What an iceberg can teach us about divorce, courtroom battles, and the danger of believing we know the whole story.
One of the most important lessons I’ve learned in nearly three decades of practicing family law is this: Some of the information is not all of the information.
It sounds simple enough. Almost obvious. Yet in the middle of a divorce, a custody dispute, or a bitter courtroom battle, it may be one of the most difficult truths to remember. We human beings have a remarkable ability to take the information available to us, construct a narrative around it, and convince ourselves that our version of the story is the truth. Not part of the truth or simply our perspective on the truth, but the whole truth. And that’s where we get into trouble.
The Iceberg Beneath the Surface
Think about an iceberg floating in the ocean. What we see above the waterline is only a small fraction of its total mass. The overwhelming majority remains hidden beneath the surface. I’ve come to believe that the iceberg is a powerful metaphor for what happens in a courtroom, particularly when families find themselves in the middle of a divorce or custody dispute.
In a trial, the judge is asked to make life-altering decisions based on the evidence presented. That evidence represents the portion of the iceberg visible above the waterline. But beneath the surface lies an enormous amount of additional information that may never find its way into the courtroom.
Some of that information has been shared with the lawyers but never becomes part of the evidence. Perhaps it is inadmissible under the rules of evidence, legally irrelevant to the questions before the court, or impossible to sufficiently corroborate. Sometimes, for strategic reasons, information simply isn’t presented. Whatever the explanation, the lawyers may know things about the people and circumstances involved that the judge will never hear.
Deeper still are the things the parties know but have never shared with their attorneys. Private conversations, personal fears, embarrassing mistakes, unspoken motivations, and details that might dramatically change how an outsider understands the conflict. And then there is the deepest part of the iceberg: the things neither party fully understands about themselves or the other person. The unconscious patterns, unresolved wounds, assumptions, and insecurities that influence our behavior without our even recognizing what’s happening.
All of it is part of the story, but only a fraction is visible above the waterline.
The Courtroom and the Limits of Truth
This is not a criticism of our judicial system. It’s simply an acknowledgment of its limitations. Judges are human beings working within a legal framework, and they must apply the law to the admissible evidence presented to them. They cannot base decisions on speculation, private knowledge, or information that never properly enters the record.
While we often refer to a courtroom as a place where the truth comes out, the reality is more complicated. A courtroom is designed to resolve legal disputes, not necessarily to uncover every dimension of the human experience.
Over the years, I’ve represented people whose stories were far more complicated than the evidence could ever fully communicate. I’ve watched witnesses tell technically accurate stories that nevertheless left out important context. I’ve also seen situations where two people experienced the same event in profoundly different ways, and neither person was necessarily lying. They were simply looking at different parts of the iceberg.
The law requires judges to make decisions, and those decisions matter tremendously. But a judicial finding is not necessarily a complete explanation of everything that happened within a family. The evidence may establish what the court is legally entitled to conclude without revealing the entire human story that brought the parties there.
Two Things Can Be True at the Same Time
One of the most destructive features of high-conflict divorce is the belief that for one person to be right, the other person must be wrong. We become trapped in binary thinking, convinced that someone must be the victim and someone else the villain, that someone must win and someone must lose. If my account is true, then yours must be false.
But human relationships rarely fit so neatly into those categories.
A husband can have genuinely loved his wife and still have caused her tremendous pain. A wife can have legitimate reasons for wanting to leave a marriage while her husband can be genuinely devastated by her decision. A parent can deeply love a child and still make choices that are harmful to that child. Someone can be responsible for their behavior while also carrying wounds that help explain it.
Two things can be true at the same time.
That doesn’t mean all behavior is acceptable, that accountability is unnecessary, or that every allegation deserves equal weight. It certainly doesn’t mean that evidence should be ignored or that we should excuse harmful behavior simply because we understand what might have contributed to it. Explanation is not the same as excuse, understanding is not the same as agreement, and compassion does not require us to abandon boundaries.
It simply means that understanding human conflict requires the capacity to hold more than one truth at once. That kind of thinking is difficult, particularly when we are hurt, angry, or frightened. But it is also essential if we hope to move beyond conflict rather than remain trapped inside it.
