Emotional Regulation 101
Emotions; we all have them. Those feelings that act as signals for threats or rewards. Emotions act like a compass and sometimes offer much guidance. For instance, if you steal sugar and lie to your parents about it because of fear and your parents end up finding out, letting the fear direct you wasn’t really productive. However, you may experience the same emotion of fear when you see a rabid dog on the streets and choose to run. In this case, fear directing and guiding your response was fruitful.
Based on these examples, we can see that it’s important to judge when to trust our emotional cues & triggers and act on them, and when not to. Basically, it’s important to learn to regulate our emotions so we can get the best from them as they do serve an important purpose.
The basis of emotional regulation is being able to pause between what you’re feeling and how you react. Slowing down for a bit and acting after objectively evaluating a situation allows us to stay calm under pressure and act in line with our core values, ethics, and who we want to be.
Today I want to add to the emotional regulation series that I’ve had going on my Instagram & TikTok with a guide of 6 emotional regulation skills we can apply as adults.
1. Self-awareness
Noticing and being able to name how we feel is a great step towards emotional regulation since that way you know particularly what you’re feeling giving you some control & perspective.
For example, if you’re feeling ‘bad’ you may ask yourself if you’re feeling sad, anxious, ashamed, guilty, afraid, or hopeless. Give yourself some options and try to explore and name your feelings without acting on them or judging the cause and effect of your emotions, at least at this stage.
I spoke about more reasons to label and not categorize your emotions and how it helps in this video on Instagram.
You may also use this 'feelings wheel' to help you identify what you’re feeling.
2. Mindfulness
When you feel an emotion, there are usually ways you can tell that you’re having a specific emotional experience. For example, you may feel your chest tighten or feel hot if you’re angry; or you may feel butterflies in your stomach and flushing in your cheeks if you’re excited or happy; or a heaviness in your chest when you’re sad.
Mindfulness helps us explore and identify aspects of our external world, including our bodies. Simple mindful exercises such as breathing exercises, meditation, and sensory relaxation can help us achieve a state of calm within and help us make more guided decisions and actions.
3. Objective Evaluation
This is exactly what it sounds like - looking at and analyzing the situation more objectively. For example, when you feel frustrated by something and you want to avoid those feelings, you may resort to self-destructive habits or react to the feelings of frustration in a destructive manner. To practice objective evaluation you may start by asking yourself if your best friend, child, or sibling was experiencing the same thing, what would you advise them to do? Are you doing the same or could you make some adjustments?
4. Cognitive Reappraisal
Cognitive reappraisal is rooted in changing how we think resulting in greater acceptance and flexibility. It’s an essential component of some modalities of psychotherapy such as CBT, DBT, and Anger Management.
Some cognitive reappraisal skills include situational role reversal and thought replacement, which help us look at a distressing situation from a new perspective. For example, we can replace thoughts like ‘my boss doesn’t like me’ and ‘I suck at this’ with alternatives like ‘my boss is upset right now’ and ‘I’ve learned new things before, let me give this another try.’
In practicing cognitive reappraisal, we look for better ways to perceive and deal with difficult thoughts & emotions instead of suppressing or eliminating the emotions. That way, we shift our focus from the distress and consequently reduce the impact of the emotion.
5. Attention Control
This skill starts with reappraisal as discussed above. It’s all about diverting our attention from the negative emotions and looking at a new rewarding perspective. For example, you can divert your attention from the anger and shame felt after having a difficult conversation with your parent at the end of the day, by thinking of it as a lesson to have difficult conversations with them when they’re not tired.
By focusing on the lesson learned from the conflict, you gain perspective on how you can avoid interpersonal disputes and also save yourself the agony. As a result, you’re successful in modulating your response to a distressing encounter and restoring your peace of mind.
Attention control is basically like eating a sugarcane. You suck out all the juice and yumminess (what is valuable to you) and discard the dried-out fibers (whatever isn’t serving you from the situation).
6. Self-soothing
There are no bad emotions, only bad responses to said emotions. If you’re angry, that’s not a bad thing; but if you resort to hurting or abusing people and property as an expression of anger, that’s wrong.
Self-soothing can help reduce the unhelpful and toxic responses to emotions. Some self-soothing practices that help:
Meditation
Breathwork
Self-care
Reminiscence therapy - great for resolving emotional conflicts involving other people. This practice involves intentionally trying to recollect the good memories we’ve had with the person we’re struggling with currently. Of course within reason (this may not be helpful in an abusive situation or relationship)
A Word from Wendy:
Practicing emotional regulation doesn’t mean being happy all the time, and it definitely doesn’t protect us from pain, disappointment, and other uncomfortable feelings. It’s about management so that we learn to accept our feelings and overpower them instead of letting them overpower or control us.
It's about moving past temporary setbacks and tying that in with our values, self-compassion, rational thinking, gratitude, and self-expression to enhance our inner peace. Like Mooji said,
“Feelings are just visitors, let them come and go.”
Are you looking to better regulate, process, and manage your emotions? Reach out to me for therapy via this link.