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I have seen families literally destroyed by trust disputes. When a loved one dies, whatever slights and rivalries existed among the heirs no longer have that person present to keep the peace — and they get worked out, painfully, through the estate. These are among the most intense disputes I handle, because the money is never really only about the money.

Why estate disputes run so deep

When a family member feels wronged by another family member, the emotion runs far deeper than in any business dispute. Very often, when you look back through the history of the siblings bringing a case against a trust, you find people who felt disenfranchised or unfairly treated growing up. The trust fight is carrying baggage that is decades old. That is why a court can settle the dispute while the conflict continues — and why the appeals never seem to end.

Settling a dispute is not resolving the conflict

There is a real difference between settling a dispute and resolving a conflict. A court, or even a mediator who simply leverages the law, can produce a settlement while leaving the underlying conflict fully intact. In family matters especially, the work is to resolve the conflict — and that usually requires a stage of the process dedicated to letting people feel heard and validated. Validation does not mean “you were right.” It means, “As you explain this, I can understand why you would feel that way.” Often that is the first time anyone has offered it, and it is frequently the breakthrough.

The human dimension lawyers can miss

Estate attorneys are excellent at what they do, but they are trained to focus on the legal dimension: Does this hold up? They can neglect the human dimension, which is exactly what matters most when a trust involves a family. A mediation looks not at who did what yesterday, but at what would be best for everyone tomorrow — and searches for creative solutions the law alone would never produce.

Design the trust to prevent the dispute

Much of this pain is preventable. Two suggestions I offer grantors again and again:

• Think hard before naming a beneficiary as trustee. Appointing one child — the eldest, or the favorite — as trustee over the others is a common recipe for conflict. A trusted family confidant or independent professional, someone who is not also a beneficiary, is often the wiser choice.
• Build dispute-resolution instructions into the trust itself. One of the grantor’s goals should be to make sure the trust does not tear the family apart. You can specify, in advance, how disputes will be handled — and that foresight is worth far more than the legal drafting alone.

Remarkably, in all my years I have never had a grantor call and say, “We’re creating a trust — we’d like to sit down and negotiate the human aspects to avoid problems later.” For high-value trusts and complicated families, that conversation may be the most valuable one you can have.

Raphael Lapin is a Harvard-trained mediator based in Los Angeles who has mediated more than a thousand disputes, including trust and estate conflicts. Learn more about mediation and dispute resolution at Lapin Negotiation Services. This article is general information, not legal advice.

When a dispute arises, most people assume there is only one road: litigation. In fact there is a whole spectrum of options, and choosing well can save you enormous cost, time, and stress. I think of it as the dispute resolution continuum, running from the least invasive option to the most.

1. Negotiation

At the far left is direct negotiation — you and the other party sitting down to resolve the matter yourselves. It is the cheapest and fastest route. Its limitation is that once a dispute already exists, it is often loaded with emotion, and many direct negotiations stall because of it.

2. Mediation

If negotiation fails, mediation is the next step. Mediation is, simply put, facilitated negotiation. A neutral mediator — an expert in the process of negotiation and communication — helps the parties talk productively and reach their own resolution. Crucially, the mediator has no power to decide anything. If the parties do not agree, there is no agreement. And yet, in practice, the large majority of cases that reach mediation settle. Why spend years and hundreds of thousands of dollars in court when you can bring that resolution forward to now?

3. Arbitration

Move further along the continuum and you reach arbitration. Unlike mediation, arbitration is adjudicative: the arbitrator is essentially a private judge, usually an expert in the subject matter, who hears the case and makes a binding decision. Its advantages over court are flexibility and speed — you can design how formal the process is and how much discovery it involves. Its major limitation is that an arbitration award is very difficult to appeal; you are bound by the outcome except in narrow circumstances.

4. Litigation

At the far right is litigation — the most formal, most expensive, and most unpredictable option. Sometimes it is necessary. But it is worth understanding what you are choosing: in California a case can spend years in the system, and even then, the vast majority settle before trial anyway — often on the courthouse steps.

How to choose

Here is the key principle: once you move to the right, it is very hard to go back. Litigation is difficult to de-escalate. If you start on the left, you can always escalate later if you must. So it pays to take the emotion out of the decision and ask which process actually serves your interests — and to consider building an ADR (alternative dispute resolution) clause into your contracts, so you have agreed on a path before a conflict ever arises. It is far easier to talk calmly about how you will handle a dispute before you are in one.

Raphael Lapin is a Harvard-trained negotiator and mediator in Los Angeles. Explore dispute resolution, mediation, and ADR services for Santa Monica and the Westside at Lapin Negotiation Services. This article is general information, not legal advice.

Divorce is painful enough without turning it into a war. Yet the litigation system is built for battle: two sides, two lawyers, and a judge who will settle the dispute without ever resolving the underlying conflict. There is a better path for most families, and it starts with finding the right mediator.

