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Figs O'Sullivan

  • August 20, 2026

Why Would Anyone Want to Be a Couples Therapist?...

Why Would Anyone Want to Be a Couples Therapist?

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🎧 Prefer to listen? Why Would Anyone Want to Be a Couples Therapist? the audio version from the Figlet daily podcast.

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You act meanest when you feel most unlovable inside.

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Ask Figlet about why you act unlovable.

All people have places inside where they don’t feel lovable, and when those places get touched, we don’t look particularly lovable to other people, because we’re protesting being disconnected. How can we show up in that vulnerability even though we feel threatened?

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Every couple has a pattern they cannot see. Find yours.

In love, each of you is a Relentless or a Reluctant, which makes you one of three kinds of couple: Relentless and Reluctant, two Relentless, or two Reluctant. The free quiz reveals your creatures and the cycle they fall into together. About three minutes.

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Figs O'Sullivan is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT #79062) and the founder of Empathi. For 17 years he has helped couples move out of disconnection and back into secure, loving connection, drawing on Emotionally Focused Therapy and attachment science. With his wife Teale, he runs a San Francisco couples therapy practice, is a relationship expert to the Stars and Silicon Valley, and built Figlet, an AI relationship coach trained on their clinical work. His approach has guided more than 58,000 relationship assessments.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What makes couples therapy different from individual therapy?+
Individual therapy is like working on your car engine while it's turned off. Couples therapy is working on it while it's running at full throttle. In couples work, you're watching the Waltz of Pain happen live, two childhood strategies colliding right in front of you. You can't hide behind insight or fancy theories because the reactivity is immediate and raw. When someone's attachment system gets triggered, they don't look particularly lovable, and that's exactly when the real work begins. It's messy, vulnerable, and requires the therapist to stay regulated while everyone else is losing their minds.
Do couples therapists need special training to work with relationship issues?+
Absolutely. You can't just take your individual therapy skills and apply them to couples. That's like trying to conduct an orchestra when you only know how to play solo piano. Couples therapy requires understanding systemic patterns, the Infinity Loop of mutual reactivity, and how to interrupt the Versus Illusion where partners see each other as the enemy. Most importantly, it demands what I call the Wounded Healer approach, where you use your own lived experience and marital repairs to normalize struggle without shaming couples. You need specialized training in attachment science and how to facilitate emotional repair.
How do couples therapists handle their own relationship triggers while working?+
This is the secret sauce of effective couples work. When I see a couple stuck in their Waltz of Pain, it often mirrors patterns from my own marriage. Instead of pretending I'm above it all, I use that recognition to stay humble and present. The Body as the First Ledger means my nervous system remembers every moment I've felt abandoned or inadequate, just like my clients. The key is doing your own repair work consistently so you can be a non-anxious presence when couples are dysregulated. If you're curious about getting support for your own relationship patterns, check out Figlet, our AI relationship coach for 24/7 guidance between sessions.