The Danger of Needing to Win
In my experience, one of the greatest obstacles to resolving family conflict is the emotional need to be vindicated. People understandably want someone, especially a judge, to hear their story and declare that they were right. They want the person who hurt them to be held accountable, their suffering acknowledged, and the world to understand what really happened.
Those are deeply human desires, and I don’t minimize them. But when vindication becomes the primary objective of a divorce, the process can take on a life of its own. Every disagreement becomes another battle, every compromise feels like surrender, and every concession feels like an admission that the other person was right. Before long, people can spend extraordinary amounts of money, time, and emotional energy fighting over a version of the truth that no courtroom will ever be capable of fully capturing.
The tragedy is that even after a judge rules, the emotional need for vindication may remain unsatisfied. Winning a legal argument does not necessarily heal a wound, and losing one does not necessarily mean your experience was invalid. A court can divide property, establish custody arrangements, and determine financial obligations, but it cannot necessarily give someone the acknowledgment, apology, or emotional closure they have been seeking.
This is where the iceberg becomes particularly important. When we convince ourselves that the small portion of information visible above the waterline represents the entire truth, we become increasingly attached to our own narrative. We stop being curious about what we don’t know and start treating every competing perspective as a threat. Instead of trying to understand the conflict, we become consumed with winning it.
What Are We Not Seeing?
I believe one of the most valuable questions we can ask, whether we’re lawyers, spouses, parents, or simply human beings trying to navigate difficult relationships, is this: What am I not seeing?
What information might exist beneath the surface that would change my understanding of this situation? What if the story I’m telling myself is accurate but incomplete? What if the other person’s experience is different from mine, yet also contains truth? And what if my need to win is preventing me from recognizing an opportunity to move forward?
These questions require humility, which can be particularly difficult when we’re facing the loss of something important. But humility is not weakness. In fact, I believe the ability to acknowledge that we don’t know everything is one of the greatest demonstrations of emotional maturity. It allows us to remain grounded in what we know while leaving room for the possibility that there is more to the story.
At Robertson + Easterling, we understand that there are times when litigation is necessary. There are circumstances involving abuse, dishonesty, financial misconduct, or threats to a child’s well-being where strong advocacy and decisive judicial intervention are essential. Our responsibility as lawyers is to prepare thoroughly, present the strongest admissible evidence, and protect our clients’ legal interests.
But we also recognize that the legal outcome is only one part of a much larger human story. The end of a marriage is not simply the conclusion of a lawsuit. It is a transition in the lives of real people, often including children who will continue to love both parents long after the courtroom doors close. While the legal system may require a decision in favor of one position over another, life after divorce does not have to be organized around winners and losers.
Sometimes the most meaningful victory is not proving that the other person was wrong. It is establishing healthy boundaries, protecting your children, accepting what you cannot change, and choosing not to carry the conflict into the next chapter of your life. Sometimes it’s recognizing that being understood by a judge is not the same thing as finding peace. And sometimes it’s having the courage to acknowledge that your understanding of what happened, however sincerely held, may not be the entire story.
Remember the Iceberg
The next time you find yourself convinced that you know exactly what happened in someone else’s marriage, family, or courtroom battle, remember the iceberg. Remember that the evidence above the waterline is only a portion of the information and that beneath the surface are facts, experiences, motivations, and perspectives that may never be fully revealed. Even the people living through the conflict may not completely understand everything that contributed to it.
We can pursue justice without pretending to possess perfect knowledge. We can hold people accountable without reducing them to the worst thing they’ve ever done. We can acknowledge our own pain without denying someone else’s, and we can recognize that two things can be true at the same time.
Perhaps the greatest challenge in navigating divorce, or any meaningful human conflict, is learning to distinguish between what we know, what we believe, and what we simply cannot see. The courtroom may ultimately determine who prevails on a particular legal issue, but it is up to us to decide whether that outcome will define the rest of our lives.
Some of the information is not all of the information. And sometimes, the wisdom to recognize what we cannot see is just as important as the courage to act on what we can.
At Robertson + Easterling, we believe navigating divorce requires more than an understanding of the law. It requires perspective, thoughtful strategy, and a commitment to helping people move forward with clarity and purpose. Our goal is not simply to help clients through a legal proceeding, but to help them build a foundation for what comes next.
