Marriage

From the audio tape
Conflict Resolution for Couples

How can couples prevent conflict, resolve conflict, or wipe up after conflict if it emerges? That's our topic today.

Let's not start, though, by talking about marriage or conflict. Let's talk about the weather. Let's talk about climate. Would you prefer to live in a climate with thunderstorms, wind, and dark drizzle, or a climate of warm sunshine? I think most people would prefer warm sunshine. There can be a little bit of variety. We don't need unremitting blue skies. Generally, though, the climate within the home is most comfortable for people if it is mostly sunny.

We have air conditioning and heating so that in our homes the physical climate stays stable and comfortable. This talk today is to help keep our emotional zone equally comfortable. We will be talking specifically about conflict or disruptions to that comfortable climate zone as it applies to couples. The same principles apply to relationships between parents and children, friends, work relationships. Still, our focus today is on conflict prevention, resolution, and clean up for couples.

What do we mean by conflict? Usually when people think of conflict, they think of fighting. Today's discussion goes beyond fighting, because conflict can be expressed within a home in a number of ways. By conflict, I mean times when there are differences -- differences of opinion, differences between what people want, or differences of any sort that create friction. Those differences could be expressed in anxious tension, in somebody feeling depressed, in arguments, fighting, or even violence.

Clearly, there are levels of escalation when we are talking about conflict. Conflicts can be discussed in quiet dialogue, get more heated, or can erupt in attempts to injure each other. Hopefully, with the skills we will learn today, escalations that become hurtful can be eliminated. We will learn to utilize conflict as an opportunity for building collaboration, cooperation, warmth, affection and caring -- those elements that give us a sense that our home is a source of comfort and sunshine.

$19.95 Two-tape audio set 108 minutes ISBN 1-884998-07-0
$19.95 One CD 65 minutes

The Power of Two Workbook: Communication Skills for a Strong and Loving Marriage
By Susan Heitler, Ph.D. and Abigail Hirsch, M.A.

Click here to read what The Rocky Mountain News says about The Power of Two Workbook.

What experts are saying about
The Power of Two Workbook

“Heitler and Hirsch’s The Power of Two Workbook is wonderfully sensible and use friendly, aimed at real people with the real problems of living together. It seems particularly designed for couples with pretty good marriages and very good intentions but with a faulty instruction book on relationships. This workbook is not only very wise, it is also optimist and a lot of fun.”

Frank Pittman, M.D.,
author of Grow Up! How Taking
Responsibility Can Make You a
Happy Adult

“Susan Heitler and Abigail Hirsch have written a gem of a book that will help couples, newlywed of long married, break out of the marital gridlock. No matter how solid your marriage, the skills and strategies clearly outlined here offer do-able ways to unscramble problems with which you’ve long struggled – as well as new ones that crop up along the way.”

Margery D. Rosen is
the author of several books on
marriage and relationships as well
as the long-running column, “Can
This Marriage Be Saved?” in
the Ladies’ Home Journal.

“This workbook is deceptively fun to fill out. The exercises help to develop skills that can make all the difference between a difficult marriage and a loving partnership.”

Marilyn Van Debur,
former Miss America author of
Miss America By Day

The Power of Two details the communication and conflict-resolution skills that happy couples use to deal with differences.

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Cooperative dialogue
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Conflict resolution strategies
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Shared decision making
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Expressing and receiving anger
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Recovering after upset
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Helping when your partner has a problem
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Making a good marriage great

"As a brief therapist who works within managed care contracts, I assign Power of Two homework reading to bring about rapid yet lasting change. Couples quickly learn to interrupt negative patterns and get back on track. That's gold." Barry Sroloff, Ph.D., clinical psychologist in private practice, Denver

"I recommend to my couples that they purchase two copies of The Power of Two. Each spouse highlighting the passages relevant to his/her own growth concretizes the idea that a strong couple consists of two individuals, each responsible for their own contributions to the partnership."
Barbara Ellman, LCSW, co-author of Feminist Family Therapy

"...lucid. user-friendly format."
Arnold Lazzarus, author of Multi-Modal Therapy

"...teaches the skills that make marriages successful."
John Gray, author of Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus

"...an outstanding guide."
Monica McGoddrick, author of Genograms in Family Assesment, The Changing Family Life Cycle

From the book The Power of Two:
Secrets to a Strong & Loving Marriage

Part 1
The Basics of Collaborative Dialogue

The main way that couples enjoy and accomplish, or disrupt, the business of living together is through the exchange of words. Talking together signals that you want to share your experiences with each other, that you value each other's input, and that you care about each other. What you say and hear as you talk with each other becomes your shared world. Your teamwork in running your household depends on your ability to give and take information. Your tone of voice and words convey your attitude toward each other -- liking, respect, or irritation. Connecting by talking, like sexual connecting, both expresses and consolidates your relationship.

When your dialogue feels safe, loving, and satisfying, your relationship feels like a good one. If talking together becomes dominating, tense, rude, or bruising, the relationship feels less secure and less appealing. Moreover, since verbal interaction occurs doing so much of the time you spend together, and is essential to the business of living together, how you talk to each other becomes the single best indicator of the health of your relationship.

Public peace versus battle on the home front

By the time most people are old enough to hold a job, they have developed reasonably good skills at cooperative interaction. Few adults fight with friends, neighbors, colleagues -- or for that matter, anyone outside the family circle. Most of us know enough about the guidelines for civil interactions to keep our public persona friendly and cooperative.

What changes when we go home? Family life requires considerably more shared decisions than friendship does: when to come to the dinner table, how much money to spend on what, who gets to do what when. All these issues and many more need joint agreement. The more issues -- many of which touch highly charged and emotionally sensitive concerns like power, money, sex, self-esteem, and personal autonomy -- the more likely conflict is to erupt.

$15.95 Book ISBN 1-57224-059-8 (paper, 1997)

Can all conflicts be resolved cooperatively? At Power of Two, we believe the answer to that question is a clear and solid YES. With the skills of the win-win waltz, plus some creative thinking, you can transform all of your his way--her way differences into opportunities for finding gratifying our-way solutions.

Learn how to

* Talk about sensitive issues and evoke interest, not defensiveness
* Listen in a way that consistently enables both of you to feel heard
* Dialogue with productive yes-and strategies that keep you feeling like partners
* Turn arguments into opportunities for shared creative thinking
* Find win-win solutions for every marriage dilemma.

From the outline that accompanies the audiotape Working with Couples in Conflict

Part 1

Couples Therapy: Why are couple therapy skills essential for all therapists?

* Couple treatment is generally the best treatment option for individuals with problems if they are married, as well as for patients asking for marital counseling.
* Consequences can be serious for the spouse and for the marriage when married patients are treated with individual therapy without a marital component.

Essential premises

* Premise #1: Conflicts, within and between people, lie at the core of emotional distress.
* Premise #2: Therapy involves attention to three tasks.

1. Eliminating symptoms.
2. Guiding existing disturbing conflicts to resolution.
3. Coaching skills for handling subsequent conflicts.

* Premise #3: Whatever or whomever the conflicting entities, conflicts move to resolution via passage through the same three-step route.

1. The three steps

a. Expressing initial positions
b. Exploring underlying concerns
c. Creating win-win solutions
2. Critical conceptual distinctions

a. Concerns versus solutions
b. The impact of "but"
c. Positional bargaining from excessive attachment to initial solution suggestions (positions)
d. Importance of specificity and summarizing
e. One solution versus multiple solution options and solution sets
f. Breadth and depth of concerns and how these vary for different kinds of conflicts.