Discover the Top Emotional Regulation Techniques No One Told You About!

Do your emotions ever feel like a rollercoaster you can’t get off of? One moment, everything seems fine, and the next, a wave of frustration, sadness, or anxiety crashes over you, leaving you struggling to cope. For many people, emotions feel unpredictable and overwhelming—like they’re in control rather than you. But here’s the good news: emotional regulation is a skill you can learn, and with the right techniques, you can manage your emotions in a way that aligns with your values and goals.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) offers a proven framework for mastering emotional regulation. These skills aren’t about suppressing how you feel or pretending everything is okay. Instead, they help you understand your emotions, reduce their intensity when needed, and respond thoughtfully rather than reacting impulsively.

Take Jordan, for example. At 31, Jordan often felt trapped in cycles of emotional overwhelm. Stress at work led to outbursts, while feelings of guilt made it hard to ask for support from friends. But once Jordan started using DBT’s emotional regulation techniques, things began to shift. With tools like Opposite Action and ABC PLEASE, Jordan learned how to calm intense feelings, prevent emotional burnout, and rebuild relationships with confidence.

In this blog post, we’ll explore the most effective techniques from DBT’s Emotional Regulation module. You’ll discover practical strategies for naming and understanding your emotions, building resilience, and changing how you respond to life’s challenges. These are the techniques no one told you about—but they can make a world of difference.

Ready to take control of your emotions? Let’s dive in.

What is Emotional Regulation, and Why is it Important?

Emotions are a natural part of being human, but when they feel overwhelming or uncontrollable, they can disrupt your ability to live the life you want. Emotional regulation is the skillset that helps you manage these moments with confidence and clarity. Whether you’re dealing with intense anger, crushing sadness, or paralyzing anxiety, emotional regulation gives you the tools to respond thoughtfully rather than reacting impulsively.

What is Emotional Regulation?

At its core, emotional regulation is the ability to understand and manage your emotions in a way that aligns with your goals and values. It doesn’t mean suppressing your feelings or pretending they don’t exist—it means learning how to:

1. Identify what you’re feeling and why it’s happening.
2. Reduce emotional intensity when feelings become overwhelming.
3. Respond constructively to emotions, rather than letting them control your behavior.

For example, instead of snapping at a loved one during an argument, emotional regulation helps you pause, reflect, and choose a response that strengthens your relationship instead of damaging it.

Why is Emotional Regulation Important?

When emotions go unmanaged, they can create chaos in many areas of life:

• Relationships: Emotional outbursts or avoidance can create tension or misunderstandings with loved ones.
  
  
• Productivity: Unregulated emotions like stress or frustration can lead to procrastination, trouble focusing, or feeling paralyzed by decisions.
  
  
• Emotional Balance: Living with constant emotional highs and lows can leave you feeling drained, disconnected, or burned out.
  
  

Emotional regulation helps break these patterns by providing tools to:

• Navigate stress and overwhelm without feeling consumed by them.
• Build emotional resilience, so you recover more quickly from setbacks.
• Improve how you show up in relationships, work, and daily life.

The Struggles of Emotional Dysregulation

If you’ve ever felt “too emotional” or like your feelings are steering the ship, you’re not alone. Emotional dysregulation can show up in many ways, such as:

• Reacting impulsively in ways you later regret, like saying something hurtful in an argument or making rash decisions.
  
  
• Avoiding situations that trigger discomfort, like skipping social events or putting off important tasks.
  
  
• Feeling stuck in cycles of negativity, such as constantly replaying a mistake or dwelling on worst-case scenarios.

These patterns can be exhausting and frustrating, but they don’t define you. Emotional regulation is a skill anyone can learn—and it offers actionable steps to help you manage emotions, no matter how overwhelming they may feel.

How DBT’s Emotional Regulation Module Can Help

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) is one of the most effective approaches for learning emotional regulation. The skills in DBT’s Emotional Regulation module teach you how to:

1. Understand your emotions: Recognize and label what you’re feeling to gain clarity.
   
   
2. Reduce emotional vulnerability: Build a strong foundation with healthy habits like sleep, nutrition, and self-care.
   
   
3. Change your emotional responses: Challenge negative thoughts and replace unhelpful behaviors with constructive actions.

