Reading Notes

Troubleshooting Emotion Regulation

  • Most of the time, emotion regulation works pretty well
    • Notice that our emotions don’t fit the situation and alter them so that they do
    • However, in certain situations, automatic emotion regulation doesn’t kick in, and we have to regulate manually
  • Checklist for troubleshooting emotion regulation
    • Are you in crisis?
      • Signs that you’re in crisis
        • Feeling overwhelmed?
        • Can’t think about anything except emotion
        • Can’t take in new information
        • Hard time solving problems
        • Self-destructive urges
      • If you’re in crisis, use the crisis survival skills until you feel better and can handle the situation
    • Are you biologically vulnerable?
      • Symptoms
        • Sick?
        • In pain?
        • Hungry?
        • Did you sleep enough?
        • Drunk/high?
        • Did you miss a dose of your medication?
        • Miss exercise?
        • Temperature: too hot/too cold?
        • Have to interact with something you’re sensitive to (bright lights, loud noises, etc)?
      • If you can solve these problems relatively quickly, do so
        • Eat something
        • Put on a sweater
        • Take a nap
      • Even if you can’t do anything about your vulnerability, acknowledging it and identifying it as the source of your emotion can be helpful
    • Can you quickly solve whatever it is you’re upset about?
      • Is your problem actually relatively easily solvable?
      • Can you muster the willpower to solve your problem now?
    • Mindfulness of current emotion
      • Step back and notice what you’re feeling
      • Treat it like an event
      • Don’t act on your feeling - just notice it
      • Don’t try to block the emotion
      • Don’t try to amplify the emotion
      • Notice where in your body you feel the emotion
      • Separate yourself from the emotion - instead of thinking “I am x”, think “I’m feeling/experiencing x”
      • Don’t judge your emotions
        • Your emotions evolved to help keep you safe and happy
        • Try to be curious and respectful
      • Do you even know which emotion you’re feeling right now?
      • Is there anything you need to Radically Accept?
        • Are you committed to doing the best you can with the resources you have?
        • Or are you angry about how everything seems to be so unfair?
        • If the latter, radical acceptance may help
      • Are there myths about emotions getting in the way?
        • Do you think you should be feeling a different emotion than what you currently are feeling?
        • Try to process your emotion nonjudgementally
        • Describe your situation as factually as possible
        • Think dialectically
          • Ask yourself, why should I be feeling a different emotion?
          • Then ask yourself why shouldn’t you be feeling that emotion?
      • Is there some benefit that you’re getting from this emotion?
        • Does your emotion feel good?
        • Does it communicate things to others?
        • Does your emotion motivate you to do things that you want/need to do?
        • Does your emotion legitimate your beliefs or identity?
        • It’s important not to regulate emotions that have benefits; at least figure out how you’re going to get your needs met without the emotion
    • Finally use emotion regulation skills
      • First, actually use the skills
        • Knowing about emotion regulation skills won’t help you if you don’t actually put them into practice
      • Second, use appropriate skills
        • Using distress tolerance on a problem that you can solve just means that you’re avoiding/running-away
        • Using opposite action on a feeling of guilt might make you apologize for something where you were actually in the wrong
      • Finally, make sure you’re using your skills appropriately
        • Make sure to separate facts from interpretation

Mindfulness: What is Mindfulness

  • Mindfulness is all about slowing down, seeing everything as if it was the first time you saw it, and experiencing all the richness of reality
    • Living with awareness of the present moment
    • Not suppressing or clinging to the past
    • Not overly anticipating any particular future
    • Accepting reality as it is
    • Letting go of situations that you can’t control
    • Approaching situations instead of avoiding them
    • Making wise and effective choices
  • Mindlessness is like walking a familiar route, thinking about something else, and then realizing that you’re at your destination without knowing how you got there
    • Stuck in patterns or habits
    • Trapped in counterproductive behavior
    • Bored/preoccupied
    • Unfocused
    • Multitasking
    • Treating interpretations of situations as if they were facts
    • Avoiding things that are painful or upsetting
    • Being overwhelmed by negative emotions
  • How do you do mindfulness?
    • Meditation
      • Spend a few minutes focusing on something or paying attention to awareness itself
    • Religion
      • Most religious practices have some kind of mindfulness
      • Prayer, yoga, etc
    • Incorporate mindfulness into exercise
  • When you start mindfulness, you’ll be bad at it
    • Important to be kind and gentle with yourself
    • Beating yourself up about not being able to be mindful will only make it harder to be mindful in the future
  • Mindfulness is especially difficult for people with depression
    • Depression both leads to rumination and overanalysis and avoidance/suppression
    • Many depressed people do things to numb out negative emotion
      • Food
      • Entertainment
      • Sleep
    • The problem is that this doesn’t actually make the negative emotion go away - just pushes it to the background
    • This often leads to worse depression in the future
    • What’s worse, this numbing makes it difficult to feel joy
  • But why should we be mindful? Isn’t being lost in thought how we think of cool things?
    • Yes, but a lot of the time, we’re not lost in thought because we’re solving a problem or thinking of a cool thing
    • We’re lost in thought, thinking about the same (negative) things we thought about the last time we got lost in thought
  • How to switch from mindlessness to mindfulness?
    • Switch from thinking to experiencing
    • Observe the sensations in your body
    • Be aware that your thoughts are just thoughts
      • They’re mental events
      • Interpretations of events that may be appropriate or inappropriate

