i've worked with people who will tell me
that their parents never showed any
affect literally stoic all the time so
that it taught them that they're not
supposed to talk about it or if they
show a negative emotion or they say
something the parents are like oh hush
like i don't want you to talk about that
so then they learn that they're not
supposed to and then as adults they
learn to shut that part of themselves
away
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so when we talk about the specific tools
that can be used to mitigate this type
of change uh the first one is
encouraging effect yeah encouraging
affect so
oftentimes people who have insecure
attachment have a lot of difficulty with
communicating affect in a pro-social way
what does that mean communicating assets
so communicating their internal feelings
okay and talking about them in ways that
would be actually pro-social and get
them what they need so for example an
adult who has anxious uh preoccupied
attachment
they will be over communicative with
their emotions they're even a little bit
heightened when they talk about their
feelings and whenever they have a
negative feeling they feel like they
have to act on it right away instead of
you know what this is not the time i'm
in the middle of a work meeting
we can let that sit and i'll deal with
my partner when i get home no they're
just they can't even focus at work
they're struggling with focusing on what
they need to do that day with all of the
feelings that they're having and the
relationship dispute that they just had
this morning and so
they start to
act in a way that is very reassurance
seeking from their partner and the
partners like what's going on i'm at
work i don't have time to talk about
this right and they get stressed out and
so you can see how this can play out on
the other side individuals who are more
dismissive in their attachment they
don't talk about their feelings at all
in fact i've worked a lot with patients
who we call alexa thymic and these are
people who can't even put words to their
emotional content if you ask them how
they feel they're like i don't know do
you feel sad
that would be an okay way to describe it
it's like well tell me how you feel i'm
not really sure it's like they don't
even go there to the point where they
don't even understand their internal
affective or feeling states anymore so
this type of technique is really about
encouraging affect in a way that is not
threatening to the person but also
teaching them that talking about your
feelings is healthy and it doesn't have
to be scary and also just because you
have a feeling doesn't mean you have to
react to it right so depending again on
where your attachment difficulties are
and how it's playing out in your current
life is it a role struggle is it a
relationship issue is it a lack of
social skills whatever it is
reconstructing that map of how to
communicate and encourage affect in a
way that would get them to the places
that they need in life that's huge
that's really huge not to be well this
is incredibly sexist but don't you feel
like men have a tougher time expressing
how they feel than women and it makes a
lot of sense because that is the social
script that we've been given
females are led to believe that it's
more okay to talk about their feelings
whereas males in general not as much so
unless you've had a parent or parents
who really encourage that in you
in general yes men have a more difficult
time expressing their emotions in a
straightforward fashion than females do
but i think it can also vary again
depending on how you were raised what
type of attachment issues you might have
sometimes we find that there are
a lot of women who have a hard time uh
exp talking about their feelings again
because they've just they've decided to
view that as a sign of weakness
and perhaps they were taught that in
their childhood again maybe coming from
their attachments right i've worked with
people who will tell me that their
parents never showed any affect
literally stoic all the time so that it
taught them that they're not supposed to
talk about it or if they show a negative
emotion or they say something the
parents are like oh hush like i don't
want you to talk about that so then they
learn that they're not supposed to and
then as adults they learn to shut that
part of themselves away and so this
encouraging affect technique is really
really important for them to
re-establish healthy
emotional expression with their current
relationships so is part of the ipt
process then
helping people
cope or manage their relationship with
somebody who maybe
acts right away on feelings in the
moment without
really thinking about it yeah well i
think again it might depend on the type
of attachment style that you have so if
you're a dismissive person and your
partner is an anxious preoccupied person
that really needs to be worked on and in
fact i find that pairing happen all the
time earlier we talked about the fact
that people will reenact their earlier
traumas and cycles and so if you had a
dismissive parent
your most likely attachment development
is going to be anxious preoccupied and
then as an adult you keep finding
dismissive adults to try to replay that
script with and try to fix that problem
but you end up with the same outcome
right and that makes you even more
anxiously preoccupied but how if i'm at
work right now and my phone is blowing
up for because my partner
just
is thinks you know i'm yeah unfaithful
yeah and they want to talk about it
right now and they're going that's
