How do I calm me? Let me count the ways

Many clients with whom I work benefit from having strategies which they can use to calm down or ‘self-soothe’. These strategies are called for when the person is experiencing one or more emotions at a level of intensity which is uncomfortable, hard to manage and at times overwhelming.

Being unable to calm down at these times often results in the person having difficulty managing their verbal and behavioural reactions. In turn, this often has negative effects on the individual or others with whom they are interacting.

As an example, consider an athlete or other performer whose inability to calm themselves before or during a performance results in their experiencing a level of anxiety so strong that it leads them to perform at a level below their capabilities. Or think of someone who has to deal with stressful situations and challenging people in their work. Being unable to calm down may result in their having difficulty managing their stress and anger. This may lead them to make too many mistakes and to get involved in altercations which puts their employment in jeopardy.

Fortunately, there are many strategies of different types which a person can use to calm themselves in these and other situations. And like with most psychological skills, you will become more proficient at these strategies the more you practice them. I will discuss these strategies in the following sections.

Relax your body

When your body is relaxed, it is much easier to remain calm. Therefore, it is good to have go-to strategies to ease your physical tension.

I recommend two kinds of strategies to relax the body. One is to engage in regular cardiovascular/aerobic exercise. Doing this kind of exercise will make it more likely you will feel relaxed in your body and find it easier to remain calm.

A second strategy is to practice being able to calm your body quickly when you need to when facing a challenging or stressful situation. An easy-to-use method is relaxed breathing. This fills your diaphragm with air and calms your body while lowering your heart rate. The relaxed breathing routine I follow and recommend is the ‘centering breaths’ exercise described by sports psychology consultant Jason Selk in his book 10-Minute Toughness. This exercise uses the 6-2-7 breathing method in which you inhale for 6 seconds, hold for two seconds and then exhale slowly for 7 seconds.

The centering breaths exercise can be used before giving a performance, such as in sports, or to calm yourself in a stressful situation such as you may face during an athletic competition or at work. The more you practice this exercise, the more confident you will be that you can handle challenges and adversity by feeling calmer through relaxing your body.

Calm your mind

Emotions at a high level of intensity are fueled by ‘hot thoughts’ in which we are thinking in an overly negative manner. Practicing thinking more accurately—and therefore more positively—is another way you can calm yourself.

There are a variety of strategies which you can use to change how you feel by changing the way you think. Some simple and effective techniques involve rehearsing positive statements with which you can fill your mind when facing a challenge or stressful situation such as “I can do this”. You can also use mental imagery to remind yourself of times when you’ve performed well in the past or imagine yourself handling the current situation effectively.

Structured techniques from cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) such as thought records and behavioural experiments allow a person to critically examine the evidence supporting and not supporting hot thoughts which are elevating the intensity of their emotions. Doing so trains the person to realize that these hot thoughts, rather than being incontrovertible facts, are typically negatively skewed beliefs which are either not completely true or largely untrue. Practicing these CBT skills results in a person being able to calm themselves efficiently by using their mind.

Use distraction/attention-switching

Taking your mind off hot thoughts which are driving up the intensity of your emotions is often the quickest option to pursue in order to calm yourself. Doing so then makes it easier to use the techniques which I mentioned earlier in which you relax your body and change your thinking to achieve a state of calm.

This technique is known as distraction or attention-switching. It entails either thinking of something more pleasant than what you are currently thinking, doing an enjoyable activity which takes your mind off the current stressful situation or talking with someone about a topic other than the one which is causing you emotional distress.

For example, when your emotions are in overdrive you could imagine being in a place which you associate with calmness and serenity. Or you could use the 54321 technique in which you switch your attention to noticing five different things you see, hear and feel in your immediate environment. Or you could have an enjoyable conversation with a supportive friend, family member or co-worker to take your mind off the situation which is causing you distress.

It is amazing how quickly your emotions decrease in intensity when your mind is not filled with hot thoughts. Distraction and attention-switching will allow you to achieve this state quickly.

Having said that, it is often recommended that this strategy be followed up with the aforementioned strategies which deal directly with your hot thoughts. It will be easier to do this once you’ve calmed down through attention-switching and physical relaxation techniques.

Take a time-out

Sometimes calming down is best achieved by temporarily removing yourself from the stressful situation. In sports, this is literally done through the use of ‘time outs’ which allow the individual athlete or team to gather their composure by talking things over with supportive teammates or a coach/manager.

Outside of the athletic arena, time-outs as a way to calm down are used effectively by couples who have agreed upon signals which either partner can use to take a break from the discussion of an issue if they believe they are too stressed to discuss the issue constructively. This strategy, which I use with couples who I help in relationship counselling, allows the two partners to calm down and resume the discussion of the issue at a later time when they are both in an emotional state which is conducive to their discussing the issue constructively.

Use ‘the other’ three R’s’

The ‘three R’s’ which many of us were taught are ‘reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmetic’. The ‘other three R’s’ are ‘relax, reflect and respond’ which can be used to counter a fourth R—react.  That is, when we are in stressful situations it is very tempting to react very quickly and automatically. This typically occurs when  hot thoughts are in our minds and when the intensities of our emotions are at their peak. The result is that we do not usually behave or perform effectively when we react.

Better behavioural and performance results typically occur when you counter reacting with relaxing, reflecting and responding. This includes relaxing—calming your body—and reflecting—thinking things through in a an accurate and more positive way to counter hot thoughts. These two R’s then lead to the third R—responding rather than reacting–which is characterized by more constructive behaviour and better performance stemming from delaying your actions until you have calmed yourself.

The secret to using the other three R’s instead of reacting is to make it a point to delay acting by whatever means works for you such as by counting to 10 or taking a time out. Committing to following a rule that you will wait before acting gives you a chance to relax, reflect and respond. The calm you will achieve by doing so will make it much more likely that you will behave and perform effectively.

May you use strategies to calm down when needed,

-Dr. Pat