Inspirations

Building Mastery

by Nataleigh Kohn, LMSW

Early this summer, I moved out of the city and into the countryside. This move brought on many changes across essentially every aspect of life, as you can probably imagine. However, one change in particular stands out, and brings to mind a favorite DBT skill: I had to learn to drive. Learning to drive (skillfully and safely) was, for me, an incredible challenge in the art of Building Mastery.

Building Mastery is a skill from our Emotion Regulation module. To build mastery, we set out to purposefully do things that make us feel proud or accomplished, such as acquiring and mastering a new skill. Completing a challenge or becoming an expert (or merely just competent) in a task or activity helps to build our resilience and reduce our vulnerability to challenging emotions. Sometimes I like to think of it as if we are characters inside a video game, and in order to acquire points, we need to unlock new achievements—with each new achievement point, we build strength and resilience against future challenges.

One key of Building Mastery is to set tangible, attainable goals toward your ultimate goal. We want to strike a balance between challenging ourselves, while still setting ourselves up for success. Over the course of the past four months, I have gradually and mindfully driven further and further, on busier and busier roads—eventually completing a drive on my own three hours from our home into the city. I likely would not have been successful if I had attempted a drive like this from the beginning (which may have actually contributed to more negative emotions and fear around driving), however since I took my time and steadily built competence over time, patience and consistency paid off.

What is something you’ve built mastery of recently? If you can’t think of something, I challenge you to choose something this week and go for it!

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Sleep

by Alyssa Colbert, LCSW

At an early hour of the morning on October 1st, I was awoken by the hissing sound of my heater being turned on. The annual day when New York City buildings are required to turn on the heat had arrived. I felt the heat slowly start to emanate from the heater and before I knew it, my thermostat read 80 degrees. As I tossed and turned, unable to fall back asleep, I couldn’t help but think about the training that clinicians at our practice did last week led by Dr. Brian Curtis. Dr. Curtis is a clinical psychologist who specializes in sleep disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and borderline personality disorder in adults. His training last week was on the integration of the treatment of sleep disorders and Dialectical Behavior Therapy.

Our quality of sleep can be a significant factor that interferes with behavior change and progress toward our goals. One of the clinicians at our practice has this great saying: “A sleep disorder is a mood disorder.” Dr. Curtis held this same wisdom when discussing how one of the functions of sleep is to process and regulate our emotions. As we know from our PLEASE skill, exposure to vulnerabilities makes us more susceptible to emotion dysregulation. It makes sense that poor quality of sleep or having a sleep disorder, can increase our emotional vulnerability and directly impact our quality of life.

One of Dr. Curtis’s recommendations for attempting to regulate your sleep and improve your sleep quality is to consider sleeping in cooler temperatures. This is because our core body temperature decreases when entering into a deeper sleep. If your environment is warm, you are likely going to have a more difficult time falling asleep because your body is tasked with the challenge of decreasing your temperature in a warmer environment. Once I remembered this fact on that October 1st morning, I quickly got activated to try and change my room’s temperature. Another recommendation from Dr. Curtis is to take a warm bath or shower prior to sleeping. While this is seemingly in contrast to the previous recommendation, if we remember the wisdom of dialectics, both can be true. Dr. Curtis discussed that taking a warm bath or shower actually functions to decrease our core body temperature by releasing some of our body’s temperature into our environment. This is what is happening when our skin appears flushed after a bath or shower.

Have you talked with your therapist about your experience with sleep? If not, we’d recommend that you consider putting it on your session agenda. The two recommendations from Dr. Curtis are just a few of many. You and your therapist could assess your sleep together and explore if there is a specific intervention that could be helpful for you. In the meantime, we’d encourage you to take a look at the Sleep Hygiene handout in the DBT skills workbook (Emotion Regulation Handout 20B). This handout can give you some more ideas to improve your experience with sleep.

