#22: Build Mastery and Cope Ahead
In today’s episode, Marielle and Ed discuss the emotion regulation skills of Build Mastery and Cope Ahead. These are future-oriented skills that involve some planning to carry out.
Build Mastery is a way to strengthen your sense of competence by doing small, regular things that are challenging. Over time, this skill will help you stretch yourself and believe in your capability to accomplish hard things which in turn, will increase your emotional resiliency. This skill also helps you avoid a common mistake when trying to learn a new skill or do something hard: setting your sights too high and then giving up in defeat. Instead, Build Mastery helps you make small, incremental changes that are stretch you out of your comfort zone but aren’t impossible. You’ll find that the skill of Build Mastery will help you increase your sense of self-worth, self-efficacy, and pride in what you can achieve.
Cope Ahead is a skill that walks you through a process of planning for stressful situations ahead of time. This is a good skill to use when you anticipate that you will be in a situation that will bring up strong painful emotions and/or you might feel like engaging in a behavior you are trying to stop. Part of why this skill can be so helpful is that it asks you to make a coping plan ahead of time, step by step, and then visualize coping well with the situation.
Show Highlights:
- Build Mastery is about doing small, challenging things on a regular basis
- Build Mastery helps you feel more confident, more competent, and more in control of the direction you want your life to go
- Often people run into trouble with Build Mastery by setting goals too high or doing too much at once and then giving up
- Steadily working towards a goal builds a positive sense of self
- The key to building mastery is challenging yourself – finding the sweet spot – doing what’s a stretch for yourself but not too much of a stretch that you can’t do it
- Increase the difficulty slowly, over time
- Be careful about comparing yourself to someone else as we all have different things that challenge us
- Ask: What’s reasonable and realistic for me?
- Appreciate yourself for whatever efforts you do make
- Cope Ahead is a great skill use when you anticipate that you might be tempted to engage in behavior that you are trying not to
- The first step of Cope Ahead is to describe the situation that might be challenging to you and the emotions or action that may be a problem for you
- Be specific about what coping skills you will use to help you get through
- Actually imagine yourself in the situation coping well so you’re mentally rehearsing coping effectively
- Practice relaxing after visulalizing the stressful situation
Links & Resources
DBT Skills Training Handouts and Worksheets, Second Edition
SUDs (Subjective Units of Distress) scale
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#22: Build Mastery and Cope Ahead Transcript
Marielle Berg
Hello and welcome to The Skillful Podcast where we explore DBT and RO-DBT skills to help you reduce emotional suffering, improve your relationships, and become more present in your life. I’m your host, Marielle Berg, a psychotherapist at the Bay Area DBT and Couples Counseling Center.
Marielle Berg
So welcome Ed. I’m looking forward to us diving more deeply into the Emotion Regulation skills today.
Ed Fowler
Yeah, me too. I like that we have been kind of focusing on the skills that build our emotional resilience and decrease emotional vulnerability. And I think it’s great to talk about these kinds of really solid foundation of emotion regulation.
Marielle Berg
Yeah.
Marielle Berg
So today, we’re going to be talking about, there’s a set of skills that go by the acronym ABC PLEASE. We’re going to be talking about the ABC part of that.
Marielle Berg
Yes, heavy on the B and C.
Marielle Berg
Yes, we’ll go more into the A in another episode, that deserves its own full episode.
Ed Fowler
Yes, yeah. So we we had talked recently on the podcast about the A, which is Accumulating Positive Emotions, and went into all the ways, on a daily basis, on a regular basis, we can do things that are kind to ourselves, that give us a sense of pleasant activities during the day as a really important way to build that emotional resilience. That if we have these positive things on a regular basis, it decreases our vulnerability to falling into overwhelming emotion.
Ed Fowler
And one aspect of Accumulating Positive Emotions, which is the A in ABC, is doing things on a regular basis. Another aspect of it is thinking about long term goals as a way to accumulate positive emotions. So thinking about what we want in our life, what we want our life to be, in DBT speak, what would make our life worth living, and really making sure that we’re doing, taking actions on a regular basis that’s moving us in that direction. Which I think also much like accumulating positive emotions, short term deserves a nice unpacking, and we are going to do that in a little bit, in a few weeks here. But just to kind of mention that the A in ABC is Accumulating Positive Emotions, which has both a short term and a long term function.
Marielle Berg
Yeah. And just to say a bit more about the long term, accumulating positive emotions, that whole skill is really about living a life that is aligned with your values. Because if you are living a life that is not aligned with your values, or there are some values that are alive in your life, and others are, are not, it’s going to be much harder to be emotionally balanced, and to feel happy and satisfied on a regular basis.