What divorce mediation actually is

Mediation is facilitated negotiation. A neutral mediator — with no power to impose a decision — helps both spouses communicate productively and reach their own agreement on the things that matter: finances, property, support, and, above all, the children. Because the two of you design the outcome rather than having it handed down, agreements reached in mediation tend to be more durable and far less bitter than anything won in court.

Why it beats court

Litigation is expensive, slow, and unpredictable. In California, a contested case can spend years in the system, and the costs are not only financial — there is the emotional toll, the lost productivity, the depositions, and the damage done to a relationship you may still need to maintain as co-parents for the rest of your lives. A court can settle a dispute, but the conflict lingers on. Mediation aims to resolve the conflict itself, so both people can genuinely move forward.

What to look for in a mediator

Not all mediators work the same way. Some are retired litigators who bring a courtroom mindset and lean on the law to pressure a settlement. Others are trained specifically in the process of negotiation and communication, and work to understand each party’s real interests and find creative, durable solutions. When you are choosing a mediator, look for:

• Genuine training in negotiation and dispute resolution, not just years spent litigating.
• Neutrality and the ability to keep judgment out of the room, so both spouses feel safe.
• Skill with emotion. Family disputes carry decades of history; the mediator has to let it be heard without letting it derail the resolution.
• A commitment to staying with it. A good mediator does not abandon you at the end of a session — the work often continues until there is a signed agreement everyone is comfortable with.

How the process feels

A well-run divorce mediation usually moves between two modes: first, making sure each person feels genuinely heard and understood; then, turning toward the future — “What would let you go home tonight able to sleep, knowing this is settled fairly?” The goal is not for anyone to win. It is for both people to exit with their dignity intact and their most important interests met, which is what makes the agreement last.

Raphael Lapin is a Harvard-trained mediator based in Los Angeles. Learn more about divorce mediation in Los Angeles and mediation services at Lapin Negotiation Services. This article is general information, not legal advice.

Family conflict is different from any other kind. We bring our whole history to it — decades of memory, old wounds, and the assumption that the people closest to us should see the world the way we do. When a family dispute lands on my desk, I know the emotions will run deeper and more intensely than in any boardroom. But the same disputes, handled well, can bring a family closer than they have ever been.

Conversation versus dialogue

People confuse conversation with dialogue, and the difference matters enormously. Think of a group of friends rehashing a game they all watched: lots of talking, no new information exchanged. That is a conversation. A dialogue is different — in a dialogue, I learn something from you that I did not know before, and you learn something from me. In any important family exchange, that is what you are aiming for. A useful habit is to pause and ask, of yourself and the other person: “Is there anything new I’m hearing that I didn’t know before?”

Let the history be heard

In family disputes there is almost always history that has to be dealt with. Not so that the past dictates the future, but because as long as people do not feel their history has been heard and understood, that unfinished business will obstruct any resolution. There has to be room, early on, for each person to express how they experienced the past — without it collapsing into a cycle of blame and counter-blame. When Nelson Mandela established the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions in South Africa, the purpose was not to indict anyone. It was to let people be heard, so the country could move forward.

Study the other person; embrace the difference

We assume family members are like us — and then treat every difference as a threat. The richest relationships I have seen are the ones where people approach each other with what I call constructive curiosity: a genuine excitement about learning who the other person really is. I like to say I approach another person the way a scientist approaches a subject they find fascinating — not to accuse or blame, but to understand. Understanding each other’s differences does not push people apart. It brings them closer.

Pull out the small revelations

In a good dialogue, you will notice small flashes of revelation — a moment where you suddenly understand why someone feels the way they do. Take those out, polish them up, and hand them back: “If I understand you correctly, this is something that really matters to you, and I may not have appreciated that before.” You do this throughout the conversation, not only at the end. Those moments are where relationships actually change.

Raphael Lapin is a Harvard-trained mediator based in Los Angeles. Lapin Negotiation Services offers mediation for family, business, and estate disputes — including divorce mediation in Los Angeles.

Whenever we run into someone difficult, our instinct is to conclude that they are, by nature, a difficult person — and that the problem is entirely theirs. The truth is that there are very few pathologically difficult people in the world. In decades of this work I am not sure I have met one. Most of the time, difficulty lives in the situation and the dynamic between us — which is good news, because that is something we can change.

Start with a different question

When I have to work with, negotiate with, or resolve a dispute with someone I find difficult, I do not start by asking what is wrong with them. I ask myself two questions: What am I doing — or not doing — that is enabling this person to be difficult? And what new ingredient can I introduce into this dynamic that might change its direction?

If nothing new is introduced, the interaction will continue on its own inertia. The moment I stop reacting and start introducing something new — more listening, more acknowledgement, a better question — the conversation can change.

