DBT Emotion Regulation Skills (training overview)

Source: Training Development Resources/Coping-Self-Care-Wellness — Mindy Flanigan, LMSW, DBT training slides ("Copy of Emotion Regulation Skills.pdf")

A DBT-based emotion regulation training with several directly usable pieces. It opens with dialectics — holding two true-seeming-opposite things in balance at once (e.g., "I want my life to be better while I still engage in problematic behaviors") — and frames the therapeutic stance as balancing acceptance with change. The core emotion regulation objectives: understand how emotions work, identify and label them, reduce vulnerability to strong emotions, build positive emotions and experiences, and reduce emotional suffering — while treating negative emotions as real and meaningful rather than things to eliminate. Concrete tools include square breathing (inhale 4 counts, hold 4, exhale 4, repeat); a non-judgmental worksheet (naming a judgment you make about yourself or others, then writing a neutral, non-judgmental replacement description); a willingness vs. willfulness worksheet (willingness = openness to doing what's needed even outside your comfort zone; willfulness = fighting reality and demanding things go your way); a self-soothe kit built around the five senses; a building positive emotions worksheet (naming activities, thoughts, and relationships that bring positive emotion, plus barriers and strategies to bring more of it in regularly); and a radical acceptance worksheet built on the idea that there are only four ways to respond to a crisis — solve it, change how you feel about it, accept it, or stay miserable. Reducing emotional suffering is anchored to two overlapping acronyms: CARES (Calm, monitoring Arousal, Rest/relaxation, Effectively coping with Emotions, healthy Sleep) and MEDDSS (Mastery — engage in something you're good at; Exercise; Diet — reduce sugar/caffeine/nicotine; Drugs — take medications as prescribed, avoid alcohol/drugs; Sleep — not too little or too much; Spirituality — however the person defines it). (This is a DBT Emotion Regulation module handout, physically filed in this folder rather than the dedicated DBT folder — cross-reference DBT.md, which covers Mindfulness, Interpersonal Effectiveness, and Radical Acceptance content from that folder instead.)

Reframing Self-Care: Beyond Calm

Source: Training Development Resources/Coping-Self-Care-Wellness — "Self as Other: Reflections on Self-Care" (CrimethInc, an anarchist collective's publisher — noted so the source's political framing is transparent; the synthesis below keeps to the practically useful reframe rather than the essay's broader anti-capitalist argument)

A useful challenge to the default mental image of "self-care" as bubble baths and calm-down activities. Two reframes worth carrying into coaching conversations: first, calming down isn't always the right response — the parasympathetic (rest-and-digest) activities most people picture are one valid form of care, but some distress genuinely calls for the sympathetic nervous system's energy (movement, exertion, expression) rather than suppression, and pushing someone toward stillness when they need to move can backfire. Second, and more importantly for coaching: self-care and reciprocal/community care are linked, not separate — humans' first instinct under threat is to seek connection and comfort from others, and fight/flight/freeze only kick in after that fails. A young person who's isolating with solitary "self-care" routines (yoga alone, journaling alone) may actually need someone to show up, sit with them, or simply not leave them alone — and framing every coping need as something to individually self-manage can inadvertently reinforce isolation or mask a need for real support. Worth keeping in mind when "have you tried self-care?" starts to feel like a deflection rather than a genuine offer of support.

Grounding Techniques

Source: Training Development Resources/Coping-Self-Care-Wellness — "Copy of Grounding Techniques.pdf"