Ed Fowler
I think that it’s a it’s a critical aspect of living a balanced life, is keeping an eye on what is important to me, and is that, are the activities that build that into my life showing up on a regular basis?
Marielle Berg
Yeah.
Ed Fowler
Am I doing the things that are gonna get me towards the things that are most important to me?
Marielle Berg
Yes, yeah. If you love nature, and you want to be in nature as much as you can, and you are living life in an urban environment, and almost are never around nature, or rarely, it’s going to make sense that you’re going to be feeling more negative or painful emotions more often.
Ed Fowler
Right, exactly. Great example.
Ed Fowler
So the ABC skills in DBT, that we’re going to go over more in depth today. A stands for Accumulating Positive Emotions. B stands for Building Mastery. And C stands for Coping Ahead. And all three of these skills are skills about thinking about the future in a way, and planning to do things in the present that will be beneficial to us longer term.
Ed Fowler
And so the B in that skill set is Building Mastery, which I think is really like a valuable thing to be conscientious about. Because it’s easy for us to not be paying attention to doing things that increase our sense of accomplishment, our sense of growth, our sense that I am doing things that are helping me improve in one way or another, and that that really, that that ability on a regular basis to feel a sense that I’m building mastery of important things for me, increases that sense of emotional stability.
Marielle Berg
Yes, and a way to think about Building Mastery is doing things, ideally, you know one or maybe more things a day, that helps you feel more competent, more self confident and in control.
Ed Fowler
Yeah.
Ed Fowler
That feeling like I am doing something to build control in my life is a really valuable thing. That I am focusing on an activity that it, that I have to put effort into, this is not I’m not doing something that’s easy. So accumulating positive emotions, doing something pleasant each day might be a really simple thing. Building mastery is like I got to stretch a little bit, I got to do something that I actually have to put effort into. So that I build that sense of like, oh, if I put effort in, it pays off. I can build my skill set around certain things.
Marielle Berg
Yeah.
Marielle Berg
So we’re really talking about challenging ourselves. And I think there’s probably a whole host of reasons why people might shy away from this. But I think a common one is that we can set our, our goals or our sights too high. And so we wind up doing things that make us want to give up.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Ed Fowler
So for instance, like we, I have talked recently in our group about trying to build this into my own life, and deciding that after many, many years of enjoying running and being very, very inconsistent with it, as much as I enjoy it, and getting older, so that it’s not always going to be such an easy option for me to run, deciding that in the next year, I want to try to run a half marathon, which is, for me a pretty big goal. And so that I’m very consciously doing that as a form of Building Mastery.
Ed Fowler
I want to increase my ability to feel like I can set a goal, I can steadily work towards it. And I can achieve that goal using that as a form of Building Mastery. If I say I want to run a half marathon and I’m going to do it next week, when right now, I’m like running really inconsistently, not very much mileage at all. And all of a sudden, I’m going to run 13.1 miles in a week, or a month, or even two months, that’s setting myself up for defeat. That’s going to be too big of a stretch.
Ed Fowler
I can’t go from, you know, running every once in a while, a couple of miles, to running 13.1 miles in a week or a month or a couple of months. Like I need to build up to it. So if that’s my goal, and I’m not giving myself adequate time to prepare, this goal is too much of a stretch, then I’m easily going to be frustrated. I’m going to say see, I can’t ever do anything related to running I don’t plan well, this isn’t meant to be I’m not a runner. Why did I even consider that that was a possibility for me? It’s easy to fall into all that Emotion Mind kind of thinking.
Marielle Berg
Yeah.
Marielle Berg
And I think the one about you, Building Mastery by building up your endurance to run a half marathon, or any kind of physical challenge, I think is a great one to think about with Building Mastery, because most of us have had the experience and we can all kind of know that it takes time to build that strength, that endurance. And I think it’s harder when it’s not so clear cut, when it’s a different kind of goal that someone’s working towards. I think people set them up without, set themselves up without even realizing to run that half marathon without training and then really blame themselves for not reaching that goal.
Ed Fowler
Right, right. And I think there are other things that people often talk about as a kind of straightforward way of building mastery. For instance, learning a musical instrument, or taking up some sort of craft kind of thing like knitting or sewing that requires steady practice that it’s built in. I can’t just say, oh, I’m gonna play the flute and pick up a flute and start playing ready for concerts, then I’m going to have to slowly learn and build over time. And that’s really the value in the Building Mastery skill, is I’m doing something on a regular basis, that is building up my skill set, that I get to see my progress, I get to see that I can set a goal and slowly, steadily work towards it and feel that sense of steady progress, which I do think really increases emotional resilience.
