Emotional Regulation
What is emotional regulation and what do we mean by it?
Generally emotional regulation is a term used to describe how someone manages their emotions and how they respond to an emotional experience.
For example, someone has hit your car in the car park, ultimately you will feel upset, angry, annoyed, especially if the person didn’t leave a note and now you are left with a hefty bill. However, if these emotions last for a longer time than reasonably acceptable (a few days) and if your initial response was to lash out, scream, shout, maybe at passers by or the owners of the car park, this would suggest you are not managing your emotions and suffering with emotional deregulation.
This is also true with our children. Children experience the same emotions as we do and throughout their day it will be different things which will affect them rather than someone hitting your car. For example, they may not do well in a test, they may not like the lunch, they may fall out with a friend, they may not do well in a game or the internet may be off so they can’t play. Consequently, a smaller issue, like dropping their snack on the floor could cause a huge explosion of emotions which ultimately triggers further consequences from us as parents and for them, including having time out or potentially being banned. All because their emotional regulation is poor.
How do we improve emotional regulation and why is is important?
As we have explained emotional regulation is about recognising and understanding our thoughts, what feelings we are experiencing and how we react. Having this understanding and recognising what situations may make us ‘over react’ is a good start as we can start to deal with these issues positively. Ultimately, being able to recognise our feelings and then how we respond with that feeling is also beneficial. The more we understand and recognise about ourselves, the more positive and more in control of our emotions we will be.
Having this understanding and recognise our triggers and emotions are hugely important for all aspects of our lives. As a child it helps provide us with the key skills and components to become secure and confident within adulthood. As for adults, it can help us have positive and supportive relationships, both romantically as well as socially and even within work. Not to mention to not hurt ourselves.
What can we do to help ourselves and our children?
create space/time - walking away, taking a moment to stop can help you pause and then think about what is happening.
notice what you are feeling - recognising your feeling and identifying where in your body you are feeling it. For example, jaw clenched, making a fist, butterflies, sweaty palms etc.
naming what you feel - being able to name your feeling is also as important as recognising what and where you are feeling it. It may be more than one feeling which is ok. You could even get used to saying your emotions out loud, especially when children are around so this helps them to recognise emotions
accepting the emotion - emotions are normal and sometimes we may react differently to a similar situation, this is normal too. Being able to accept you have felt in a certain way to a certain situation and not give yourself a hard time is hugely important as this will help you build resilience for future situations.
identify and if possible reduce triggers - being able to identify certain situations which will induce negative emotions, is cruical to help with your emotional regulation. Some triggers we might be able to remove, for example, not being near animals but others we may not be able to remove, for example, not going to school or work.
consider the story - in some situations, we may not have all the information and so we may start to fill in the blanks. For example, we haven’t heard from someone who we sent a message to so may start thinking, this person is ‘annoyed with me’ or ‘doesn’t like me’, when in reality they may not have seen the message or just been too busy. Being able to think rationally about the situation and put yourself in their situation will help not to fill in the blanks.
Positive self-talk - another aspect we will find ourselves in is we will undoubtedly think the worse and say things like, “I’ve messed up”, “I always get it wrong”, so turn these comments into positive. “I always try my best”, “everyone makes mistakes sometimes”. The feelings may still be there but not the self blame.
Practicing mindfulness - it may be useful to practice mindfulness and to be in the moment rather than thinking about what may have happened and what could happen. This will help build resilience and develop calmness and patience.
Emotional regulation isn’t easy and will take time to improve but the positive point is it can be improved. Even if you have a bad day and over react, doesn’t mean it will happen again. Keep going and keep trying. It will pay off.