An extensive, concrete list of grounding techniques for dissociation, overwhelming feelings, or intense anxiety — reorienting to the here-and-now. Physical/body-based: stomp feet or press them firmly into the ground, cross arms and legs, rub palms together and clap, take a warm bath or shower, find your pulse and count beats, change position (sit if standing, stand if sitting). Sensory: hold a comforting object, pet an animal and say its name aloud, eat something and notice its taste/temperature, smell outside air or grass. Environmental: name what's around you (sounds, people, objects), go outside and sit against a tree, take a walk and count houses, look in a mirror and make yourself smile. Cognitive/prepared-in-advance: visualize a bright red STOP sign to interrupt a flashback; during a calm moment, make a list of what's in each room of your house (to help you reorient during a flashback) and a list of positive affirmations to read aloud later; make a list of known triggers to work through with a counselor. Two structured exercises round it out: a five-senses hand-tracing exercise (trace your hand, label each finger with one of the five senses, and identify something safe representing each — recall this from memory when triggered), and the well-known 54321 game (5 things you can see, 4 you can feel, 3 you can hear, 2 you can smell, 1 good thing about yourself).

Letting Go of Emotional Suffering (worksheet)

Source: Training Development Resources/Coping-Self-Care-Wellness — DBT worksheet, Seth R. Axelrod, PhD (adapted from Linehan's Skills Training Manual)

A short mindfulness-of-current-emotion worksheet: describe the triggering situation and name the emotion; observe it (thoughts, urges, body sensations, and where in the body); notice the parts that come and go like a wave, practicing letting them pass rather than pushing them away or clinging to them; recognize that you are not your emotion and can have an urge without acting on it; note how long it took for the worry about the emotion to subside; name what you're willing to accept about the reaction; and rate suffering 0–100 before and after the exercise. A clean, quick template for walking a young person through noticing and riding out a strong feeling in the moment.

Urge Surfing

Source: Training Development Resources/Coping-Self-Care-Wellness — "Copy of Urge Surfing.pdf", Chris Walsh training material describing Alan Marlatt's relapse-prevention technique

A well-explained technique for riding out cravings and urges (substance use, but also gambling, overeating, or any impulsive/destructive urge) without acting on them. Core idea: urges rarely last more than about 30 minutes if there's no opportunity to act on them — the internal struggle of fighting an urge is often what feeds it, not the urge itself (illustrated by the classic "white bear" thought-suppression research: people told not to think about a white bear thought about it more, not less). Urges are described as ocean waves — small at first, cresting, then breaking up and dissipating on their own — and as a "stray cat" you've been feeding: each time you give in, the behavior gets reinforced and comes back louder, but if you stop feeding it, the crying gets briefly worse before it fades for good. The technique itself: sit with an unsupported back, begin mindfulness of the breath, and when discomfort or an urge arises, get curious rather than avoidant — notice the exact physical sensation (location, quality, temperature, borders — sharp like a football's edge or fuzzy like cotton wool) and how it changes over at least five breath cycles, gently returning attention to the breath whenever the mind wanders to thoughts or stories. Includes guidance for coaches on teaching it live: either manufacture the opportunity (guide mindfulness meditation until a minor physical urge like an itch naturally arises) or use it opportunistically when a client visibly has an urge in session ("It looks like you might be having an urge right now — how does this feel in your body, and whereabouts?") — walking them through noticing the sensation's qualities, then briefly diverting attention to the conversation topic, then returning to check how the sensation has changed. Clients typically need to be walked through this three or four times before they trust the process enough to use it alone.

Future-Self Journaling

Source: Training Development Resources/Coping-Self-Care-Wellness — "Future_Self_Journaling.01.pdf"

A daily journaling practice framed around intentionally "rewiring" habitual patterns through repetition — 10 minutes a day for 30 days, done at whatever time of day the person has the most mental clarity (not mid-crisis or emotionally depleted). The setup asks the person to name one specific behavior or pattern they want to change (e.g., "I want to be less emotionally reactive"), write a few affirmations that support that change without overthinking them, and describe concretely how they'll practice the new behavior day to day. The daily template then prompts: today's affirmation; what pattern I'm focusing on shifting today; something I'm grateful for; three traits my future self has; an opportunity today to be that future self; and how I feel about who I'm becoming. A low-effort, repeatable structure a coach could hand to a young person working on a specific behavior change over several weeks.