Marielle Berg
Right, and then you can look back and say, oh, three months ago, I was like, I only knew these notes or could only play this more simple song and look where I am now.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Marielle Berg
And that really helps with you know, as you’re saying, self confidence, self esteem. And I’m thinking more in the emotional realm, where I was saying that people might do the equivalent emotionally of, you know, just running a half marathon without training or trying to pick up the flute and do a magnificent concert without any sort of practice, that for someone who has a real difficulty with asserting themselves their equivalent of running a half marathon without training might be going in and asking their boss for a raise. Like, that’s just too much. And so there might be some building up that needs to be done, or some practice that needs to happen, that will build that muscle of self assertion.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Marielle Berg
Before you can do the big thing, like asking for a raise.
Ed Fowler
Right. And so for instance, that’s a good example of setting a Building Mastery goal of I want to be able to ask for a raise, and I have really struggled with that, and I want to be able to do it. The next part of that then would be to say, okay, if I want to ask for a raise, what are the steps I need to take to be prepared for that, and be realistic about those steps.
Ed Fowler
And I think that, you know, like, one of the things we talk about with Building Mastery is increasing the difficulty gradually, slowly over time. So if I want to ask for a raise, what are the steps that I need to do in order to feel confident enough to do it? Because asking for a raise is probably going to be scary, no matter what, what’s gonna get me to the point where I can actually take that risk? Instead of like, I got to ask for it today, I’m never going to do it.
Marielle Berg
Yeah. And then people are like, well, then forget it. I’m not gonna, you know, or look, I tried, and it didn’t work.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Marielle Berg
Without realizing that there probably needs to be some practice or training to begin with.
Marielle Berg
And when we’re thinking about this skill, another piece I want to add is that what is challenging for one person isn’t necessarily challenging for another. So when you are thinking about Building Mastery for yourself, be really careful about not comparing yourself to someone else. Being like, well, it’s so easy for them, how come I can’t do it?
Ed Fowler
Right. And it’s interesting, because I think of that in terms of for myself, like, years ago, when I really never exercised at all, and felt all kinds of shame about the fact that I never exercised and felt really out of shape, the way I started was to walk on a regular basis and spend like a year walking, and increasing the distance and time a little bit, but doing it pretty consistently, several days a week. And I still, that was like 20 years ago. And I feel so proud of that. Like still, today I am living off of the emotional resilience that came from that action, where it was like something reasonable, something that I could do something I felt really proud of, that I let that sink in over time.
Ed Fowler
Because before I did the walking thing, I was like, I gotta run, I gotta run, I gotta run, right? And I couldn’t do it, right? I remember one time going running, and just being so miserable, and I didn’t run for years after that, because I was like, this is terrible, I hate this. Right. But I had said, people run everybody runs, people are supposed to be runners, right, and so I got to run. And when I was able to set a reasonable goal, that was a stretch, that felt good for me. Like, I still feel proud of that. And even now as I want to kind of get more into running, walking is down. And that’s still like really giving me a lot of benefits. So it’s thinking about what’s reasonable, what’s realistic for me, what’s going to actually help me to feel proud and not feel like I am not doing enough or I should be doing more or that’s a stupid goal. But no, like, really this is this is what’s doable, and a good stretch for me.
Marielle Berg
Yeah.
Marielle Berg
And another piece, in terms of doing the skill that’s important, is to realize that it takes a certain amount of being able to tolerate where you are. And so it may be that, you know, if we’re using the walking and running analogy, that walking around the block, is is is Building Mastery for you on that day. And if you’re really depressed, maybe getting out of bed and taking a shower, is Building Mastery, because that’s challenging you today.
Ed Fowler
Right. And that and it’s so hard and this is where our skill of Radical Acceptance is so valuable, because I think in and skill also of Nonjudgmentalness are so valuable, because I think where we can increase our emotional vulnerability is all these self judgments and shoulds. I should be further along than I am. I should be doing more. Someone else or lots of people are doing x, I should be doing that. It’s you know, the judgments I hear all the time. It’s pathetic for me not to be doing that, right?
Ed Fowler
And being able to nonjudgmentally assess where am I at right now, and what’s a small step in the direction that I want to go to build mastery?