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Forest Bathing

Forest bathing is the act of applying mindfulness to walking in the woods. This idea is based on a Japanese concept where individuals carve out time to walk in the forest, with the intention of slowing down and observing nature around them. This practice is known to help individuals feel happier and calmer. In DBT, we build Mindfulness into our daily routine in order to help us regulate emotion and to practice being in the moment. Walking mindfully, often outside, is a common practice.

Awe is a psychological concept that has recently gained attention within the field as a way to impact our mental health. Greater Good, a science center based at UC Berkley, defines awe as “the feeling we get in the presence of something vast that challenges our understanding of the world, like looking up at millions of stars in the night sky or marveling at the birth of a child. When people feel awe, they may use other words to describe the experience, such as wonder, amazement, surprise, or transcendence.” (for more information see www.greatergood.berkeley.edu).

Awe is something that occurs for me when I can experience nature. It is a feeling of connection to a vast world beyond ourselves, a reminder of the greater world that we inhabit. For me, awe is easy to access in the forest. Thus, the idea of forest bathing just makes sense to me. I encourage you to think about what places inspire awe for you. It may be a forest, beach, or lake. It may be noticing the song of a bird, a flower blooming, or leaves starting to change color.

Different aspects of nature may lead you to experience awe, and to help you access mindfulness. For myself, I know that time in the woods absolutely helps me feel calmer and happier. It serves as a reset – time away from the business and hustle of life, time to breathe and be present. Away from screens and distractions, I find it simple to settle into the present moment.

Last weekend, right before the transition to fall, I was able to sneak out and visit the woods with my family. During our hike, I observed how the forest looks in late summer, green and lush. A rocky path led me to observe the ground intently, noting where I placed my feet. Practicing Mindfulness was very accessible in these moments, with so much to observe. The smell of the forest captivates my attention. The trees and their leaves draw my eyes. And, even better, watching my dog’s huge grin as he gets to hike in the woods with his family brings a smile to my face as well.

Though it doesn’t happen as often as I wish it could, I hope this is a practice I can continue thoughout the fall in order to maintain my own mental health. In DBT we talk about applying skills intentionally. For Mindfulness, this means a commitment to the practice. Mindfulness helps us feel better overall when we can commit to it regularly. Though a hike may be ideal, even taking a few minutes to sit outside and breathe, observing the nature in our immediate environment, can help us maintain this practice.

I challenge you to take a moment to try your own version of forest bathing.

References

Matthew P. White et al., “Spending at Least 120 Minutes a Week in Nature is Associated with Good Health and Wellbeing,” Scientific Reports, January 14, 2020.

Gretchen Reynolds, “An ‘Awe Walk’ Might Do Wonders for Your Well-Being,” The New York Times, September 30, 2020.
Sturm, V. E., Datta, S., Roy, A. R. K., Sible, I. J., Kosik, E. L., Veziris, C. R., Chow, T. E., Morris, N. A., Neuhaus, J., Kramer, J. H., Miller, B. L., Holley, S. R., & Keltner, D. (2022). Big smile, small self: Awe walks promote prosocial positive emotions in older adults. Emotion, 22(5), 1044–1058.

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For many of us, change is challenging. We want things to stay the same, particularly when the conditions are in our favor. We like predictability, so much so that we’d prefer being stuck in unhealthy relationships so long as these people are familiar to us (see the familiarity principle or mere-exposure effect).

            Change is the idea of novelty, the idea that something doesn’t remain the same, that nothing is inherently permanent. The reason why we find change so scary and anxiety-provoking is that we simply don’t know and hence, cannot prepare for what is yet to come. If we had some validity in anticipating accurately change and its consequences, maybe that heartbreak of loss wouldn’t feel so painful. Maybe that feeling of missed opportunity wouldn’t make us feel so empty. Maybe our thought patterns surrounding the extremes (“I shouldn’t have done that, it’ll never be okay”) wouldn’t sting so strongly.

