Methods of Emotion Regulation Psychology

Emotional regulation, which is recognized as effective in the field of psychology, is essentially not about "suppressing negative emotions" and pursuing "emotional stability" at all times, but establishing a three-level underlying logic of "awareness-acceptance-adjustment". There is no universal method, and different schools of technology need to adapt to the three dimensions of personal personality, triggering scenes, and emotional intensity in order to be truly effective.

You must have had times like this, right? I was squeezing in the subway during the morning rush hour and someone stepped on my freshly cleaned white shoes. The other person squeezed into the crowd without looking back. I was so angry that I was about to curse. Suddenly, something I read on the Internet popped up in my mind: "Emotional stability is the best match for adults." I swallowed the words hard. As a result, I felt out of breath all morning when I sat at my desk. I typed twice as hard on the keyboard as usual, and even when I bit my pearls while drinking milk tea, my teeth felt irritated.

Many people first come into contact with emotion regulation and learn the "cognitive reappraisal" of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT): interpreting the events that trigger emotions from a different perspective. For example, when being scolded by the boss, they think "He is wrong about the situation but not the person", and when being rejected for an appointment, they think "I just can catch up on sleep at home." This method has been proven effective through a large number of clinical trials, but many practitioners and clients have reported that if used incorrectly, it can easily lead to self-PUA. I met a young girl who worked in Internet operations before. Every time she was asked to change the requirements to the 18th version by Party A, she forced herself to think, "Party A is doing it for the good of the project." She endured the physical examination for half a year and found out that she had three types of breast nodules. Later, we adjusted the method and allowed her to curse in the air for 30 seconds when she received a modification request, and then sit down to make changes to the plan. On the contrary, the emotional internal consumption was reduced by most, and the work efficiency was much higher.

Different from the cognitive school's idea of ​​​​actively adjusting thoughts, mindfulness and acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) take another path: do not judge the good or bad of the emotion, first allow it to exist. Just like when it's going to rain, you don't have to curse the sky, just look for an umbrella first. When you feel angry, feel the tightness in your chest. When you feel grievances, allow yourself to have a sore nose. Don't rush to force yourself to "get better soon." I have seen many highly sensitive people use this method to solve the emotional internal friction all year round, but it also has obvious limitations: you can't be so nervous that your voice is shaking when you are about to go on stage to give a speech, and still stand in the middle of the stage and feel immersed in anxiety for 5 minutes, right? If you really encounter an emergency scene and can't wait to sort out your thoughts and accept your emotions, you have to use a more direct method.

Neuroscientific research has long confirmed that the amygdala, which is responsible for emotional responses, will temporarily take over the rational function of the prefrontal lobe 3-6 seconds after the emotion is triggered. At this time, it is useless no matter how many reasons you tell yourself. It is better to make a physiological intervention to quickly interrupt the emotional fermentation. For example, if you take a big gulp of half a glass of ice mineral water, the low temperature will quickly lower the temperature of your mouth and throat, and also reduce the excitement of the amygdala. ； Or pinch yourself hard for 3 seconds. The pain signal will be received by the brain first, directly interrupting the current emotional chain. I usually catch the high-speed train and go to the wrong station, and when I receive a temporary request before getting off work, my first reaction is to go to the vending machine and buy a bottle of iced Coke and take two sips. My mind will be clear in an instant, and I will not stand there and be upset for a long time.

To be honest, many people say that their emotions "come out of nowhere", but in fact they just haven't found the hidden trigger point. When I do consultations, I don’t teach you how to do it right away. I usually ask the client to keep an “emotional account” for half a month. Instead of writing a long essay, I just keep in mind three elements: time, triggering events, and emotional intensity, and score them from 1 to 10. What’s interesting is that many people figured out the pattern on their own within less than a week: A boy working on products found that as long as he stayed up until after 1 o’clock the day before and went to bed after 1 o’clock the day before, his anger level when encountering a product bug the next day would be 4 points higher than usual. ； Another stay-at-home mother found that every time she got angry with her children, it was because she had a quarrel with her mother-in-law half an hour ago. Once the source is found, it becomes much easier to deal with it: as long as boys stayed up late the day before, ordered themselves a cup of their favorite hand-brewed drink when they arrived at the company the next day, and walked around the corridor twice before dealing with bugs, they would rarely have conflicts with the development team. ； My mother learned to walk around the neighborhood for 10 minutes before going home after quarreling with her mother-in-law, and she became much more patient with her children.

Nowadays, people everywhere on the Internet advocate that "emotional stability is the highest level of education", but there have always been different voices in the field of psychology. Scholars of the existential school believe that emotions themselves are signals sent by the body to you: anger tells you that your boundaries have been violated, sadness tells you that something important has been lost, and anxiety reminds you that there may be risks in the future. If you suppress these signals every time, it will be like when the smoke alarm goes off at home. Instead of checking whether there is a fire, you just disconnect the battery. Sooner or later, something will happen. Last year, I had a visit. She didn't even shed tears when her husband cheated on her. She kept telling herself to hold on and not lose. However, three months later, she suddenly suffered from panic disorder and was sent to the emergency room. The doctor said that those unshed tears had long since turned into nodules in her body.

A while ago, I was looking through the emotional ledger of my previous visit, and I saw someone wrote something on the last page: "I used to think of my emotions as wild dogs that were about to be chased out, but now I realize that they came to deliver me a letter. I took the letter and it left. ”In fact, in the final analysis, emotional regulation is never a knowledge point that needs to be memorized. How you treat a good friend who is angry is how you treat your own emotions - there is no need to rush to reason, and there is no need to force it to get better immediately. Even if you give it a glass of warm water and sit with it for a while, it is much more useful than pushing it away.