Marielle Berg
Yes.
Ed Fowler
Where I am right now is I’m really depressed and it is very hard to take a shower on a regular basis. So taking a shower is going to be my step.
Marielle Berg
Yeah.
Ed Fowler
And my ultimate goal is take a shower every day. And that’s going to be my thing. And I am going to use this as a way to start feeling a sense of accomplishment and pride, instead of a sense of of defeat and self judgment.
Marielle Berg
Yes.
Ed Fowler
That is a gigantic stretch, that’s actually big and can create so much benefit, if we can do it. But if we start with, oh, that’s too pathetic, that’s like, nobody else is doing that other people are running half marathons, I should be doing whatever, then you know, like, we’re not going to be able to take advantage of the benefit this skill has to offer.
Marielle Berg
Yes. And this isn’t officially part of the skill, but I think it can be a piece to add in is to give yourself kudos or appropriation. If it is that you took a shower, and that that’s super hard, or you walked around the block, or you tried to be assertive with a friend, you know, whatever it might be, to give yourself a moment to say, yeah, I did something hard.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Marielle Berg
Not, I should be able to do so much more.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Marielle Berg
And that’s reinforcing I think in and of itself.
Ed Fowler
And I think one of the things that can be helpful for this skill is to make a plan. So to say, I would like to be able to do x in this amount of time. So here’s my plan on a regular basis to work up to it, because it gives us something concrete to work towards. And I do think it can be a little easier to give ourselves credit when we can check off oh, I did the thing that I had planned to do. The flipside of that is if we slip and we have a hard time and we’re not able to stick to the plan, which often happens, to be able to be gentle and try again. And that’s where our Mindfulness skill can be so valuable of it’s not about sticking to the plan 100%. It’s about trying, even if I get off the plan.
Ed Fowler
Yeah.
Marielle Berg
And sometimes maybe you didn’t stick to the plan, because the activity you planned for yourself was too much.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Marielle Berg
So we need to break it down even more.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Marielle Berg
Yeah. So that’s Building Mastery. A kind of simple, maybe, or simple to understand or explain skill, but one that can be super effective in building self esteem, a sense of competence and feeling feeling good about yourself.
Ed Fowler
I think another skill that goes well with that, and with the Accumulating Positive Emotion is the C in ABC skills, which is Cope Ahead. And so this skill is about recognizing when we are going to be in difficult situations, knowing that’s going to be coming up, and planning ahead planning for success. Planning for how will we deal with difficulties in the future. So that much like the A and B skills, we’re doing some planning to do something in the present that will help me feel positive in the future.
Marielle Berg
Yes. And so will lead you through, there’s a bunch of different steps with Cope Ahead. But maybe we should first talk about some examples of situations when you might want to think about using the Cope Ahead skill.
Ed Fowler
I think a big one that I have used, and I hear a lot, is visiting family. Because so often we end up visiting family, that’s nice, and it’s great. And family is where all of our idiosyncrasies come into contact with the people who have known those idiosyncrasies the longest. And so there can be friction a lot of times in visiting family. And so knowing, like that oftentimes, old stuff gets stirred up visiting family, those kinds of things, making a plan. If we’re going to be around family that we know there may be some friction, we know that somebody tends to say the same kinds of things that I find annoying, or whatever it might be, making a plan for, what am I going to do that will help me to deal with this, so that I am not caught off guard, I feel like I’m able to be my most self confident self in that situation. I’m planning for, if I do feel overwhelmed at some point, what will I do to soothe myself or to deal with that? So that going into something that could end up being frustrating, I’m feeling a little bit more prepared.
Marielle Berg
Yes.
Marielle Berg
And the family situation or visiting family of origin is such a big one and a common one. And it makes me think back to when I was training to be a therapist. It was my one of my very first classes and the instructor who was well into their 60s said I you know, I’ve been a therapist for 40 plus years and I’ve been teaching for many years, and I go back to my family of origin and I am a 10 year old again. All all my stuff is back up.
Ed Fowler
Yeah.
Marielle Berg
So so, we could say you know, in any situation where you’re going to maybe feel afraid or threatened or emotionally triggered in some way, those are all great times to think about using the skill.
Ed Fowler
People use it sometimes like in work situations, where it’s like certain meetings that you know, that you have to have, or interacting with a certain supervisor or coworker that you know, is, tends to be challenging. If you know in advance, this is going to be hard for me, right, that’s a perfect time to install some coping ahead strategies.
