Dialectical Behavioral Therapy(DBT):The Complete Mindfulness

Dialectical behavior therapy, is extraordinarily effective at helping people manage overwhelming emotions. Research shows that dialectical behavior therapy strengthens a person’s ability to handle distress without losing control or acting destructively. A lot of people struggle with overwhelming emotions. It’s as if the knob is turned to maximum volume on much of what they feel. When they get angry or sad or scared, it shows up as a big, powerful wave that can sweep them off their feet. If you’ve faced overwhelming emotions in your life, you know what we’re talking about. There are days when your feelings hit you with the force of a tsunami. And when that happens, it makes you afraid to feel things because you don’t want to get swept away by your emotions. The trouble is, the more you try to suppress or put a lid on your emotions, the more overwhelming they can get. What’s important to know right now is that trying to stop your feelings doesn’t work. There’s a fair amount of research to suggest that the likelihood of developing intense, overwhelming emotions may be hardwired from birth. But it can also be greatly affected by trauma or neglect during childhood. Trauma at critical points in our development can literally alter our brain structure in ways that make us more vulnerable to intense, negative emotions. However, the fact that a propensity to intense emotions is often rooted in genetics or trauma doesn’t mean the problem can’t be overcome. Thousands of people have used the skills you’ll learn in this book to achieve better emotional control. They have changed their lives—and you can too. So what are these skills, and how will they help you? Dialectical behavior therapy teaches four critically important skills that can both reduce the size of emotional waves and help you keep your balance when those emotions overwhelm you.

1. Distress tolerance will help you cope better with painful events by building up your resiliency and giving you new ways to soften the effects of upsetting circumstances.

2. Mindfulness will help you experience more fully the present moment while focusing less on painful experiences from the past or frightening possibilities in the future. Mindfulness will also give you tools to overcome habitual, negative judgments about yourself and others.

3. Emotion regulation skills help you to recognize more clearly what you feel and then to observe each emotion without getting overwhelmed by it. The goal is to modulate your feelings without behaving in reactive, destructive ways.

4. Interpersonal effectiveness gives you new tools to express your beliefs and needs, set limits, and negotiate solutions to problems—all while protecting your relationships and treating others with respect.

This is another exercise that will help you recognize and focus on your thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations. In this exercise, you will identify the number of thoughts you have in a three minute period. This will allow you to become more mindful of just how quickly your mind really works. This exercise will also help you prepare for the next exercise, Thought Defusion. The instructions for this exercise are simple: set a timer for three minutes and begin writing down every thought you have on a piece of paper. But don’t try to record the thought word for word. Just write down a word or two that represents the thought. For example, if you were thinking about a project you have to complete at work by next week, simply write “project” or “work project.” Then record your next thought. See how many of your thoughts you can catch in three minutes, no matter how small the thoughts are. Even if you start thinking about this exercise, write “exercise.” Or if you start thinking about the paper you’re writing on, write “paper.” No one else ever has to see this record, so be honest with yourself. When you’ve finished, count the number of thoughts you had in three minutes and multiply that number by twenty to get an idea of how many thoughts you might have in an hour.

Using successful communication skills, such as mindful “I” statements, is a part of what dialectical behavior therapy calls “doing what’s effective”. This means that you do what’s necessary in the present momen; to resolve a problem, cope with a situation, or reach your goals, even if what you do feels uncomfortable, or it goes against what you are experiencing emotionally. For example, maybe you’re not comfortable speaking directly to the other person about how you feel. But sometimes in order to get what you want, you have to modify what you feel like, especially if you struggle with overwhelming emotions.

If you’re going to change the way you behave in the present moment, you have to be aware of what you’re thinking, feeling, and doing in the present moment so that you can choose to do what’s effective.

In order to do what’s effective, you have to do the following:

Be mindful of your thoughts and feelings.

Avoid judging the situation 

Choose actions that are necessary to reach your goal.

Do the best you can.