Week Eleven
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Emotional Regulation
Week Eleven: Self-Soothing
According to Psychology Today, “Emotion regulation is the ability to exert control over one’s own emotional state. It may involve behaviors such as rethinking a challenging situation to reduce anger or anxiety, hiding visible signs of sadness or fear, or focusing on reasons to feel happy or calm.”
The core of emotional regulation is the realization that each of us are responsible for how we respond to situations, and how we let situations, and other people, affect us.
The Exercise:
Start by pulling out your journal. Think about times in your life that you’ve had a strong emotional reaction. Pay special attention to recent examples.
How do you respond in the moment? How are you feeling?
How do you respond later? How do these behaviors affect the people around you?
Does your response change as your emotions become under your control?
How long does it take for you to regain control of your emotions?
This week, look for a strategy that calms you. Everybody is different, so for some people it might be deep breathing. For some it might be humming a comforting tune. Others might doodle, or record their thoughts.
Think hard and find your strategy, then use it. When you feel flustered, irritated, agitated, annoyed or otherwise imbalanced, use it.
Focus on your mood while you’re using it. How intense are your feelings? How quickly are they changing?
If you have a hard time reducing the intensity of an emotional response, what is preventing you from calming? Are you triggered? Are you using untrue or incomplete narratives to keep you worked up into being the victim?
Also, when you see members of your family in distress this week, remind them to self-soothe as well. Give people time and space to self-soothe before engaging with them.
Practice together as a family. After you’ve done the journaling exercise and selected your self-soothing mechanism for the week, come together as a family for a practice session.
Give examples of recent times that self-soothing would have led to better results. Role-play how it went, and how it could have gone.
References:
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