Marielle Berg
Yes. And it’s also helpful to use, if you can anticipate ahead of time, that you will be in a situation where you’re going to feel a strong urge to engage in a behavior that you’re trying to stop. Or a target behavior as we refer to it in our skills group. So that’s any kind of maybe compulsive or addictive behavior, or behavior where you might want to lash out or run away, you can think about using the skill to help you respond differently.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Ed Fowler
Lots of possibilities of situations that we know in advance – that could be a challenge for me, I tend to struggle in that situation, let me plan ahead.
Marielle Berg
So the first step of Cope Ahead is describing the situation that’s likely to be challenging for you. And so I think it’s useful to write it out, to actually spend some time saying, this is the situation, this is who’s going to be there, or this is, how I might think or feel, or these are, what my urges might be. And when you’re describing the situation, think about sticking with facts and being very specific.
Marielle Berg
Yeah.
Ed Fowler
I think that’s an important part of this is, like, two things that you mentioned. One is taking time to actually, for instance, write it out, helps to increase our awareness and increase the importance of this planning. And this is not something I’m doing on the fly, this is something I’m actually devoting some time to, and writing it out as a way to kind of ensure that we’re devoting some time. So writing out what it is that we expect to happen, and what will be challenging about that.
Ed Fowler
And then the second thing that stood out to me was like being non judgmental about it. Just the facts. And I think it’s really good practice instead of, you know, my boss is always saying this, and they’re gonna, I know that they’re going to do it again, it’s like, my boss has a tendency to comment on this, I find that challenging. I feel angry, and hurt when that happens, I notice a desire to engage in this particular behavior, just really factually writing out what’s what we’re anticipating will happen.
Marielle Berg
And when you’re doing that, also naming some more of the emotions and potential actions that are likely to interfere with you acting as effectively as you want to.
Ed Fowler
Right. So really naming, what are the emotions that I am concerned about? What are the actions, the urges that are probably going to come up that I need to be paying attention to?
Marielle Berg
Yeah.
Marielle Berg
And then the next step is deciding what coping or problem solving skills you’re going to want to use in the situation. And again, we encourage you to be specific, not just say, oh, I’m just going to deal with my anger, or I’m going to walk it off, but to be to get pretty specific about what, and to put some details in about what you’re actually going to do to help you with your emotions, and any kind of urges that you have.
Ed Fowler
Right. And I do think like thinking specifically about what will I do? So that okay, if I’m concerned about anger, what will I do when I notice the anger? What actions will I take? And I do think that I hear people, and I’ve done this many times myself, saying, I’ll just deal with it. That’s not actually coping ahead, because there is no plan there. There’s nothing specific, like, okay, when I notice anger, what I’m going to do is go step outside. And I am going to take a moment to mindfully notice my surroundings as a way to get back into the present moment. And then I’m going to notice my anger and what it is I might want to say.
Marielle Berg
Yes. Or if it’s around a problem urge, I’m going to call, and not just a friend, think about what friend or, who are you going to reach out to? Is there a chance they’re actually going to be available or not? So really kind of thinking through your plan in advance.
Ed Fowler
And I do think that that kind of specificity is what sets us up for the most benefit from this skill. So not just I’m going to call a friend, but I’m going to call this person and if they’re not there, then I’m going to call this person and if they’re not there, then I’m going to call this person because I’ve done this many times. I’m going to call this person and then they don’t answer. And it’s like, Well, screw it. I guess I just couldn’t do whatever I want to do. It’s like, no, no, no, no. We got plans and backup plans.
Marielle Berg
Right.
Marielle Berg
Okay, great. Do you want to talk us through the next step of the skill?
Ed Fowler
Well, I think that one of the things that’s really valuable in Coping Ahead is we sit down, we notice what it is that we’re concerned about, what do we anticipate happening, we make us very specific plan for how to deal with it. And then the third step is to take some time to imagine ourselves doing those coping activities.
Marielle Berg
And when you’re imagining yourself, it’s not as if you’re watching a TV show or movie. It’s really putting yourself in the, or imagining that it’s happening now. The way athletes can visualize themselves doing whatever series of movements they want to do, as part of their training, and sort of mentally preparing themselves. So actually imagining it with as much vividness as you can conjure up. So there’s a mental rehearsing that’s happening,
Ed Fowler
Right. And one of the things that this is something that actually athletes and musicians and you know, people who have to do something that’s kind of high stress and need to be very specific in what they’re doing, will use this type of visualization a lot. And it has, research has shown, that imagining ourselves doing something very vividly as if we’re in that moment, is just as effective in terms of preparation, and like kind of practice, as doing the action. So that just imagining it can have the same benefit as if we did it.
