Antoni Martínez is a psychologist and motivational coach. He graduated from the University of Valencia in 2002. He later completed a Master's degree in Health Psychology and took doctoral courses. With an extensive professional career, he has been helping people achieve their goals for more than 15 years. He is currently also director of Positive Psychology, a blog with numerous followers where he shares his knowledge with the world.
Q. What led you to study Psychology?
A. It was always something very vocational. I've always had it in my head, I wanted to understand why people behave the way they do. Although, if I had to choose a reason, it would be to help people be happy.
Q. Throughout your career as a psychologist you will have learned a lot about human behavior and emotions. If you had to summarize all your learning, what would you highlight?
A. As you say, it is complicated. Each person is different and must be taken into account when doing therapy. However, we all have things in common. We all have that desire to achieve peace and happiness with ourselves, and I think that is what I would stick with.
Q. Do you think it is difficult for people to achieve happiness? If so, for what reason?
R. Happiness It can be difficult to achieve because we seek to reach a goal. In my opinion, happiness lies in knowing how to manage our thoughts well. We have on average 60,000 thoughts throughout the day, many of which are bad. Thinking that everyone is against you is not going to make you a happy person. These thoughts that bring us closer to happiness can be worked on, and today we have many ways to do this.
Q. Going into negative emotions, specifically in conflictive situations, do you think that people argue too much?
A. We argue a lot because we don't communicate well. We say things wrong, aggressively. If we communicated properly there would be no argument, but reaching that point requires a certain degree of assertiveness.
Q. What role does active listening play in conflict situations? Do you think that people, in general, listen to each other little?
A. Active listening means that I listen and pay attention to what the other person wants to tell me, which is why it plays a very important role in conflicts. The main problem is that we listen to each other, but not always actively.
Q. Do you think that a psychologist is more qualified to act as a mediator than, for example, a lawyer or a social worker?
A. A psychologist knows mental processes, so he is well qualified to act as a mediator. However, a lawyer has the legal knowledge and a social worker has the social knowledge, so both would be qualified in my opinion.
Q. As a psychologist, would you recommend a person go to mediation before going to trial?
A. Of course. When we get into a conflictive situation, we all want to feel heard. A conversation can save the situation, since deep down we want to feel valued and heard.
Q. How does conflict mediation influence people's happiness and emotions?
A. It has a lot of influence since we all want to feel valued and listened to. If we manage to feel this way, the conflict can be solved, but for that we have to work and dedicate time to active listening.
Q. In your opinion, what values or capabilities should a good conflict mediator have?
A. Active listening, assertiveness, empathy, as we were saying. But also the structure of the mediation process. That is, a clear analysis of the situation must be made. See what both parties want and where they would like to go. After that, develop a process between the two. Finally, agree in writing or at least very clearly verbally on the resolutions taken.
Q. Is there anything else you want to highlight about mediation or psychology?
A. I would like to highlight that, in conflict situations, the first area to resort to is or should always be mediation or couples therapy, for example. Thus we move towards a jointly reasoned solution.
Interview prepared by Rocío Sánchez
