Several years ago, I was lucky enough to undergo an intensive, six-month treatment program of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT). It was one of the most transformative experiences of my life.
A cornerstone of DBT is a set of skills for "distress tolerance". These skills (or lack thereof) are a measure of how you deal with stress.
Healthy distress tolerance skills might include exercise, therapy, hobbies, reaching out to friends, etc. Unhealthy ones like drinking, smoking, taking drugs, sexual promiscuity and overeating come with a heavy price. Yet so many people do it anyway while it eats at their lives.
DBT says that we can build better skills for surviving stress, ones that don't ultimately make our problems worse. Use these coping skills the next time you're tempted to engage in self-destructive responses to emotional pain:
Healthy distress tolerance skills might include exercise, therapy, hobbies, reaching out to friends, etc. Unhealthy ones like drinking, smoking, taking drugs, sexual promiscuity and overeating come with a heavy price. Yet so many people do it anyway while it eats at their lives.
DBT says that we can build better skills for surviving stress, ones that don't ultimately make our problems worse. Use these coping skills the next time you're tempted to engage in self-destructive responses to emotional pain:
- Activities: Engaging activities that distract you take your mind off your worries for a while.But they have to be activities you can't do mindlessly. You need an activity that just fills up your whole mind. What are some examples?
- Contributing: Contributing means how do you make the world a better place? Is there someone else you can help, assist or comfort? Can you contribute to something larger than yourself? This skill gets your mind off your own problems and into solutions in the outside world.
- Comparison: Distracting by using comparisons means comparing your current situation or crisis to one that's worse than you are in now. Think back on your own life about times when things have been a lot harder. Think about the resources you have now that you didn't then. Think of the people who have less than you have. Are things really as bad as you believe they are?
- Emotion: Evoke an opposite emotion in yourself with books, movies and listening to emotional music. The idea is to trigger an emotion opposite to the one you're feeling. Watch a comedy if you're feeling sad or angry. Listen to a silly song when you're depressed. Sometimes watching a scary movie provokes a response. The reason this works is that it jars your feelings loose.
- Pushing away: This is a skill for when you're at the end of your rope. The idea is to leave mentally for a while.Build an imaginary wall between yourself and the situation. Imagine yourself pushing it away with all your strength. Block thoughts of it from your mind. Each time it comes up, tell it to go away. Try mentally putting the pain on a shelf or in a box in order to contain it.
- Thoughts: Push away intrusive, painful thoughts by counting to 10 or counting tiles or windowpanes or stars in the sky. Do whatever it takes to keep your focus on the counting. This is a great skill to use in a sudden emergency if you need to quickly pull something out of your bag of tricks.
- Sensation: Hold ice in your hand or apply it to the back of your neck. This will help free you from tangled up, distressing feelings.
- Other ideas are put a rubber band on your wrist and snap it, take a hot, hard shower, a cold, hard shower, listen to loud music or swim in very cold water. Any strong physical stimulus of this kind can jog you loose from your pain and distract you from it.
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Healthy distress tolerance skills might include exercise, therapy, hobbies, reaching out to friends, etc. protopic vitiligo