawyers are so often exposed to the views of our clients’ partners. It may for example be at that one hour slot before a hearing that is mandated to be a time to talk with the the other party.

On one such recent occasion I found myself saying to a wife acting in person against my client - “ what if your husband is not the devil that you take him to be”. Life is very rarely a pastiche of good and evil.

We family lawyers have so many tools at our disposal to help our clients find a better way. And we have to. There is no proper alternative. Whatever that is, for example the Resolution code of conduct, or the availability of mediation, or the encouragement of The President to aspire towards co-operative parenting, it is surely abundantly obvious that we can all play a part to help our parent clients co-operate.

I write these few words on the cusp of leaving a lawyers’ firm of great dignity and conscience, and joining a firm which was formative in creating, in Resolution, the society of family lawyers who look for amicable solutions.

The way that we advise our family clients can go both ways - and talk to both sides of a client’s personality.

Moons and Junes and Ferris wheels
The dizzy dancing way that you feel
As every fairy tale comes real
I've looked at love that way

Taking our cue from Joni Mitchell, let’s remember why we do our work and whom we serve.