Mindfulness: Doing and Being Mind

  • Three stages to unhappiness:
    • First we feel unhappy
    • Second we have thoughts about our emotions
      • Difference between chronically depressed and non-depressed people
        • Non-depressed people think, “I’m sad”
        • Depressed people think, “I’m worthless”
        • This often leads to poor coping mechanisms
    • Third we try to deal with emotions: Doing Mind and Being Mind
  • Doing mind
    • Thinking
    • Planning
    • Goal-setting
    • Problem-solving
    • In order to achieve your goals, though, you need to examine your current state
    • Sometimes examining your current state is painful - this is where being mind comes in
  • Being mind
    • Curiosity about your mood
    • Acceptance of current situation
    • Being in the present moment
    • Noticing experience without having an agenda
  • Other differences between being mind and doing mind
    • Being mind is not about suppressing or invalidating your emotions
    • Doing mind is about being goal focused, doing things without even noticing that you’re doing them
    • Being mind experiences feelings and sensations directly
    • Doing mind treats thoughts about things as if they were the things themselves
    • Being mind is in the present moment
    • Doing mind is “mental time-travel” - ruminating about the past, or worrying about the future
    • Being mind approaches unpleasant experiences with interest, curiosity and respect
    • Doing mind avoids or destroys unpleasant experiences
    • Being mind doesn’t expect that reality fit with our ideals
    • Doing mind is acutely conscious of the flaws in reality and wants to fix them (preferably now)
    • Being mind values the quality of the moment
    • Doing mind is about pursuing goals and and plans
  • We cannot live in being mind or doing mind 100% - we should seek to balance the two in “wise mind”
  • Synthesis, rather than compromise
  • How do you develop wise mind?
    • Strategically posting reminders to stay in wise mind
    • Randomly reminding yourself to be mindful
    • Select one thing to do every day and try to be mindful about it
    • When overwhelmed, do things one at a time
    • Notice events in your everyday life
    • Staying aware of what needs to be done, even when relaxing
    • Practice willingness to do what is needed, even when it’s unpleasant in the moment
    • Pausing and asking yourself, “What am I thinking? What am I feeling? What are the sensations in my body?”
    • Stopping during unpleasant experiences to notice your feelings and sensations
    • Regular meditation practice

Mindfulness: Six Mindfulness Skills

  • Three “what” skills and three “how” skills
  • What skills:
    • Observe
      • Pay attention, intentionally, to the present moment
      • Try to notice all the details of a thing or situation
    • Describe
      • Put words to your experience
      • Describe only the facts, not your interpretations or opinions
    • Participate
      • Throw yourself into the current experience
      • Observing and describing are tools to help participation
  • How skills:
    • Non-judgementally
      • Differentiate between facts about external reality and your judgements about those facts
      • “I am bad” is not a fact, it is a judgement
      • If you find yourself judging something, notice it and try to extract the facts out of your judgement
      • Don’t recursively judge yourself for judging something
    • One-mindfully
      • Be present in the moment
      • Do one thing at a time
    • Effectively
      • Know what your goals and make sure that what you’re doing is, at the very least, not taking you further away from your goals
      • Focus on what works, not what your emotional urges are telling you to do
      • Make a list of emotions that consistently cause you to be ineffective
      • Whenever you notice those emotions, ask yourself, “Is this effective?”

Mindfulness: Thoughts Are Not Reality

  • Don’t believe everything you think
  • You don’t have to believe everything your brain is saying just because it’s your brain
  • However, there is a big difference between knowing intellectually that your brain is lying and knowing it emotionally
  • You can use meditation to build up this emotional awareness:
    • Instead of instantly trying to refocus, pause to recognize what you’re thinking about
    • Try focusing on and describing thoughts
    • Don’t overexert yourself - three to four minutes is enough
  • When you’re upset, try doing nothing
    • First stop
    • Then carefully take awareness away from thoughts and into bodily sensations
    • Notice that thoughts come and go, and that they’re not the same as facts
    • Try writing your thoughts down