Amends Dialogue

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[Music]
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so the immense dialogue is one of my
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favorite dialogues because
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as an avoider i'm used to the idea that
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if i have to apologize it means that i'm
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basically a terrible person and you know
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i just want to stay away from that
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feeling and you know pretend that
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nothing bad have ever happened but what
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i've discovered is that really when if
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i've done something that hurts my
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partner and i'm able to step up and to
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take responsibility for that and and to
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let her know that i really care about
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her and that i really want to make
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things better and that my longing for
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her is to um is for things to be good in
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her world then what can actually happen
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is i can screw up
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doing a men's dialogue and because it's
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coming from an on honest place and i
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wasn't intending to screw up or hurt her
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in some way that we can actually end up
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better connected after that than we were
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before
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and so the immense dialogue is quite um
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it's quite simple and so in this case
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where uh luke is going to be the person
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who is going to be trying to do an
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amends with manu so he's going to start
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off by saying i'd like to have an
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immense dialogue it's now a good time i
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know i'd like to have an immense
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dialogue is now a good time yes it is
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and so as always we're doing the
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invitation to give um
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one an opportunity to to check and
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bear in mind that if we're doing a me in
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a men's dialogue we are talking about
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something where something's happened
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that that isn't isn't great and um and
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so manu might just take a moment just to
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do an internal check to check that she's
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available that she's open um and ready
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ready to receive
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and so now luca's going to start by
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saying very specifically what it is that
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he wants to make amends uh for
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and um and so to be very tangible and
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very specific so that manu knows exactly
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what he's talking about so he's not he's
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not going to do in a means like i just
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want to make uh you know doing a means
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for you know not being very thoughtful
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or you know or being a bit uh bossy or
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grumpy because money's like what time
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are you talking about then we want them
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very specific so we know exactly what's
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happening and um
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and um and obviously he's not going to
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be being doing any defending or
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justifying he's just going to describe
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the behavior that he is wanting to make
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an amends for
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i want to apologize for last week
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when we were running late and i told you
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that you could just take an uber and go
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by yourself
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so um and zamanu knows exactly what he's
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talking about and so the next piece that
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luca's going to do is he's going to
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share with manu his understanding of how
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that would have hurt her
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i know that that would have been a
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really hurtful painful comment to hear
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that you probably would have taken it as
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rejection and that i was leaving you or
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or abandoning you and going on my own
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and i know that would have made you sad
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and angry
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and so luke is saying i know i know i
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know but he's doing it in a tone um that
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that indicates that he is kind of
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guessing and he's doing his best guess
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um so he may be wrong um in terms of
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this and so he's gonna he's just gonna
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check um with manu so am i getting that
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am i getting that
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yes you are
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and um and so manu might confirm that
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yep you're on the right track and she
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might also add if there was another
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element that was particularly you know
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painful um for her or something that
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came up that he didn't cover in the
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initial apology
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yeah for me was really painful for
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hearing that in that way in the way that
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you tell me angry with anger and
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yeah to say just i will just get up just
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get over and
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so the tone is also upsetting for you
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okay that makes sense thanks so luca's
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um doing what he just did there so he's
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going to mirror that mirror the tone and
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when someone mentions a feeling like
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anger i would tend to to mirror that
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that thing so it was really hard hard
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for you um that i was angry as well just
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to make sure that that feeling in
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particular gets caught so it was really
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hard for you to hear that i was angry as
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well
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and so now you're going to double check
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so have i got that now so have i got
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everything now
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now i personally wouldn't say have i got
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everything because that would then lead
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someone to go and start dredging um for
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information and what we're aiming for is
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have i got you and so all we're talking
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about manu as she is in this moment
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rather than sending her in a
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pain-finding mission because that's not
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really something we want to do have i
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got you know
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yes you did
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and um and so now what luke is going to
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do and this is a really kind of amazing
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uh piece which i'll talk a little bit
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more about after he's done it is he's
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gonna talk about um so what is it uh
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what i wish i had done instead and what
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he's gonna try and do is create a really
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powerful positive um picture of an
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alternate response
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to his feeling of whatever was going on
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for him when he said that what i wish
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i'd have done differently is that i wish
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i would have noticed that my anger was
