Bridging Our Political Differences in Therapy

“I don’t understand how you can be my brother and be so screwed up about basic concepts of right and wrong. How are liberal democrats so morally bankrupt?” These words were uttered by Alex, who was talking to his younger brother, Joseph, who then matched his brother´s contempt by saying, “You must be kidding! You pretend to be a conservative Christian, but you excuse anything immoral if it’s done by someone in the Republican party.”

The brothers had been raised in a strict evangelical Christian household in the Midwest. While Alex had followed in his family’s footsteps via his religious conviction and conservative views, Joseph, who was the only member of his family to go to college, had eventually left the church and formed much more liberal views. While the family disapproved of Joseph’s liberal stance, they had remained close, perhaps because he did not assert his views too directly. In fact, Joseph and Alex were very close, despite their vastly different ways of thinking about the world. At least, until the 2020 election when Alex became incensed that “Biden stole the election.” At that point, Joseph could not refrain from directly challenging his brother’s assertions, and the two found themselves embroiled in many tense and angry exchanges that put a strain on their relationship. Then, in 2022, Joseph approached Alex about going with him to talk to a therapist for assistance working out their tensions. At first, Alex balked at this idea, but he finally relented when Joseph told him, “Either you do this with me now or we will never again have a relationship.”

Ideally, in a first therapy session, the therapist listens to and understands each person’s perspective without judgment or alignment with either party. In this case, however, Leticia, an LMFT with strong liberal views who grew up in a religiously conservative family, felt sympathetic toward Joseph and irritated with Alex. While she did not overtly express her bias, she could feel her reactivity internally and she worried it was influencing how she was directing the session. Reflecting on her strong reactions after the session, she realized nothing in her training had prepared her to address politics as a component of identity and a factor influencing relationship dynamics. She also had not received training on how to manage her reactivity to political differences or how to help clients work through theirs. This was intriguing to Leticia, given how deeply politically divided our nation is, and how much these divisions are intimately experienced within couple and family relationships.

In our JMFT article, “Divided We Fall: Constructive Dialoguing About Our Political Differences Within Family Therapy Training,” we explained that political affiliation is a central part of our identity and so an attack on our political party/positions can feel like an attack on our personhood. Although the field has focused scant attention on exploring politics in our lives, and how therapists can facilitate effective political dialogues with clients, we contend that MFTs need to be prepared to address relational difficulties related to politics. Hence, we are focusing a light on this topic now and inviting consideration of how our political orientations influence our relationships with our family, friends, colleagues, and most importantly, our clients.

Establishing a framework for exploring politics in our work

Talking politics can be provocative because when opinions differ, tensions can quickly arise. In recent years, we have witnessed how ugly political disagreements can become; hence the tendency to want to avoid political talk is understandable. Yet, as therapists, we understand that avoidance blocks intimacy and authenticity. We have found that is best to talk openly and honestly about our political positions, especially when we disagree. The key is to find ways to do this that are constructive and civil. Toward that end we focus on four concepts tied to creating a context that supports constructive political dialoguing: differentiation, self-of-the-therapist work, meta‐conversations and a focus on process over content, and replacing either/or thinking with both/and thinking.

Differentiation. Political conversations, as we witness almost daily, tend to strike people at their core and evoke strong emotional responses, making it hard to engage in civil and respectful dialogue. Murray Bowen’s concept of differentiation speaks to the capacity to discuss potentially provocative material without being emotionally reactive. Differentiation is characterized by the ability to be emotionally connected with others while maintaining a clear, solid sense of self that does not need to change or secure approval from others. The higher one’s level of differentiation, the greater the capacity to be tolerant of hearing viewpoints that may differ from your own. In a way, differentiation is the ability to emotionally self-regulate when faced with disagreement or disapproval from others. Hence, enhanced levels of differentiation play a key role in therapists’ ability to work effectively with clients from varying political persuasions.

