Emotion Regulation Basics
What are at least two goals of Emotion Regulation?
1) Understand and name emotions
2) Decrease frequency of unwanted emotions
3) Decrease emotional vulnerability
4) Decrease emotional suffering
Coping skills, as the name suggests are learned skills/practices that help someone manage urges/difficult emotions/thoughts in a healthy, effective way.
1) [untreated] physical illness
2) Poor sleep
3) Malnutrition
4) Mood altering substances/medication mismanagement
Can you list 10 pleasant activities in under 20 seconds?
*Individual response.
Ready, go!
What do emotions do for you?
Identify at least two things.
2) Emotions communicate and influence other
3) Emotions communicate to self
There are four modules in DBT.
First identify them, next think of as many acronymic skills as you can.
GIVE
FAST
DEARMAN
THINK
IMPROVE
(Wisemind) ACCEPTS
Two part question--
The 'A' in ABCPLEASE stands for? Name at least three of those things.
The 'B' in ABCPLEASE stands for? Name at least two of those things.
The 'C' in ABCPLEASE stands for? Describe how you would use this skill?
A: Accumulate positive experiences (in the short-term, and in the long-term)
Pleasant activities is the short term.
B: Build mastery
Building mastery by completing chores consistently, engaging in a hobby etc.
C: Cope ahead. First, identify what the potential activator would be (has intermediate step to visualize), identify skills you will use if it occurs, think/visualize yourself managing effective, using the skills.
The 'A' in ABCPLEASE also stands for 'Accumulating Positives in the Long-Term.'
What are the steps needed to do this?
1) Avoid Avoiding
2) Identify values that are important to you at this time
3) Identify one value to focus on
4) Identify a couple goals related to this value
5) Choose ONE goal/intention to work on now
6) Identify SMALL/REASONABLE action steps towards your goal
7) Take one action step now
What makes it difficult to regulate your emotions?
Identify at least three things.
2) Lack of skills
3)Mood/willfulness
4)Reinforcement of emotional behavior
5) Emotional overload
6) Emotion myths
My emotions DO NOT fit the facts, and/or acting on my emotions would NOT be effective.
What skill should I use?
Engaging in Opposite Action has several steps; what are they?
Identify as many as you can.
1) Identify/name the emotion you want to change
2) Check the facts--is the emotion justified by the facts, is the intensity and duration of the emotion fitting?
3) Identify action urges
4) Ask Wise Mind
5) Identify opposite actions
6) Act opposite ALL THE WAY
7) Repeat
True or False:
One you learn about emotional regulation, and the skills, you never have to practice regulating your emotions again--it will just happen naturally!
FALSE.
Practice makes progress.
A term in DBT ER used to describe the process in which we experience emotions/emotional response is called?
Model of Emotions
(A model for describing emotions)
What is one Emotion Regulation skill that's helpful when you want to reduce emotional prompting events?
PROBLEM SOLVING
I identify feeling fear/anxiety and have the urge to avoid and cancel my upcoming meeting with a supervisor.
How would I engage in Opposite Action to help?
I identified the emotion I want to change, fear, identified the action urge, to avoid/cancel, and can identify that doing that would NOT be effective for me.
Opposite actions would be to prepare for the meeting, and attend the meeting, staying, and being engaged for the duration.
If comfortable, identify one time when you used an ER skill.
* Individual Response
In the model of emotions, there are 5 steps/stages.
What are they, and in which order do they occur?
1) Prompting/activating event
2)Interpretations of events that prompt emotion
3) Biological changes & Experiences of emotion
4) Expressions and actions
5) Aftereffects/Consequences of emotional experience/behaviors
True or false: A coping skill is a strategy I can use to help handle my emotions
true
Consider the part of ER module that is about managing really difficult emotions.
Sometimes emotional activation is so high that you can't use any skills, particularly if the skills are complicated or take a lot of thoughts.
This is called ____________________
THE SKILLS BREAKDOWN POINT