De-escalating Conflict
- Austin Anger Management
- Nov 22, 2025
- 2 min read
Healthy communication takes intention, empathy, and awareness. These 9 guidelines offer practical ways to stay calm, connected, and compassionate during difficult conversations, helping both partners feel safe, heard, and respected.
Talk about one issue. Stick with the topic. Build a bridge by sharing feelings, empathize, be compassionate, and then share your experience. Validate your partner's truth. (Doesn't mean you agree.) Stay as neutral as possible. If you get distracted, gently bring yourself back to the topic.
Create safety with volume, tone, words and non-verbal behaviors. Check with your partner to make sure they feel safe, and ask them what you can do to increase their feelings of safety. Remember, the how is more important than the what.
View your partner in a positive way. While speaking, and especially while listening, think about all the things you love and admire about your partner.
Use qualifiers and de-fusers. Leave out, "always," and "never," which trigger feelings of danger.
Bring yourself back to the present moment when you find yourself living in the past or future. Every over-reaction has its origins in the past.
Listen to concerns with a weekly ritual to prevent building up resentment. Set a time without distractions to take turns asking, "Is there anything you're feeling scared about?" and then listen.
Be vulnerable. Speak your truth from your heart, which means being honest while considering your partner's feelings. Avoid using trigger words.
Remember you love the person you are talking with. Give them the benefit of the doubt, and assume their intentions are good.
Stay with calm conversation. If you feel the impulse to leave, share your feelings. "I'm feeling... scared, hurt, attacked, uncared for, invisible, panicked, overwhelmed, flooded, etc." If you feel flooded, follow the instructions in "Taking a Break to Prevent Me from Losing My Temper."