These tools are designed to be practical, easy to learn, and applicable to your daily life.

Meet Jordan: A Case Study

Jordan had always struggled with emotional dysregulation, especially when it came to work stress. When projects piled up, Jordan’s anxiety would spiral into procrastination and self-criticism. After tense meetings with their supervisor, Jordan would replay every detail, obsessing over what went wrong and imagining worst-case scenarios. These patterns left Jordan feeling exhausted, stuck, and disconnected from loved ones.

Through DBT, Jordan learned how to name and validate emotions instead of fighting them, reduce emotional overwhelm with self-care, and respond to triggers with thoughtful, constructive actions. We’ll revisit Jordan’s journey throughout this post to show how emotional regulation techniques can work in real life.

Emotional regulation isn’t about never feeling angry, sad, or anxious—it’s about learning to navigate those emotions with skill and intention. In the next section, we’ll dive into the first step of emotional regulation: understanding your emotions by naming and validating them.

Understanding Your Emotions: Naming and Validating Feelings

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by your emotions but struggled to pinpoint exactly what you were feeling? Or maybe you’ve been quick to dismiss your feelings altogether, telling yourself, I shouldn’t feel this way. The truth is, understanding and validating your emotions is a crucial first step in emotional regulation. Without it, you’re left trying to manage something you can’t fully grasp.

Why Understanding Emotions Matters

You can’t regulate what you don’t understand. By learning to identify and validate your emotions, you gain clarity about what’s driving your reactions and how to address them effectively. This process helps you:

1. Recognize what you’re feeling so you can respond appropriately.
2. Reduce confusion or overwhelm by breaking emotions down into manageable pieces.
3. Build self-awareness, which is essential for personal growth and resilience.

For example, instead of feeling “bad” and acting out, you might identify the underlying emotion as frustration about a specific situation—something you can address directly.

The Process of Understanding Emotions

1. Name the Emotion:
   • Emotions can feel vague or overwhelming until you put a name to them. Start by identifying primary emotions like sadness, anger, fear, or joy, and explore any secondary emotions layered on top, like guilt, frustration, or embarrassment.
     
     
   • Example: Instead of saying, “I’m upset,” you might clarify, “I’m feeling angry because I felt disrespected in that conversation.”
     
     
2. Explore the Emotion’s Origin:
   • Ask yourself: What triggered this emotion? What happened right before I started feeling this way?
     
     
   • Understanding the cause can help you separate the emotion from the situation and determine how to move forward.
     
     
3. Understand the Emotion’s Purpose:
   • Emotions are signals designed to help us navigate the world. For instance:
     
     
     • Anger may signal a boundary has been crossed.
     • Fear may alert you to potential danger.
     • Sadness may indicate a need for rest or reflection.
       
       
   • When you understand the purpose of an emotion, you can respond to its message without being consumed by it.

Validating Your Emotions

Validation is the process of acknowledging your emotions as real and important—even if they’re uncomfortable. This doesn’t mean you have to like or agree with your feelings, but it allows you to accept them without judgment.

• Why Validation is Crucial:
  1. Dismissing or invalidating emotions often makes them more intense because it creates a sense of shame or confusion.
     
     
  2. Validation reduces the “fight” against emotions, allowing you to focus on managing them instead.
     
     
• How to Practice Validation:
  1. Acknowledge the Feeling: Say to yourself, “I feel [emotion], and it makes sense because [reason].”
     • Example: “I feel hurt because my friend canceled our plans, and I was really looking forward to seeing them.”
       
       
  2. Remind Yourself That Emotions Are Temporary: Say, “This feeling is valid, but it won’t last forever.”
     
     
  3. Show Yourself Compassion: Treat your emotions the way you’d comfort a friend. For instance, you might say, “It’s okay to feel this way. It’s understandable given what happened.”

