What is the Gottman Level 3 Training?

There is no better way to learn how to apply Gottman Method Couples Therapy than the Level 3 Training. This advanced, practicum workshop is only offered in (synchronous) real-time, either by Drs. John and Julie Gottman or by a Certified Gottman Trainer around the world in virtual and in-person training events.

Through videotaped cases of real couples, hands-on role plays, demonstrations of assessments and interventions, and nuanced discussion of technique, the Level 3 Training significantly expands participants’ understanding of when and how to use Gottman Method techniques.

Training Description

In large and small-group breakouts , participants will have the opportunity to practice and refine their use of Gottman Method therapy and receive personalized guidance in developing a roadmap for making sound clinical decisions.

The Level 3 Training curriculum addresses the complex presentations, true resistances and challenging co-morbidities we face on the front lines as relationship therapists and how we can transform them into effective healing methods for the couple. The workshop is structured to help create a safe and secure environment so participants can learn and practice while feeling free of criticism and negative judgment.

Building on the knowledge obtained from Level 1 and Level 2 Trainings, participants will master how to effectively conduct a Gottman assessment, use the Oral History Interview during a couple’s assessment and understand its implications. They will learn how to clearly explain to a couple their strengths and challenges in terms of the Sound Relationship House, and how to develop a case conceptualization and treatment plan that structures the treatment based on the couple’s presenting concerns and the assessment data.

Participants will learn how to conduct intervention sessions with a client-centered flexible and dynamic approach.  They will know how to select and utilize appropriate tools to help a couple deepen their Friendship System. They will learn how to clarify a couple’s conflicts in terms of solvable, perpetual, and gridlocked problems, and use the Rapoport and Dreams Within Conflicts techniques to help a couple communicate effectively and to achieve break-throughs with their perpetual conflicts.

Participants will learn how to successfully intervene when one or both partners are flooding, help a couple reach solutions using the Compromise Ovals intervention, and sensitively intervene when comorbidities are present. Click here for the Level 3 preparation checklist.

At the completion of this training, participants will be able to:

• Conduct a thorough assessment of a relationship system using the Gottman assessment protocol including conducting the joint, individual, and feedback sessions.
• Ask appropriate Gottman Oral History questions and stay on track with sensitivity to couple’s issues and building rapport, with appropriate timing and with sensitivity to issues of comorbidities.
• Analyze and present the Gottman checkup results to the partners in a sensitive and therapeutic manner.
• Build a coherent and client centered treatment plan that addresses the specific goals for therapy and presenting concerns based on the clinical interviews and the Gottman checkup results.
• Conduct intervention and relationship change sessions therapeutically by choosing an intervention that is appropriate for the clients at the moment.
• Facilitate a Rapoport intervention to help couples learn listening and validation skills.  Explain research showing that the first three minutes of a discussion predicts whether that discussion will go well and whether their overall relationship will go well.  Introduce the concept of softened start-ups and explain why it helps (i.e., it is easier for their partner to hear and understand their point).
• Explain the importance of expressing needs in positive terms and instruct each partner to restate their point without criticism and then direct them to resume dyadic interaction.
• Recognize, interrupt, and redirect a couple’s communication when the Four Horsemen are present in their communication process by explaining the operational definitions of each of the horsemen, the research-based antidotes, and guide the couple to resume communication in a more collaborative and dyadic way.
• Identify when one or both partners are physiologically flooded (and not just upset) and stop the interaction between the couple.  Provide a brief explanation of flooding in clear, sensitive language.  Intervene by guiding one or both partners through a relaxation technique before continuing.
• Help partners engage in deeper discussions that prevent gridlock on perpetual issues by using the Dreams within conflict intervention.  
• Explain the Dreams Within Conflict process and goals clearly.
• Instruct a couple on the Dreams Within Conflict intervention.
• Assist one partner to ask the other partner questions about the dream or deeper meaning embedded in their specific gridlocked issue.
• Provide The Dream Catcher Questions handout and coach one partner to ask the other questions from the handout to increase understanding of their partner’s underlying dreams or deeper meaning embedded in the specific gridlocked issue; help the couple hold to the questions to go deeper vs. getting into their own point of view.
• Guide a couple through a recovery conversation using the Aftermath of a fight or regrettable incident intervention
• Help breakthrough impasses in a couple’s communication by using the Dan Wile and Internal working model interventions.
• Guide a couple to use friendship and shared meaning interventions in session to build positivity and create or renew shared meaning in the system.
• Instruct and guide the couple on using the Art of Compromise to achieve win-win agreements on perpetual gridlocked problems.
• Stop a couple's interaction when one or both partners are not accepting influence.
• Explain the need for accepting influence. This includes finding a way to understand and honor some aspect of their partner’s position, with a focus on yielding and accepting influence rather than on persuading.
• Stop a couple and instruct in the concept of offering and accepting repairs and why it is useful.  Provide the Repair Checklist and explain its use.
• Guide a couple to use and practice the interventions at home starting with friendship and shared meaning exercises followed by communication and conflict management exercises
• Help a couple graduate from couples therapy with a focus on relapse prevention, maintenance of skills, and understanding of how to support each other’s life dreams