Self-of-the-therapist work. We are the tools of our profession. Who we are matters. The various dimensions of our identity, our life experiences, and our family relationships affect what we see and do not see, and what we do and do not do as therapists. Consequently, therapists must “know thyself,” and be attuned to how the dimensions of oneself shape and influence our clinical work. While the field has focused attention on self-of-the-therapist work tied to FOO (family-of-origin), race, ethnicity, gender, religion, and social class, little attention has been focused on political orientation and the values and beliefs tied to political positions. If therapists are to be effective in helping clients negotiate their political tensions, this must begin with therapists understanding how their identity, family experiences, and life history shape their political values, beliefs, and biases, and influence how they think and feel about others with similar and differing political positions.

Meta-conversations. When a dialogue is not going well and the participants are stuck in a toxic game of back and forth, meta-conversating about the process rather than the content can sometimes be helpful. For example, if two people are angrily arguing about gun control laws and are locked in an argument that is not progressing, a therapist might intervene by avoiding the content and meta-communicating about the process by saying, “It seems you are both trapped in an escalating fight-to-the-death showdown where you are each determined to be heard but neither of you is listening to the other.” This meta-conversating is a way to lower the heat and reorient the participants so they can listen as well as speak and understand rather than try to influence.

Replacing either/or thinking with both/and thinking. Constructive dialoguing about differences is obfuscated by either/or thinking which divides the world into discrete oppositional categories that results in a process of dehumanization (e.g. “I see things in the right way because I am good/smart/moral/decent, and you see things in the wrong way because you are bad/stupid/immoral/indecent”). But the reality is that human beings are a messy mixture of virtues and vices. The greater the political divide, the greater the temptation to start reducing reality into simply either-or categories that result in vilifying the other party. For the sake of peaceful coexistence, either/or thinking must be replaced with both/and thinking that enables us to see both the good and the bad in the other, and in ourselves, which is an essential condition for forming a meaningful connection.

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Back to the case of the two brothers …

Recognizing her emotional reactivity during the session with Alex and Joseph, Leticia first sought support in her peer supervision group that included trusted colleagues of differing political affiliations. During the peer supervision Leticia and her colleagues became embroiled in several heated political discussions and she found herself feeling some of the same reactivity she did during the session with Alex and Joseph. Consequently, she decided she needed to address this within the context of her personal therapy.

Leticia explained to her therapist that she was concerned about her “political reactivity.” Her therapist guided her to explore dynamics in her family-of-origin. Leticia was the middle of five children, and she admitted that she felt like she was “the typical invisible middle child” whose ideas were often discounted or dismissed, especially by her two older siblings. The alienation she felt in her family became heightened after she went to college where she became “a lost cause liberal.” Identifying these family-of-origin dynamics illuminated why she felt reactive to Alex and sympathized with Joseph, but it did not fully account for the reactivity she felt around the political content they were disagreeing about: “I always felt like my family did not see me, and I think I dealt with that hurt by distancing myself, hence why I am the only one who lives in another state. But things got really bad after the 2020 election because when I went home for any holidays, they said such crazy things. A few times I would try to challenge things I heard but I got slapped down for that, especially by my oldest sister. The last time I was home it was really bad, and I guess I tried to protect myself by avoiding them ever since. I don’t think I realized how upset I have been.”

Leticia was seeing now that the way she had protected herself from feeling devalued and dismissed by her family, especially her older siblings, was through distancing, but this reflected a lower level of differentiation which was fueling the reactivity she felt with her clients when they enacted dynamics that were painfully familiar.

With her emerging insights Leticia saw that enhancing her clinical effectiveness would require increasing her level of differentiation so that she could sit with clients who expressed political viewpoints she found offensive while remaining non-reactively engaged. Her therapist also pointed out her growth would require reaching out to her siblings to work on simultaneously asserting her truths but without any expectation of approval or agreement, and with the resolve that she would likely be criticized and that was okay.

In addition to her therapy work, Leticia also signed up to participate in training offered by the organization Braver Angels as a way of enhancing her skills for having constructive conversations with those holding dramatically different political positions.

Relative to her sessions with Alex and Joseph, Leticia started by clarifying that the goal was to help them avoid losing their close connection over political differences. She also shared that her hope was that they could come to better hear and understand each other, but that this did not mean that they would always end up agreeing: “I think we can agree that there is a lot that you two disagree about, but we are not going to try and get either of you change your beliefs or viewpoints. Rather, the goal is for you to better listen to each other without letting anger and disdain get in the way so you can maintain your bond as brothers.”