Case Study: How Jordan Used Emotion Naming and Validation

Jordan often felt overwhelmed by anxiety before big meetings at work. Their thoughts spiraled into self-criticism, like, I’m such a failure for feeling this nervous. Everyone else seems so calm. This only made the anxiety worse, leaving Jordan paralyzed and unable to prepare effectively.

Through DBT’s emotion regulation techniques, Jordan learned to slow down and name the emotion:

• “I’m feeling anxious because I want to do well in this meeting, and I’m worried about being judged.”
  
  

By identifying the cause of the anxiety, Jordan realized it wasn’t about being “bad at meetings” but about a desire to succeed. Jordan then validated the feeling:

• “It makes sense that I feel anxious—this meeting is important to me, and I care about the outcome. It’s okay to feel this way.”
  
  

This process of naming and validating helped Jordan reduce the intensity of the anxiety and focus on preparing for the meeting instead of getting stuck in a spiral of self-criticism.

Practical Exercises for Understanding and Validating Emotions

1. Emotion Journaling:
   • At the end of each day, write down:
     • One emotion you felt.
     • What triggered it.
     • What you think the emotion was trying to tell you.
       
       
2. Practice “Name It to Tame It”:
   • When you notice an overwhelming emotion, pause and name it aloud or in your mind. For example: “I’m feeling frustration because I’m running late.”
     
     
3. Use Validation Statements:
   • Create a list of validation phrases to use when emotions arise, such as:
     • “It’s okay to feel this way.”
     • “This emotion makes sense given the situation.”
     • “I don’t have to like this feeling, but I can accept that it’s here.”
       
       

Why This Step Matters

Understanding and validating emotions is the foundation of emotional regulation. It’s like shining a flashlight in a dark room—once you see what’s there, it’s easier to navigate. By naming and validating your feelings, you take the first step toward managing them effectively and responding in a way that aligns with your goals and values.

Reducing Emotional Vulnerability with ABC PLEASE

When life feels overwhelming, it’s often because your emotional reserves are running low. Maybe you didn’t get enough sleep, skipped a meal, or haven’t had a meaningful, positive moment in days. Emotional vulnerability increases when your basic needs aren’t met, leaving you more reactive to even small challenges.

DBT’s ABC PLEASE framework is designed to strengthen your emotional foundation, making it easier to handle stress, setbacks, and emotional triggers. By focusing on self-care, creating positive experiences, and preparing for challenges, you can build resilience and reduce emotional vulnerability over time.

Why Emotional Vulnerability Happens

When your body or mind is depleted, your ability to regulate emotions is naturally compromised. Common factors that increase vulnerability include:

• Skipping meals or eating poorly.
• Not getting enough sleep or having an inconsistent sleep schedule.
• Feeling stuck in routines that lack joy or fulfillment.
• Ignoring physical health issues or chronic stress.

These factors create a lower emotional “tipping point,” where even minor stressors can feel overwhelming. Addressing these vulnerabilities is like fortifying your emotional immune system—it makes you better equipped to face whatever life throws your way.

What is ABC PLEASE?

The ABC PLEASE framework is a set of self-care and planning strategies that help you manage your emotional health proactively. Each step builds your resilience and reduces the likelihood of being emotionally derailed.

1. A: Accumulate Positive Experiences
   • Create moments of joy or satisfaction in your daily life.
     
     
   • Short-term: Do something enjoyable each day, no matter how small, like watching a funny video, taking a walk, or calling a friend.
     
     
   • Long-term: Work toward meaningful, values-based goals, such as developing a new hobby, deepening relationships, or pursuing a career change.
     
     
2. B: Build Mastery
   • Engage in activities that make you feel capable or accomplished.
     
     
   • Start small, like completing a household task, then gradually take on more challenging goals like learning a new skill or tackling a work project.
     
     
   • Regularly practicing mastery boosts your confidence and reduces feelings of helplessness.
     
     
3. C: Cope Ahead
   • Plan for difficult or emotionally challenging situations by visualizing how you’ll handle them.
     
     
   • Identify potential triggers and create a strategy for staying calm and effective.
     