that's even i would actually understand
that a little bit right let's say i
forgot to lock the door and they are
angry that i forgot to lock the door
again and they want to talk me right
what do i do about that
so i think
depending on again where you are so are
you a securely attached person or you're
a dismissively attached person you may
need to work on different things so as a
healthy attached person what you need to
work on is a healthy assurance of that
person right how do i assure this person
but also put boundaries on what they're
doing
i i understand that you're stressed out
i'm assuring you that i've locked the
door
let's talk in about an hour when i have
a break got it right and and i think
that's probably going to be the same
type of technique you would teach
somebody who has a dismissive attachment
but it might be harder for them in the
beginning right they might be very
reactive like oh my gosh you know the
more that you do this and more just
makes me want to never talk to you even
though i'm just sitting here and i could
respond to you but i'm doing it on
purpose because i don't want you to rely
on me so much and it bothers me so again
i think the technique is a little bit
different depending but um but it's such
a good example i think because
i think people can relate to that
there's these different styles that
people tend to communicate in yeah okay
let's move to clarification so
clarification is focusing on the not
only the communication styles but also
your internal beliefs about it so if you
have a very extreme belief clarification
is really understanding
where that comes from and trying to
resolve it so clarification can also
involve some cbt where you examine that
belief and you say well this belief
doesn't make sense where did it come
from and how is it playing out in your
in your life right now but clarification
can also come from
our communication if you say something
and i think i heard something teaching
techniques like wait let me just make
sure i understood what you just said
kyle and now summarize what i think you
said and ask you is that correct and you
can say no that's not it at all actually
what i was trying to tell you is this
and that resolves 90 of communication
conflicts because usually we react to
what we think we heard
and so that clarification process even
taught as a tool between people who are
trying to talk is so helpful because one
is slows down the process so if you're
already reactive forcing you to like
stop and summarize what the other person
said and then allowing them to clarify
back to you yes that's what i said or no
it's not yes it slows down the reaction
yes right because usually you just get
into a frenzy wall and then you did this
and then you did this and you did this
and you did this and so that can also be
very very helpful and i think that that
can even be a way in which you can
clarify even on text or emails because
people just get into a texting storm
which by the way people who tend to get
into testing storms are people who are
more
anxious preoccupied when you see like
15 texts in a row that maybe could have
been
summarized into one intact text but
they're and then this
and then this and then this and then
this but if you utilize the
clarification technique here you can say
hold on you texted me 15 different
messages let me try to understand what
it is that you're trying to say here are
you trying to say this right it breaks
up that communication even when it's
something like text
i don't know if this is completely
relevant but
in the last few months i had this big
realization that most arguments is are
not because we differ in our viewpoint
it's that we differ in the definition of
one of the words being used
so if if we said
um
if somebody said do you think disneyland
is fun you might say yes and i might say
no and it's because you and i have
different definitions of the word fun
right but we will instead argue
why the components of disneyland that i
don't think are fun and the components
that you do rather than just agreeing oh
we have different definitions of the
word fun right makes so much sense yeah
and so that clarification can squ i feel
like squash a ton of disagreements a ton
of arguments if we just say all right
before you say we're going to do this
early tomorrow what is early to you
right because early to me is 5 a.m if
you're thinking it's 9 a.m then that's
not early we need to clarify the
definitions of the words we're using
absolutely language is
a tool in which we use to communicate
but not everybody uses language in the
same way yes right and remember when you
had me describe how to stand up and i
couldn't do it during our act series you
had described getting out of the chair
and i was like well i'll take my hands
and she's like what do you mean take
your hands you know every little step
yeah so yeah that clarification point is
a life changer i think yes yeah
absolutely all right let's move to
communication analysis okay
communication analysis so this is great
i think that this is where the therapist
can impart so much knowledge in terms of
how people work when they're in a
didactic and they're talking to each
other and so sometimes you don't even
realize the non-verbals that you're
giving off oh yeah and as somebody's
talking you're already like looking away
and that's a dismissive gesture that
maybe you don't even recognize and even
your partner's not calling you out on
and the therapist is saying whoa the
minute you mentioned his mom
that started happening right and really