Next Leticia established ground rules for meaningful dialoguing that she adapted from the Essential Partners model who for how to foster constructive conversations about divisive and polarizing issues (Chasin, Herzig, Roth, Chasin, Becker & Stains, 1995). These were:

1. Speak from an “I” position and hence speak only for oneself while allowing the other to speak only for himself.
2. Refrain from judging or criticizing the other’s views.
3. When tempted to judge or criticize, consider asking questions to deepen the level of understanding, even if you still disagree.
4. Refrain from trying to change the other person’s mind. The point is to understand, not to influence.
5. Do not interrupt the other except to indicate if you did not hear what was said.

She used meta-conversating to ease the tension of the moment and reorient them to things they could agree on.

Over the course of the next few weeks, Leticia had the brothers discuss topics they fervently disagreed about, and each time she consistently held them to task around adhering to the ground rules. Additionally, during moments when their conversations got stuck in their disagreement about specific issues, she used meta-conversating to ease the tension of the moment and reorient them to things they could agree on. She did this by shifting from content to process. For example, during one heated exchange, Alex stated, “Biden stole the election. It was all rigged. And that robbed us of having a President who will stand up for working people.” Joseph angrily retorted, “Countless independent investigations have proven the election was not stolen but you don’t know this because you only listen to news sources that tell you election lies. And Trump only cares about himself. He grew up rich and spoiled, unlike Biden who grew up in a working-class family, and hence he does care about working people.”

As they continued to bicker back and forth, each trying to disprove the other’s point and counter with their own facts, the intensity in the room heated up. Soon both brothers were seething. Leticia intervened by shifting them from content to process. She stated, “While you clearly differ in your viewpoints, you share a concern for the working class. Where did that come from?” This question redirected the brothers and got them talking about their parents, and growing up in a working-class family where they were taught the value of hard work. As they did this, they each softened and the ties that connected them grew clearer.

At another point, the brothers started arguing about the legitimacy of the election results and the fidelity of the judicial system. Again, Leticia intervened by pointing out that while they had divergent views about the facts, they shared a common respect for the importance of fairness and “playing by the rules.” She notd that this had a calming effect on the brothers and redirected them to talking again about their parents, which shifted the emotional tenor in the room. They connected around their shared respect for their parents who taught them about the importance of fairness. Leticia noted, “You may disagree about what defines fairness, but you are united in your commitment to the principles of fairness.” This was something that tied them together with their parents, despite their differences about what constituted fairness. To this, both brothers agreed as they smiled at each other.

After several sessions, Alex and Joseph ended therapy stating they had received what they needed. Joseph noted, “We see the world so differently in so many ways, but this process helped us remember the things we see similarly, and how we can always go back to that when we start to get angry.” Alex stated, “It’s easy to get angry when you hear things that you know are wrong, but at the end of the day, we love each other and there is so much that is right with us.”

As Leticia’s work with herself and with Alex and Joseph demonstrates, politics infiltrates all aspects of our lives and relationships. As therapists, we need to be able to do whatever work we have to do with ourselves so we can manage our own emotions, enabling us to sit calmly and non-reactively with our clients to help them navigate the political tensions that are straining their relationships.

Tracey A. Laszloffy, Ph.D., is an AAMFT Professional member holding the Clinical Fellow designation and the Director of the Center for Healing Connections in southeastern Connecticut, where she also maintains a private practice and serves as a faculty coach specializing in supporting faculty of color who are on the tenure track. Her research and clinical expertise have focused on healing the wounds of trauma and oppression, promoting culturally sensitive approaches to therapy, and addressing the relationship between human health/well-being and the health/well-being of the planetary ecological system. Jason J. Platt, Ph.D., is an AAMFT Professional member holding the Clinical Fellow and Approved Supervisor designations based in Mexico City. His educational, research, and clinical focus has focused on internationalizing mental health services and training. He maintains a private practice where his clinical work is primarily with bi-national couples and humanitarian aid workers around the globe. He has particular expertise in working with patients based in high-threat and high-challenge environments.