     
   • Example: If a meeting with your boss makes you anxious, plan ahead by:
     
     
     • Practicing mindfulness before the meeting.
     • Writing down key points to discuss.
     • Preparing self-supportive statements, like, I can handle this; I’ve prepared for it.
       
       

Want a structured way to get started? Download my Cope Ahead Worksheets to plan for emotional challenges step-by-step. These worksheets guide you through identifying triggers, developing strategies, and building confidence so you can face tough situations with ease.

4. PLEASE: Care for Your Physical Health
   • Address basic physical needs to stabilize your mood and energy levels:
     
     
     • Treat Physical illness: Stay on top of medical needs or chronic conditions.
     • Limit drugs and alcohol: Avoid substances that amplify emotional highs or lows.
     • Eat regularly: Maintain balanced meals to keep your energy steady.
     • Avoid emotional extremes: Watch out for things like skipping meals or over-scheduling.
     • Sleep consistently: Aim for 7–9 hours of quality sleep each night.
     • Exercise: Even light movement, like stretching or walking, can boost mood and reduce tension.

How ABC PLEASE Helped Jordan

Jordan often felt overwhelmed and emotionally drained by the end of the day. Skipping lunch left them irritable, late nights scrolling on their phone disrupted their sleep, and an absence of enjoyable activities made life feel like a monotonous grind. These vulnerabilities compounded, making even small stresses—like a last-minute meeting or a misunderstood text—feel unmanageable.

By using the ABC PLEASE framework, Jordan made intentional changes to their routine:

• Accumulate Positive Experiences: Jordan began scheduling short, enjoyable activities, like walking their dog after work and watching a favorite TV show before bed.
  
  
• Build Mastery: Tackling small tasks like organizing their workspace and practicing drawing gave Jordan a sense of accomplishment.
  
  
• Cope Ahead: Before weekly work presentations, Jordan used the Cope Ahead strategy:
  • They visualized the meeting going smoothly.
    
    
  • Wrote out notes to stay organized.
    
    
  • Practiced self-affirmations, such as, I’ve prepared, and I can handle this. Jordan also used the Cope Ahead Worksheets to create a detailed plan for staying calm under pressure.
    
    
• PLEASE: Jordan committed to eating three balanced meals a day, maintaining a consistent bedtime, and doing yoga twice a week. These changes stabilized their mood and energy, making it easier to manage emotions.

By practicing ABC PLEASE consistently, Jordan felt more balanced and better equipped to handle life’s challenges.

Practical Exercises for ABC PLEASE

1. Daily Self-Care Tracker:
   • Create a checklist to track:
     • Regular meals.
     • 7–9 hours of sleep.
     • A positive or mastery-building activity each day.
       
       
2. Plan Positive Experiences:
   • Write down one small activity you can do every day this week that brings you joy or fulfillment.
     
     
3. Use the Cope Ahead Worksheets:
   • Identify an upcoming stressful event, like a difficult conversation or a presentation. Use the Cope Ahead Worksheets to map out your triggers, strategies, and coping techniques.
     
     

Why ABC PLEASE Works

By addressing both physical and emotional vulnerabilities, ABC PLEASE helps you create a stable foundation for emotional regulation. This framework ensures that you’re less likely to be derailed by stress, setbacks, or triggers, and it builds resilience over time.

Like Jordan, you can use ABC PLEASE to take control of your emotional health, one small habit at a time.

Changing Emotional Responses with Opposite Action

Emotions are powerful motivators. When you’re angry, you might feel an urge to lash out. When you’re anxious, avoiding the situation can feel like the only option. While these responses are understandable, they often reinforce negative emotional patterns, making the situation worse over time. This is where Opposite Action, a core DBT skill, comes in.

Opposite Action is a technique that helps you challenge your emotional urges and choose behaviors that align with your values and long-term goals. By acting in ways that are opposite to what your emotions are telling you to do, you can shift your emotional state and create a more positive outcome.

