Julie Bowen on how to manage conflict between your personality and values | ReThinking

Julie Bowen is an Emmy Award-winning actress best known from her roles as Claire on Modern Family and Virginia in Happy Gilmore. She’s also a former host of the podcast Quitters, which she eventually quit. In this episode, Adam and Julie are joined by developmental psychologist Aliza Pressman for a delightful conversation about authenticity, emotional intelligence, and parenting. Julie makes the case for why sometimes quitting is the most mature thing to do, and shares what she’s learned from coaching her sons through commitments they no longer wanted to uphold. She interrogates Adam about his inability to get angry, and he and Aliza speculate on what would happen if everyone was perfectly emotionally regulated. The three also reflect on the difficult truth that you cannot change how others act, and explore strategies for teaching kids (and yourself) how to handle conflict between the values you hold and the way you actually behave. Follow our podcasts! ReThinking with Adam Grant: https://link.mgln.ai/kdYcyx 00:00 What is an organizational psychologist? 01:25 Julie Bowen's career and characters 04:14 How to know when it's time to quit 10:17 Can you change others? 16:58 How to recognize and unlock potential in others 20:44 Getting people to do what you want 24:56 How different people and families handle conflict 28:45 Staying reasonable in conflict 33:27 Personality vs values 37:46 Teaching kids about personality/value conflict 41:15 Parenting and digital moderation 44:58 Finding new purpose after a big achievement The TED Podcasts is a collection of podcasts for the curious. The TED Podcasts videos may be used for non-commercial purposes under a Creative Commons License, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives (or the CC BY – NC – ND 4.0 International) and in accordance with our TED Talks Usage Policy (https://www.ted.com/about/our-organiz...). For more information on using TED for commercial purposes (e.g. employee learning, in a film or online course), please submit a Media Request at https://media-requests.ted.com.

Julie BowenguestAdam GranthostAliza Pressmanguest

Aug 27, 202649mWatch on YouTube ↗

EPISODE INFO

Released: August 27, 2026
Duration: 49m
Channel: Re:Thinking with Adam Grant
Watch on YouTube: ▶ Open ↗

EPISODE DESCRIPTION

Julie Bowen is an Emmy Award-winning actress best known from her roles as Claire on Modern Family and Virginia in Happy Gilmore. She’s also a former host of the podcast Quitters, which she eventually quit. In this episode, Adam and Julie are joined by developmental psychologist Aliza Pressman for a delightful conversation about authenticity, emotional intelligence, and parenting. Julie makes the case for why sometimes quitting is the most mature thing to do, and shares what she’s learned from coaching her sons through commitments they no longer wanted to uphold. She interrogates Adam about his inability to get angry, and he and Aliza speculate on what would happen if everyone was perfectly emotionally regulated. The three also reflect on the difficult truth that you cannot change how others act, and explore strategies for teaching kids (and yourself) how to handle conflict between the values you hold and the way you actually behave. Follow our podcasts! ReThinking with Adam Grant: https://link.mgln.ai/kdYcyx 00:00 What is an organizational psychologist? 01:25 Julie Bowen's career and characters 04:14 How to know when it's time to quit 10:17 Can you change others? 16:58 How to recognize and unlock potential in others 20:44 Getting people to do what you want 24:56 How different people and families handle conflict 28:45 Staying reasonable in conflict 33:27 Personality vs values 37:46 Teaching kids about personality/value conflict 41:15 Parenting and digital moderation 44:58 Finding new purpose after a big achievement The TED Podcasts is a collection of podcasts for the curious. The TED Podcasts videos may be used for non-commercial purposes under a Creative Commons License, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives (or the CC BY – NC – ND 4.0 International) and in accordance with our TED Talks Usage Policy (https://www.ted.com/about/our-organiz...). For more information on using TED for commercial purposes (e.g. employee learning, in a film or online course), please submit a Media Request at https://media-requests.ted.com.

SPEAKERS

Julie Bowen
guest
Actor best known for playing Claire Dunphy on Modern Family.
Adam Grant
host
Organizational psychologist and host of Re:Thinking with Adam Grant.
Aliza Pressman
guest
Developmental psychologist and parenting expert.

EPISODE SUMMARY

In this episode of Re:Thinking with Adam Grant, featuring Julie Bowen and Adam Grant, Julie Bowen on how to manage conflict between your personality and values | ReThinking explores julie Bowen and Adam Grant on quitting, conflict, and personality-values tension Julie Bowen, Adam Grant, and Aliza Pressman explore quitting as a mature life skill, including how to recognize when something no longer fits and how to exit without ghosting or leaving relational damage.

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