The truth of the matter is that we are constantly exposed to and practicing change. Some of us, without being aware of it, may be experts at change. Every day our bodies replace billions of cells. The values of stocks incessantly alter along with the market. An ice cube melting in the palm of your hand with every passing second changes. The human population, our breath, literally every existing thing changes. There is not one thing that is unsusceptible to change. Even as you’re reading this, your perception and beliefs about change may have changed.

We think that we know so little about change because of our stronghold resistance. But every day, every moment, is an opportunity to practice embracing change. Why hold onto fighting against change when you know it is an inevitable phenomena. Bring mindful awareness to what you’ve been practicing all along. Keep going.

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Physical Vulnerability and Self Care

If you’ve ever been injured, or endured some type of physical vulnerability, you’re probably familiar with the sense of loss and emotions that accompany the physical damage to your body. Sometimes the emotional reactions can be just as taxing and painful as the injury itself. This week we are going to focus on the importance of self care to help minimize the effects of the physical and emotional strain our body endures when injured.

Obtaining a physical injury inevitably hinders our ability to function regularly and perform daily routines. This can be extremely frustrating and difficult to manage as it can force you to temporarily give up parts of your identity. For example, if you’re someone who loves to exercise, but has injured their leg, your ability to run is extremely limited. It’s important to remind yourself that this is temporary, and with time, your body will heal. However, why is it that injuries can be so emotionally and mentally difficult to deal with even though we can rationalize how they’ll get better and go away?

Within the past two years, I have endured a few sports related injuries that have shifted my perspective on the topic. I think it’s important to first recognize how you can experience a sense of loss and rejection when you obtain a physical injury. When I tore my labrums in both of my hips, I felt a sense of loss to that part of my body because neither hips were functioning at a sufficient level that could meet my needs. As a person who loves to be physically active, I felt a huge void in my life. My injuries had me question myself and my judgment about events leading up to the injury, “Why would I push my limits too far? Why didn’t I listen to my body better? What should I have done differently? Why is my body rejecting me?” These were just a few of many lingering thoughts I had about the injury. I was experiencing some regret and putting blame on myself.

With a great support team, I quickly learned that your recovery is a journey and you need to meet yourself where you’re at. Nothing can change the events from the past, but you have control about the future. I was reminded to practice more compassion for myself when going through this extensive recovery. Instead of focusing on the past or “what if” scenarios, I acknowledged the present. I evaluated how activities, like running, were previously an outlet for me and a form of self care that I strongly relied on. Running was part of my day that I would disconnect with my responsibilities, focus on myself, and enjoy the fresh air. Now, I still make time to get outside and connect with the world around me. It’s no workout, but it’s provided me with the same sense of ease. It’s critical to continue to implement self care even though your daily routines may be hindered. If you’re currently experiencing any type of physical vulnerability, validate your feelings about the injury, surround yourself with supportive individuals, practice compassion and forgiveness for yourself, and find new activities that are fulfilling and effectively provide you with self care.

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Overstimulation

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Finding Inspiration

This week is all about finding inspiration! The idea came from a recent visit of mine to The Metropolitan Museum of Art. During my time at the art museum, I noticed that certain pieces stood out more than others. There were details that brought up a sense of curiosity and excitement.  I even began to use my sketchbook again! I became mindful of how I felt in that moment- I felt recharged and motivated!

Why are these moments so important? I think my experience illustrates this well. By connecting with something I already love, like art, I was reminded of how it felt to be around creativity. What sparks joy for you? Be mindful about how certain places, things, people, etc, make you feel. You might notice chills of excitement. Your eyes may widen and you may notice yourself with a pep in your step. Things that inspire us energize us from within.

If you haven’t felt inspired lately, or even felt stuck, try doing something small this week that is special to you. In DBT we teach a skill called accumulate positives.  Some examples from our team include mindful eating, trying new restaurants, rock climbing, connecting with hobbies that we used to love, and many more. Accumulate positives asks us to find small things that genuinely bring you joy. Then, the second step of accumulating positives includes throwing ourselves into the activity and experience the activity fully.

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