There are so many things you can do to cope with big emotions and difficult situations. You may need to find the ones that works specifically for you. Take a look at the options and feel what resonates with you - what feels like it could work for you? Do any pop out and grab your attention? Try it out. How does it feel?
If you notice any improvement in your physical state, your state of mind, your emotional state, or your energy, this is a skill that's worth developing for yourself.
Take a look at the list of options below.
(Notice that it's not an exhaustive list and you may need to seek out other resources to find options that resonate with you.)
(Also, some things take more skill than others, so you'll need to practice.)
- Deep breath
- Breathe in and out and slow and deep as you can
- Count how many seconds you can inhale and how many you can exhale for
- Focus your thoughts on your breath
- It's normal for your thoughts to wander. When you notice, mindfully bring them back to breath without self judgement
- Self-talk
- Recognize the difference between your own conscious thoughts and automatic thoughts that aren't yours
- Replace your negative thoughts with thoughts you want to believe instead
- Be mindful about the thoughts you put your attention on (skillful)
- Check out CBT (post coming soon)
- Talk to someone
- Get your thoughts and feelings out of your head and body
- Get some distance
- Journal
- Write down your thoughts, feelings, and the triggering situation
- If you don't know what triggered the overwhelm, write down everything that's happened recently.
- When you notice emotion increase, decrease, or change, make a note of it.
- Change your physical state (i.e. hot to cold, dry to wet, standing to sitting, etc...)
- Take a bath/shower
- Stand in front of the freezer or hold ice for a few minutes (no more than 20 minutes)
- Sit down
- Take a walk
- Distract
- Do something to wrench your mind away from what is causing the distress
- Meditate
- 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 Exercise (use your 5 senses and notice 5 things you see, 4 things you feel with touch, 3 things you hear, 2 things you smell, 1 thing you taste). You may need to grab things that have smell and taste. This will serve as a great distraction from what you're doing.
- Mindful Awareness
- Bring your conscious awareness to what you want your attention on
- Notice when you're on auto-pilot
- Notice when you're reactive
- Make a conscious decision about your next step
- Moral Compass
- What drives your behavior? How do you decide one thing vs another?
- Mantras
- "I am..."
- safe, powerful, worthy, good enough
Coping skills increase in line with how difficult it is for you to regulate the emotion(s) you’re having. Meaning, your skill with how you use it often needs to be more developed. Therefore, practice using coping skills you want to be able to call upon in distress, when you're not in distress.
Things that can increase your difficulty coping with an emotion or situation:
- Past trauma
- Belief that the emotion(s) is Bad
- Self-hatred
- Inexperience coping with a specific emotion
- Environmental factors
- Mental health state
Regulating emotions is a process, and the difficulties above can entangle the process with trials. It's very normal to struggle with coping. That's why they're coping skills. It takes skill, which comes from practice, trial-and-error, and mindful intention.
What's the difference between Coping and Regulating?
There's a subtle nuance here from my perspective.
Coping is the ability to take in the stimuli of a situation and move towards your next step.
Regulating is bringing the energy of your mind, emotions, and body into a state of general peace, calm, and/or clarity.
So let's say I experience a trigger during a conversation and my mind floods with thoughts that align with a core negative belief that I learned in the past due to trauma, my emotions jack up to high anxiety (or plummet low into deep depression), and my energy is aligned with that high (or low) and my body reacts with vibrating foot tapping (or skin picking).
My ability to cope with the situation will affect whether I can continue with the conversation, or I completely lose the plot (and a whole spectrum in-between).
My ability to regulate myself will affect how I feel throughout the next moments, hours, and/or days.
You may or may not need to regulate in order to cope with a difficult situation.
There's definitely a scale for both coping and regulating and practice can help you regulate quicker and cope with more skill.