analyzing the nonverbal and the verbal
aspects of a communication pattern and
identifying where the problem or problem
areas are and where you need to start
troubleshooting and oftentimes this
involves seeing where things get
triggered like who's getting triggered
by what or what makes people go away and
withdraw
and also how people respond to a
technique that you actually think is
helpful so sometimes let's say one
person agrees to use the clarification
techniques and somebody does not and
when you try to do the clarification
technique on your partner they roll
their eyes so it's like okay well what
about this clarification technique is
turning you off yeah because clearly you
look turned off so now we gotta clarify
your response to the clear clarification
technique yeah and so a lot of this is
actually um almost like a behavioral
observation that the therapist will do
and then they'll provide an analysis of
what they think is the strengths in your
communication as well as the areas that
need to be fixed and then teach you the
specific techniques on how to do better
yeah what a great what great insight to
have right i think it's so fun i i get
to watch myself back on camera and so
i'm aware of the facial expressions i'll
make and and not but i don't have that
insight in when i'm just sitting and
talking with a friend and i'm probably
more vulnerable but i've been told by
friends saying you know however you're
feeling you wear that on your face so
yeah i'm telling you a story and you
don't believe me
it shows so i'm gonna watch that yeah
yeah i'm the same way and and on the one
hand i want to watch it but on the other
hand i don't want to watch it right
because it's like my value is to just be
an authentic person true so it's an
interesting thing too like when we're
talking about sort of what's important
and what's the definition of something
so some people might say well no to be a
polite person you should watch your
facial expressions and maybe that's why
they're upset with you yes and i'm
thinking no to be a polite person is to
be honest person yeah and that's why i
do what i do and then but then once you
get that understanding perhaps it will
resolve some of the conflicts that you
were having or their reactions to you
yes oh this is so good okay the final
one is facilitating behavioral change
that sounds like the toughest yeah so
this is where you actually have to put
all of your intellectual learnings into
practice right so oh okay this is why i
communicate the way i do oh okay i have
the type of attachment that would make
it more difficult for me to have a
relationship with so and so but what do
you actually do about it well a lot of
it involves some role play in the
therapy session you know how do we
actually
put this into practice okay let's
pretend i'm your dad you know and we're
going home for the holidays and you know
you're going to get into this
conversation it's going to activate you
so let's talk about how you might manage
that um but aside from the role play the
therapist will also assign you to do
behavioral experiments in your real life
like okay this week's assignment is for
you to go and talk to your sister about
the fact that she lied to you the last
time she talked to you and how that made
you feel and doing so in a way that
doesn't provoke a lot of emotional
reaction but still gets to the point of
what you're trying to say to her because
if you want to have a good relationship
with her you have to be able to trust
her right and so
really kind of giving you these
assignments and then you going out and
doing these assignments and then
reporting back and letting them know how
you did and then restructuring more
assignments to make you more and more
effective and have higher levels of
confidence in all of your interactions
this sounds so good it's so fun i feel
like i need this yeah yeah i feel like
everybody could benefit from that you
think that you're doing a good job but
maybe you could be better
we all can be better that's the whole
point yeah yeah and there are things
that i would avoid unknowingly like
having a call with my sister because
she's like ah my sister lies i'm i'm
gonna try to not let that bother me but
i might learn through therapy that it
really does bother me and more
importantly i can learn how to have a
conversation with her to improve our
relationship hello hello who doesn't
want that uh final thoughts on these
four areas well i would say that you
know we're all social beings that's what
human beings are we're all social beings
and that's why i find ipt can be just so
immensely helpful no matter what you're
going through and everybody can benefit
from a communication analysis everybody
can benefit from learning clarification
techniques i found that when i first
learned that and sometimes we call it
reflection where you reflect back what
the person said maybe in slightly
different words but hopefully still
capturing the gist it was amazing
because sometimes you felt great like
okay i'm getting it i know what you're
saying other times you're like whoa
somehow i completely missed the mark
because they'll correct you and you'll
say whoa because i was about to go on a
whole other tangent because of my belief
of what you just said that's right and
now that you've corrected me all of
those feelings of stress and and angst
about oh my gosh now we have to talk
about this whole other thing that we
don't agree on just went away because
actually we agree crazy yeah it's
amazing yeah
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