People need to feel heard — and understanding is not agreeing

Almost everyone in a tense conversation needs the same thing: to feel heard and understood. Yet many people refuse to demonstrate understanding because they think it means surrender. It does not. I can understand you perfectly and still not agree with you. Those are two entirely different things.

So when someone comes at me — “You’re difficult, you did this, you did that” — I have a choice. I can argue back, or I can say: “I’m hearing a lot of frustration. I’d like to understand more about what’s behind it.” That is not weakness. That is how you take back control of a conversation, quietly and authentically, without being domineering.

You are most in control when you are listening

It feels counterintuitive, but you are far more in control of a conversation when you are listening well and asking good questions than when you are asserting demands. Questions let you funnel the conversation. Active listening — and especially reframing — lets you steer it somewhere useful. If someone says, “We don’t trust you to deliver,” I do not repeat the accusation. I reframe it toward a need: “So it sounds like you’d want confidence that timelines and costs are transparent and dependable — is that right?” Never reinforce the negative. Always reframe it into a future need.

Be transparent about the process

People often treat negotiation as a bag of tricks and tactics — and when you are using tricks, you have to hide them. When your process is genuine, you can be completely open about it. I will literally say, “Before we trade proposals, it might help to understand each other’s needs first — how does that sound?” That transparency itself builds the trust that makes difficult people far less difficult.

Raphael Lapin is a Harvard-trained negotiator and mediator in Los Angeles and the author of Working with Difficult People. Learn more about dispute resolution and mediation at Lapin Negotiation Services.

Most people walk into a negotiation ready to assert their demands. They have decided what they want, rehearsed why they deserve it, and prepared to push until the other side gives in. It rarely works. In more than twenty-five years of negotiating and mediating disputes — from boardroom deals to family conflicts here in Los Angeles and around the world — I have found that the negotiators who consistently win are not the loudest or the most aggressive. They are the most prepared, the most curious, and the best listeners.

Here are the strategies that actually move a negotiation forward.

1. Prepare for their side, not just yours

Most of us do not prepare for a negotiation — not because we do not understand its importance, but because we have no method. And when we do prepare, we spend all of our time on our own position. That is backwards. In preparing for a difficult negotiation, we spend roughly 25% of our time on our own side and 75% trying to understand the other side: What are their interests? What are their concerns? If we do not reach agreement, what is their best alternative — and how might we make that alternative less attractive?

If you want to change someone’s mind, you first have to know where their mind is.

2. Make the other side feel heard — first

Studies show that in normal conversation, the listener misses about 70% of what the speaker says, because the listener is busy framing a response. So if I want to be heard, I have to first liberate the other party from having to defend themselves. I start the conversation on their side: “Tell me your thoughts on this — I want to make sure I understand you completely.” Only after I have demonstrated a genuine understanding do I share my own view. Paradoxically, the way to be understood is to understand first.

My mentor at Harvard, Roger Fisher — co-author of Getting to Yes — used to argue cases before the Supreme Court by first making his opponent’s argument, more compellingly than the opponent could. The judge would ask, “Mr. Fisher, whose side are you on?” And he would say, “Bear with me, your honor.” Having shown he understood the other side completely, he had earned the right to be heard.

3. Understanding is not agreeing

Many people are afraid to demonstrate understanding because they confuse it with agreement. They are not the same. I can understand you immaculately and still disagree with you. Separating the two is what lets a conversation stay productive instead of collapsing into a contest.

And notice one small word: use “and,” not “but.” “But” is the great eraser — it wipes out everything that came before it. “You’re right, but…” tells the other person you never meant the first half.

4. Trade positions for interests — and look for the 18th camel

A position is a demand: “I want $100,000.” An interest is the need underneath it: fair compensation. As long as we fight over the position, there is only one solution. Once we surface the interest, there are many. I like the old story of the sheikh who left half his 17 camels to one son, a third to the second, and a ninth to the third — a puzzle, since 17 divides by none of those. The mediator lent them an 18th camel: now 18 divides cleanly into 9, 6, and 2 — which total 17 — and the borrowed camel is returned. In every negotiation there is an 18th camel: a creative idea or a piece of information that unlocks what looked impossible. Legal posturing hides it; curiosity reveals it.

5. Disagree without being disagreeable

You can argue hard on the substance while remaining respectful, fair, and easy to work with on the relationship. Putting the other side at ease — making them feel like a partner in crafting the solution rather than an opponent to be beaten — sets the stage for agreements that actually hold.

Raphael Lapin is a Harvard-trained negotiator and mediator based in Los Angeles, and the author of Working with Difficult People. Lapin Negotiation Services provides negotiation services in Los Angeles and dispute resolution for individuals, families, businesses, and organizations.