Why Opposite Action Works

When you act on an emotion-driven urge (like avoiding a task out of fear or isolating yourself when you feel sad), it often strengthens the emotion and makes it harder to break free. Opposite Action interrupts this cycle by:

• Helping you face situations you’d typically avoid.
• Encouraging behaviors that improve your mood and reduce emotional intensity.
• Teaching your brain that you’re capable of handling emotions in healthy ways, which weakens the urge over time.

How to Practice Opposite Action

1. Identify the Emotion:
   • Ask yourself: What am I feeling right now? Be specific. For example, instead of just “bad,” you might identify “fear” or “frustration.”
     
     
2. Understand the Urge:
   • Pinpoint what your emotion is urging you to do. For example:
     
     
     • Fear might urge you to avoid a challenging task.
     • Sadness might urge you to stay in bed all day.
     • Anger might urge you to yell or lash out.
       
       
3. Choose the Opposite Action:
   • Do the opposite of what your emotion is urging you to do. Examples:
     
     
     • If sadness urges you to isolate, choose to reach out to a friend instead.
     • If fear urges you to avoid, take one small step toward facing the situation.
     • If anger urges you to lash out, practice kindness or take a moment to cool down before responding.
       
       
4. Fully Commit to the Action:
   • Opposite Action only works if you fully engage in the behavior. Approach it with energy and intention, even if it feels awkward or uncomfortable at first.

When to Use Opposite Action

Opposite Action is particularly effective when:

• The emotion you’re experiencing is intense but doesn’t fit the facts of the situation.
• The emotion fits the facts but acting on it wouldn’t serve your long-term goals.

For example:

• Emotion Doesn’t Fit the Facts: If you’re feeling afraid of public speaking, but the audience is supportive and low-risk, fear might be unnecessary in this context.
  
  
• Emotion Fits the Facts but Action Isn’t Helpful: If you’re angry at a friend, lashing out might damage the relationship. Instead, an opposite action like calmly discussing the issue is more constructive.

How Opposite Action Helped Jordan

Jordan often struggled with social anxiety, which made them avoid gatherings with friends or coworkers. Their emotions told them, You’ll embarrass yourself, and no one will enjoy your company. This urge to stay home reinforced feelings of loneliness and isolation, making the anxiety worse over time.

Through DBT, Jordan learned to identify these patterns and practice Opposite Action. Here’s how:

1. Identified the Emotion: Jordan recognized they were feeling anxious about attending a coworker’s dinner party.
   
   
2. Understood the Urge: Anxiety was urging Jordan to make an excuse and stay home.
   
   
3. Chose the Opposite Action: Despite their fear, Jordan decided to attend the dinner. They set a goal of staying for at least 30 minutes and engaging in small talk with one person.
   
   
4. Fully Committed: Instead of sitting silently, Jordan asked questions, smiled, and genuinely participated in the conversation.

The result? Jordan found that the event wasn’t as scary as they’d imagined. They left feeling more confident and even enjoyed themselves, which reduced their anxiety about future social situations.

Practical Exercises for Opposite Action

1. Create an Emotion-Urge-Action Map:
   
   
   • Write down:
     • The emotion you’re feeling.
     • The urge it’s creating.
     • The opposite action you can take.
       
       
   • Example:
     • Emotion: Fear.
     • Urge: Avoid giving a presentation.
     • Opposite Action: Practice the presentation and deliver it.
       
       
2. Start Small:
   • If the opposite action feels overwhelming, break it into smaller steps. For example, if you’re avoiding exercise, start with a 5-minute walk rather than a full workout.
     
     
3. Reflect on the Outcome:
   • After practicing Opposite Action, write down what happened. Did the emotion decrease in intensity? Did the outcome feel more positive than if you’d followed your urge?

Why Opposite Action Works

Opposite Action rewires the connection between your emotions and behaviors, helping you take control of your responses instead of being controlled by your feelings. Over time, acting against unhelpful emotional urges can change the way you experience those emotions, making them feel less intense or overwhelming.

Like Jordan, you can use Opposite Action to face fears, break negative patterns, and create new, empowering emotional habits. In the next section, we’ll explore Check the Facts, a technique that helps you challenge distorted thoughts that fuel intense emotions.