Back to School Power Ups Toolkit — Rest, Breathe, Belong

Source: Training Development Resources/Coping-Self-Care-Wellness — "Back to School Power Ups Toolkit 2024," Breathe for Change

Written for classroom educators, but directly adaptable to peer coaches and drop-in center staff — useful both as self-care for coaches and as group facilitation material for youth. Organized around three pillars:

Rest — brief restorative chair-yoga poses as an accessible way to recharge during a busy day rather than "get more sleep" advice alone: Legs Up the Wall (calms the mind, relieves minor backache), Seated Forward Fold, and Swaying Self Hug (a grounding, self-soothing cross-arm sway). Each includes modifications for tight hamstrings or limited mobility.

Breathe — grounded in real physiology (breathwork activates the vagus nerve and parasympathetic nervous system, lowering cortisol and heart rate) but paired with an explicit trauma-informed caution: breath holding or retention (common in formal pranayama) can be developmentally inappropriate for young people and can actually re-trigger trauma responses, since trauma itself often involves held or shortened breath. Seven trauma-informed teaching principles are named (offer clear context/framing, create reliability and consistency, use invitational rather than directive language, provide options, honor choice and voice, listen and respond mindfully, close with intention). Three practices are included in full: belly breathing (hands on belly, feel it rise and fall, explicitly linked to vagus nerve activation); superhero breath (a big inhale followed by an audible "ahh" exhale while standing in a power stance — useful as an energizing rather than calming practice, good for low-energy moments); and the One BREATH at a Time acronym for quick emotional processing anywhere — Break (pause, breathe into the heart), Recognize (name the feeling), Experience (feel it), Appreciate (find something to be grateful for), Transform (ask "what do I need to do right now?"), Heal (act on it).

Belong — grounded in Dr. Marilyn Brewer's model of belonging as the intersection of inclusion and distinctiveness: too little of both is exclusion, too much distinctiveness alone means always standing out, too much inclusion alone means just blending in, and real belonging means feeling both connected to the group and recognized as your own person. The source notes social exclusion registers in the brain through the same neural pathways as physical pain, which is worth naming explicitly to a young person who feels excluded — it's not an overreaction. Practical strategies: North Star Vision (a short guided visualization of how someone wants their coming weeks/months to go, followed by journaling and small-group sharing); pairing that vision with a concrete SMART goal; and three structured peer-acknowledgment practices useful in group or drop-in settings — Thankful Thoughts (a brief gratitude meditation naming someone you appreciate and what makes them specifically distinct), Peer Cheer (partners take turns acknowledging each other after any paired activity), and Appreciation Station (each person keeps a paper where others write appreciations of them over the course of a session or program). Useful toolkit specifically for group-based or drop-in-center facilitation, not just 1:1 coaching.

Are You Authentic With Yourself? (coach self-check)

Source: Training Development Resources/Coping-Self-Care-Wellness — trainer self-reflection checklist (EU-funded training material)

A short five-question self-check aimed at trainers/coaches themselves, not youth: Are you able to say no? Who are your support systems? How are you fulfilled by what you do? What are your core values? Can you walk the talk? Useful as an occasional supervision or self-reflection prompt for peer support staff — cross-reference Burnout.md.

(Not extracted: "Copy of Self-Soothing.gif" — an animated/unsupported format for this tool, skipped. The "Self-Soothing" subfolder contains four files that appear to be Full-Color/black-and-white duplicate pairs of two documents — "Self-Soothing" and "Self-Soothing Diary" — consistent with the oversized-workbook pattern (SelfLoveRainbow-style) seen throughout this Drive; the one small enough to attempt (314KB) returned only two garbled non-English characters with no usable text, suggesting a scanned/image-only PDF, and the two ~18–20MB versions were not attempted given the consistent pattern of token-limit failures at that size. The five-senses self-soothe concept itself is already captured above via the DBT Emotion Regulation handout, so little is likely lost.)