Gwyneth Paltrow explained the origins of 'conscious uncoupling' in an essay about the end of her marriage to Chris Martin
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In a new personal essay written for Vogue, Gwyneth Paltrow explained how she and ex-husband Chris Martin came upon the term "conscious uncoupling" during their break-up, and eventual 2016 divorce.
Paltrow said that the phrase, introduced to her by a therapist, initially "sounded a bit full of itself, painfully progressive and hard to swallow," but that she was intrigued by the sentiment: "Was there a world where we could break up and not lose everything?"
Paltrow said that she and Martin tried it out for a year before going public with the news in 2014 on the Goop website. The public reaction of "mockery and anger" made her bury her head in the sand, she said.
Paltrow says that people have since come around to the term, writing: "Instead of people approaching me with, 'Why did you say that?,' they now approach me with, 'How do you do that?'"
"Conscious uncoupling lets us recognise those two different loves can coexist and nourish each other," Paltrow wrote.
Gwyneth Paltrow explained the origins of the term "conscious uncoupling" in an honest and heartfelt new personal essay written for Vogue.
In the essay, published on Thursday, Paltrow described a weekend trip away to the Tuscan countryside for her 38th birthday as the time she first knew her marriage to "Coldplay" singer Chris Martin was over.
It would be years before they actually divorced — it was finalized in 2016 — but ahead of this, Paltrow and Martin sought the help of a therapist to ease the pain of breaking up.
"I had never heard of the phrase 'conscious uncoupling.' Frankly, the term sounded a bit full of itself, painfully progressive and hard to swallow. It was an idea introduced to us by our therapist, the man who helped us architect our new future," Paltrow, now 47, wrote.
"I was intrigued, less by the phrase, but by the sentiment. Was there a world where we could break up and not lose everything? Could we be a family, even though we were not a couple? We decided to try."
Paltrow said that she and Martin, who were married in 2003, committed to approaching their separation in this unique way, but elected to "put it to the test" a year before they publicly announced it and "introduced the phrase to the world."
In the essay, Paltrow said they "had great days and terrible days," and couldn't stand each other times. However, she said she and Martin would force themselves to remember what they were trying to achieve: "Somehow finding a way to smile and hug, and take the kids out for brunch like we had planned."
After a year of conscious uncoupling, the time came to tell the public about the end of their marriage, and Paltrow recalled the day they published a 2014 newsletter on Goop — entitled "Conscious Uncoupling."
"I remember trembling on the phone to Elise Loehnen, our content chief, giving the green light to send. We knew that the piece would generate a lot of attention — a celebrity couple ending their relationship always does — but I never could have anticipated what came next," Paltrow wrote.
"The public's surprise gave way quickly to ire and derision. A strange combination of mockery and anger that I had never seen. I was already pretty tattered from what had been a tough year. Frankly, the intensity of the response saw me bury my head in the sand deeper than I ever had in my very public life."
However, Paltrow noted that while the public initially mocked the phrase, public perception has now shifted, and the phrase has become more commonplace in break-up culture.
"Instead of people approaching me with, 'Why did you say that?,' they now approach me with, 'How do you do that?'" she said.
In the conclusion of the essay, Paltrow said that she now knows that Martin, who she was married to for 13 years, was always meant to be the father of her children. She also said that she knows her current husband, "Glee" cocreator Brad Fulchuk, is meant to be the person she grows "very old with."
She ended by writing: "Conscious uncoupling lets us recognise those two different loves can coexist and nourish each other."
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