Managing Emotional Intensity with Check the Facts

Have you ever felt your emotions spiraling out of control, only to realize later that your reaction didn’t fully match the situation? Our emotions are often fueled by interpretations and assumptions rather than facts. For example, thinking They didn’t text me back because they’re mad at me can create feelings of anxiety or sadness, even if it’s not true.

Check the Facts, a DBT skill, helps you challenge distorted thoughts and replace them with more balanced, accurate perspectives. This skill doesn’t invalidate your emotions—it helps you make sure they align with what’s actually happening, so you can respond effectively instead of reacting impulsively.

Why Check the Facts Works

Emotions are powerful, but they’re not always based on reality. By questioning the thoughts driving your emotions, you can:

• Reduce the intensity of emotions that don’t fit the facts.
• Avoid reacting impulsively to situations that are misinterpreted.
• Feel more in control of your emotional responses.

When you challenge your assumptions and replace them with factual information, your emotional state often shifts as a result.

How to Practice Check the Facts

1. Identify the Emotion:
   • Ask yourself: What emotion am I feeling right now? Be specific.
   • Example: “I’m feeling anxious because my boss hasn’t replied to my email.”
     
     
2. Describe the Situation:
   • Break the situation down into objective facts.
   • Example: “I emailed my boss two hours ago, and they haven’t responded yet.”
     
     
3. Identify the Thought Driving the Emotion:
   • Ask yourself: What interpretation or assumption is fueling this feeling?
   • Example: “My boss hasn’t responded because they’re upset with me or think I did a bad job.”
     
     
4. Evaluate the Evidence:
   • Look for evidence that supports and contradicts the thought:
     
     
     • Supporting evidence: “I sent the email before the deadline, so I don’t think I missed any expectations.”
       
       
     • Contradicting evidence: “My boss is usually busy and doesn’t respond to emails right away. They haven’t said anything negative about my work recently.”
       
       
5. Consider Alternative Explanations:
   • Replace your assumption with a more balanced thought:
     
     
     • “My boss might be in meetings or focusing on other tasks. It doesn’t necessarily mean they’re upset with me.”
       
       
6. Check if the Emotion Fits the Facts:
   • Ask yourself: Does my level of anxiety match the situation, or am I reacting to my assumptions instead?
     
     
   • If the emotion doesn’t fit the facts, focus on the alternative explanation and let the unnecessary intensity fade.

When to Use Check the Facts

This skill is especially helpful when:

• You’re feeling a strong emotion that seems out of proportion to the situation.
• You’re interpreting someone else’s behavior and jumping to conclusions.
• You want to reduce emotional reactivity and think more clearly before responding.

How Check the Facts Helped Jordan

Jordan often felt anxious about how others perceived them, especially at work. For example, after giving a presentation, Jordan noticed a coworker looking at their phone and immediately thought, They’re bored, and I’m doing a terrible job. This thought fueled feelings of embarrassment and self-doubt, making it hard for Jordan to stay confident during the rest of the meeting.

Through DBT, Jordan learned to use Check the Facts to challenge these assumptions:

1. Identified the Emotion: Jordan recognized they were feeling anxious and self-conscious.
   
   
2. Described the Situation: “I saw my coworker looking at their phone during my presentation.”
   
   
3. Identified the Thought: “They’re bored because I’m doing a bad job.”
   
   
4. Evaluated the Evidence:
   • Supporting evidence: “They looked at their phone once.”
   • Contradicting evidence: “They nodded and asked questions earlier in the presentation. They might have just received a text.”
     
     
5. Considered an Alternative Explanation: “It’s more likely they checked their phone for a personal reason, not because of my presentation.”
   
   
6. Checked if the Emotion Fit the Facts: With this new perspective, Jordan realized their anxiety didn’t match the situation and began to feel calmer.

By practicing Check the Facts, Jordan reduced their emotional intensity and stayed focused on delivering a strong presentation.

