Most of us are pretty bad at conflict, usually because we weren’t taught how to handle it well. But healthy conflict can be one of the best ways to deepen intimacy and trust. On this episode of the Being Well Podcast, Dr. Rick and Forrest discuss why conflict is so difficult, the models of conflict we inherit from childhood, what healthy conflict and repair look like, what emotional flooding does to the brain and body during a fight, and the research on what actually predicts relationship success. They close with a handful of things that get mistaken for repair but aren’t, including submission, thin apologies, and just solving the surface problem.
Rick’s Attachment Course: Join Rick for a 5-week online course on using the research-backed HEAL method to heal insecure attachment and create new neural pathways for interacting and connecting securely. You can learn more here.
Key Topics
- 0:00: Intro
- 3:19: Repair as the biggest predictor of relationship success
- 5:29: Models of conflict and where they originate from
- 16:08: What is healthy repair, and why is it so hard?
- 24:54: What to do about emotional flooding
- 30:25: When to let things go, and when to address them
- 38:36: What repair is and what it’s not
- 46:47: The power of authentic apologies
- 57:04: Recap