Ed Fowler
And so for instance, for us, if we’re coping ahead with a situation that we’re not going to be in, I can’t be like, okay, well, I’m gonna go talk to my boss now. And as a practice run for coping ahead, when it’s hard, but we can visualize talking to my boss, as if I’m doing it. What am I going to say? How am I going to react? What are the things, specific things I’m going to do? And that kind of gives us that sense of very vivid practice.
Marielle Berg
Right. I like the way you describe that. And it’s so powerful. Our minds are so powerful.
Ed Fowler
Yeah. Yeah, it’s, it’s amazing, how much like, for instance, this kind of visualization, which can sound kind of corny, but again, you think about it, it’s like really, you know, like, this is something very frequently used by athletes, musicians, people who have to do these kinds of things regularly. And it is like, visualizing really gives us the benefit of practicing.
Marielle Berg
And then that those folks go into those high stress, high demand situations with that sort of already rehearsed in their mind, and probably give such a sense of, like, I got this.
Ed Fowler
Right, I’ve done this. I’ve done this before. And I think for when we’re talking about coping ahead. Oftentimes, it is a situation that we have been in in the past. But we can’t necessarily practice in the same way somebody can, for instance, practice doing particular jumps and figure skating or whatever. And so for us, it is a chance to really get that practice in, visualize ourselves doing our, following through with our plan. Put together that coping ahead plan and visualize following through with it.
Ed Fowler
And then the last step is to really practice relaxing afterwards. So that we do the visual, visualization, of coping in the situation. And then we practice relaxing so that we’re giving ourselves that sense of reward. Of like, I’ve got this, I can handle this, I’m going to feel more relaxed when this is done. And we’re building that awareness in as well.
Marielle Berg
Yes, because it can be stressful to, what we’re asking you to do with the skill is to put yourself in that hard situation, mentally. And so the relaxing after I think is really important to bring you back to the present moment, it isn’t actually happening to settle your nervous system.
Ed Fowler
That’s it. Like I am, I’m okay. And letting that sink in helps us in the present and will help us when we get into the situation that we’re planning for.
Marielle Berg
So when we go over this skill in our groups, we have people actually write out their situations in detail and describe in detail how they’re gonna cope. And then we have them kind of close their eyes and actually visualize it. So this might be a little more challenging to do on your own. But you certainly can try it out.
Ed Fowler
And I do think the, you know, this process of number one, write down what is the situation and what are my concerns, what is it that I need to be coping ahead?
Ed Fowler
Number two, what’s my specific plan for how to cope?
Ed Fowler
Number three, imagine it and rehearse it, practice it.
Ed Fowler
And then relax.
Ed Fowler
And just going through that taking some time to sit down and going through that process can really make a huge difference and, and make it a little less intimidating when we have to go into the situation that we’re coping ahead for, and feel a little bit more prepared.
Marielle Berg
Yeah, I think it’s really honoring that for all of us. challenging situations, in order to get through them, effectively, often need some preparation. And that thinking we’re just going to wing it can sometimes be a setup for it to not go very well.
Ed Fowler
Right.
Ed Fowler
And that’s where, we can’t anticipate every challenging situation, and some challenging situations, we know. We know this is going to be hard. So putting some effort into planning ahead actually sets us up to have a better experience than if we just show up and see what happens.
Marielle Berg
Okay, so that’s the B and the C, and we did a little bit of the A, of the ABC PLEASE skill, and we’ll get to the please in a subsequent episode.
Ed Fowler
Yes.
Marielle Berg
Thank you, Ed. Yeah, thank you.
Marielle Berg
In the beginning portion of this episode at and I reference, the A in the ABC acronym, and we’ve already recorded and released episodes that talk about Accumulating Positive Emotions in both the short term and the long term. So I wanted to point listeners in that direction in case you want to listen to those episodes. So Episode 17, which is Pleasant Events is all about Accumulating Positive Emotions in the Short Term.
Marielle Berg
And Episode 19, which is about your values focuses on Accumulating Positive Emotions in the Long Term. And also if you’re benefiting from this podcast, we’d love if you could rate and review us in iTunes. It really helps spread the message about DBT and mental health in general. Thanks so much.
Marielle Berg
Thanks for listening to today’s episode. To learn more, or if you’re in the Bay Area and want to get started with therapy, you can find us online at bayareadbtcc.com. That’s bayareadbtcc.com.