Practical Exercises for Check the Facts

1. Create a Thought Journal:
   • Write down emotional moments throughout the week and use the following prompts to Check the Facts:
     
     
     • What emotion was I feeling?
     • What thought was driving that emotion?
     • What evidence supported or contradicted the thought?
     • What’s a more balanced explanation?
       
       
2. Pause and Reflect:
   • The next time you feel overwhelmed, pause and ask:
     • Am I reacting to the situation or to my assumptions about it?
       
       
3. Use a Worksheet:
   • Look for a DBT-based Check the Facts worksheet to guide you through the steps systematically.

Why Check the Facts Works

Our brains are wired to interpret situations quickly, but these interpretations aren’t always accurate. Check the Facts helps you slow down, question your assumptions, and make room for more balanced perspectives. Over time, this practice can reduce emotional overreactions and help you feel more grounded and in control.

Like Jordan, you can use Check the Facts to challenge distorted thoughts, lower emotional intensity, and respond to situations with confidence and clarity.

Building Resilience Through Positive Emotional Experiences

When life feels overwhelming or your emotions are running high, it’s easy to lose sight of the positive moments around you. Trauma, stress, or emotional dysregulation can narrow your focus to what’s going wrong, leaving you stuck in a cycle of negativity. But here’s the good news: you can intentionally build resilience by accumulating positive emotional experiences.

This skill, part of DBT’s Emotional Regulation module, is about actively seeking out and creating moments of joy, fulfillment, and connection—both in the short term and over the long haul. Over time, these experiences help to shift your emotional baseline, making it easier to handle challenges and bounce back from setbacks.

Why Positive Experiences Matter

Accumulating positive emotional experiences helps you:

• Balance negative emotions: Life will always have stress, sadness, or anger, but positive experiences help counterbalance these moments.
  
• Build emotional resilience: A pattern of enjoyable moments strengthens your ability to cope with difficult emotions.
  
• Create a sense of purpose: Long-term positive experiences, like pursuing a meaningful goal, give you something to look forward to and work toward.

When you focus on positive experiences, you’re not ignoring life’s challenges—you’re ensuring those challenges don’t define your emotional state.

How to Accumulate Positive Emotional Experiences

1. Short-Term Positive Experiences:
   • Identify small, enjoyable activities you can do each day. These don’t have to be extravagant or time-consuming—simple pleasures work just as well. Examples include:
     
     
     • Listening to your favorite music.
     • Cooking a meal you enjoy.
     • Spending time outdoors.
     • Laughing with a friend or watching a funny video.
       
       
2. Long-Term Positive Experiences:
   • Work toward meaningful, values-based goals that provide a sense of fulfillment and direction. These might include:
     
     
     • Building a new skill or hobby.
     • Strengthening relationships with loved ones.
     • Volunteering for a cause you care about.
       
       
   • The key is to choose goals that align with your values, so the process itself feels rewarding, not just the outcome.
     
     
3. Savor Positive Moments:
   • When a positive experience happens, slow down and fully engage with it. Pay attention to how it feels in your body and mind. For example, if you’re enjoying a walk in nature, notice the sound of the birds, the feel of the breeze, and the colors around you.
     
     
4. Plan Ahead for Positivity:
   • Schedule time for positive activities. When life gets busy, it’s easy to deprioritize joy, but intentionally setting aside time ensures that positive experiences stay part of your routine.

How Jordan Built Resilience Through Positive Experiences

Jordan’s life felt monotonous and heavy. Between work stress and social anxiety, they rarely made time for things they enjoyed, which deepened their feelings of isolation and fatigue. Using DBT, Jordan began intentionally accumulating positive experiences:

• Short-Term: Jordan started small, scheduling 15 minutes each evening to do something enjoyable, like reading or painting. On weekends, they made a point to visit a local park with their dog, which became a source of calm and joy.
  
  
• Long-Term: Jordan set a goal to reconnect with their creative side by taking an online photography course. This gave them something to look forward to each week and a sense of accomplishment as they developed their skills.
  