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starting to bubble to the surface and
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take a deep breath and exhale and walk
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up to you and give you a cuddle and kiss
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your neck and tell you as kindly and
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gently as possible that it would be
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really really appreciated if we
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left as soon as possible because we were
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already running late
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and then hopefully it would have been
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lovely for you to
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then accept that
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and agree and then we would have left
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lovingly rather than
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and so he's going to pass the rather
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than so we because what we're doing here
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is in
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manu's brain in this emotional
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area where she stored this painful
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experience we are now overlaying another
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story and the really cool thing about
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the emotional brain the child brain is
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it's not time-bound and so if we paint a
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good enough picture the child brain
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doesn't know that the story that luke's
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painting is actually different from the
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experience and so what happens is it
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acts as this really powerful
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desensitizing um agent in in her brain
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so that when she remembers
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the painful experience
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of you know being told to go and get an
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uber she's also going to remember this
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picture that luke has created and so um
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and so you can really in this case you
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can kind of go big or go home it's it's
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one of those things i wish you know i'd
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say hey babe you know well it's really
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important we can get here on time it'll
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be so awesome if you come and you looked
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up at me with this big smile and said
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okay babe i need about 10 more minutes
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to party and you know and if he can
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build a positive enough picture so that
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money is laughing by the end of it and
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feeling really happy then he's been
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really successful um in terms of that so
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look i'm going to give you another
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opportunity to kind of go go even bigger
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on that so what i wish i'd done instead
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was what i wish i had done instead was
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take a deep breath when i notice i'm
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angry and walk up to you put my arms
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around your waist and kiss your neck
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and then get you to put down whatever
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you were doing and look you in the eyes
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and say babe
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you look absolutely beautiful
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and you know how important this is would
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it be possible if we could get going
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soon and i'll give you all the love and
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i promise you you won't be any less
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beautiful if we get going now
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and um and then edin and manu might have
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responded bye manu might have responded
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with with a big smile on her face
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and she would say yes i know how
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important it is for you to be on time
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let's go
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okay and so we've created uh created
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this positive picture um and then luke's
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just gonna finish by saying um so thank
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you for listening to me thank you for
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listening to me
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thank you for sharing
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and now manu in this stage is is uh has
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an opportunity to respond uh fairly
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briefly by um by locking in what was
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powerful for her about the apology so
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what touched me about what you shared
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what touched me about what you share is
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that you actually
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and we're in in general i'm going to
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advise her not to use the phrase
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actually
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so what touched me about you shed was
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what i liked is that you thought about
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it
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i apologize
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for
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the moment that for me was
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actually
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really
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sad
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and
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and i was also angry about
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the way that you react to me
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so thank you for that thank you for
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saying
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thank you for sharing
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okay
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so
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this a men's dialogue um is relatively
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simple uh in terms of that it starts off
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with a very specific apology um then we
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build into this the sense of our
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understanding of how it is that we've
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hurt our partner and then we we build an
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alternate picture and this is really
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important because if you want to change
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difficult or challenging pattern
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it's really hard when your brain is
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stressed so luke in this incident um
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instant incident was feeling really kind
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of angry so you know it's really hard
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for him to to think creatively and
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flexibly when his brain's in a fight
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flight pattern um but by in this
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situation where he's not under so much
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stress to create an alternate picture
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also helps them in his brain encode an
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alternate response so that when he's in
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a similar situation because we know in
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relationship the person who tends to be
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late in the relationship is very seldom
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going to change so we can assume that
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for luke and manu you know luke
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is more likely to be the one who's going
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to be on time or worried about time one
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is more likely to be the one that's late
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so we know that this scenario is going
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to happen again and so what we're
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putting into luke's brain as well is a
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um an alternate strategy about what he
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could um could do and then if he was
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able to remember that in a future
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stressful situation and to walk up to
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manu and look at her and say hey it's
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really important that we go now
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hopefully manu is going to remember that
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and there will be an opportunity for her
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to respond differently and to start
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creating a more positive alternate cycle
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[Music]
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you