You hear and read a lot about ways to improve your relationship. But if you’ve tried these without much success, you’re not alone. Many highly reactive couples—pairs that are quick to argue, anger, and blame—need more than just the run-of-the-mill relationship advice to solve their problems in love. When destructive emotions are at the heart of problems in your relationship, no amount of effective communication or intimacy building will fix what ails it. If you’re part of a “high-conflict” couple, you need to get control of your emotions first, to stop making things worse, and only then work on building a better relationship.
The High-Conflict Couple adapts the powerful techniques of dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) into skills you can use to tame out-of-control emotions that flare up in your relationship. Using mindfulness and distress tolerance techniques, you’ll learn how to deescalate angry situations before they have a chance to explode into destructive fights. Other approaches will help you disclose your fears, longings, and other vulnerabilities to your partner and validate his or her experiences in return. You’ll discover ways to manage problems with negotiation, not conflict, and to find true acceptance and closeness with the person you love the most.
This book has been awarded The Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies Self-Help Seal of Merit — an award bestowed on outstanding self-help books that are consistent with cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) principles and that incorporate scientifically tested strategies for overcoming mental health difficulties. Used alone or in conjunction with therapy, our books offer powerful tools readers can use to jump-start changes in their lives.
This book has changed how I view my friends and romantic partner completely. I can better love them without owning their reaction to my love. I understand love/attachment. I understand how someone might want to reject my love, and that it has nothing to do with me. This book was a follow up to 5 years of therapy, and I think that if you read it and aren't already on some sort of healing journey it might be offensive, or confusing for you.
Unfortunately my girlfriend when given the book has only used it to keep the cat out of her drink.
4 stars.
Yet I give this book a four-star rating because, when Richo does get around to offering specific, practical advice, it is outstanding. Particularly helpful are the author's thoughts on how introverts and extroverts receive and express love differently. I am currently in what I would consider an extrovert-introvert relationship, and I plan to consult this table over and over as a reminder. Another high point is the author's discussion of fear of abandonment and fear of engulfment. In fact, my attention heightened every time I encountered a table in the book, because putting information in a table forced the author to be succinct and boil things down to the key points - which I think he perceives more acutely than any author I've seen so far.
When I looked back at the reviews on this site after reading the book (as I did before purchasing the book), I wondered if I was crazy for not being happier with the book than I was. I suspect that for a reader who understands the word "mindful" as connotative of Zen "mindfulness" and is looking for a book that looks at relationships through this lens, this is exactly the book that he/she has been looking for. Personally, I came away from this book feeling like I had to wade through a lot in order to get to the part that was really helpful for me. But the part that was helpful was very good, and I'm not sure I would have gotten it from any other book.
I recommend this book for anyone who is inexperienced in love (or possessed of a lot of negative experiences and looking for help) and wants a thorough exploration of the various phases of a romantic relationship - and doesn't mind a fairly wordy writing style.