  
• Savoring Moments: When Jordan noticed a positive moment—like laughing with a coworker or enjoying a beautiful sunset—they practiced slowing down and fully appreciating it.

Over time, these experiences began to shift Jordan’s emotional baseline. While challenges still arose, Jordan felt more balanced and resilient, knowing they had a toolkit of positive moments to draw on.

Putting It All Together: Transforming Your Emotional Regulation

Emotional regulation isn’t about eliminating tough emotions—it’s about learning how to navigate them with intention and confidence. By combining the DBT Emotional Regulation skills we’ve explored, you can create a powerful toolbox to manage emotions, reduce overwhelm, and build resilience.

Let’s recap the techniques we’ve covered:

1. Understanding and Validating Emotions: Name and validate your emotions to reduce confusion and acknowledge what you’re feeling without judgment.
   
   
2. Reducing Emotional Vulnerability with ABC PLEASE: Build a strong foundation of self-care, create positive experiences, and plan for challenges to stabilize your emotions.
   
   
3. Changing Emotional Responses with Opposite Action: Act against unhelpful urges to shift your emotional state and align your actions with your values.
   
   
4. Managing Emotional Intensity with Check the Facts: Challenge distorted thoughts and replace them with more accurate perspectives to reduce emotional overreactions.
   
   
5. Building Resilience Through Positive Experiences: Accumulate moments of joy and fulfillment to balance negative emotions and strengthen emotional resilience.

Jordan’s Transformation

Jordan’s journey shows how these skills can create meaningful change. By using Check the Facts, Jordan learned to challenge assumptions that fueled anxiety. Through ABC PLEASE, they built a routine of self-care and joy that stabilized their emotional baseline. Opposite Action helped them face their fears, while accumulating positive experiences gave them something to look forward to each day.

The result? Jordan no longer felt controlled by their emotions. They were still human, still feeling fear, sadness, or frustration at times—but now, they had tools to manage those emotions and respond in ways that supported their goals and values.

How to Get Started

1. Start Small:
   • Choose one skill to practice today. For example, try naming your emotions or scheduling a small positive activity for the evening.
     
     
2. Build Consistency:
   • Incorporate skills into your daily routine. For example, use the ABC PLEASE framework to guide your self-care or practice Opposite Action when you notice an unhelpful urge.
     
     
3. Reflect on Progress:
   • Keep a journal to track how these skills impact your emotions over time. Celebrate small wins, and don’t be afraid to adjust your approach as needed.
     
     
4. Seek Support:
   • Learning emotional regulation is a journey, and having guidance can make a world of difference. A therapist, workbook, or app can provide structure and support along the way.

Resources to Deepen Your Emotional Regulation Practice

• Books:
  • Your Emotions and You by Suzette Bray: A friendly, accessible guide to understanding and managing your emotions with practical exercises and insights.
    
    
  • Self-Directed DBT Skills: A 3-Month DBT Workbook by Elliot Weiner PhD & Kiki Fehling PhD: A step-by-step guide for mastering DBT techniques, including emotional regulation.
    
    
  • Emotion Regulation in Psychotherapy: A Practitioner’s Guide: Though written for clinicians, this resource is packed with exercises and insights anyone can use to improve emotional regulation.
    
    
• Online Tools:
  • Cope Ahead Worksheets: Plan for emotional challenges with this step-by-step worksheet, designed to help you face tough situations with confidence and clarity.
    
    
  • Online-Therapy.com: Connect with licensed DBT professionals who can guide you through emotional regulation and other DBT skills. Use code THERAPY20 for 20% off your first month.
    
    
• Apps:
  • “DBT Diary Card” or “Mood Tools” apps help you track your emotions and practice skills on the go.

Final Thoughts

Mastering emotional regulation takes time, patience, and practice—but the rewards are worth it. With DBT skills, you can reduce the intensity of overwhelming emotions, build resilience, and create a life that feels more stable, fulfilling, and aligned with your values.

Just like Jordan, you have the power to take control of your emotional journey, one step at a time. Choose a skill, start practicing today, and begin building a brighter emotional future. You’ve got this!