What is Self-Regulation and how to Use it

There is an inner tension and balancing act between doing what feels safe and good for us as individuals and what is best and good for our relationships. Aside from creating ease within oneself, self-regulation is vital when building cooperative relationships. In a previous article, on ending negative cycles of conflict in relationships, we discussed the importance of being able to contain emotions and self-regulate. In this post, we will take a deeper look at self-regulation and how best to use it. 

Referencing that inner tension mentioned earlier, we all have impulses to reach for connection in relationships but also react with fight-flight to protect ourselves. We get angry and fight, pushing people away when threatened, or flee and withdraw, isolating to find relief from the overwhelm of the relationship. Self-regulation helps to temper these impulses to disconnect and find our way back to connection. 

What is self-regulation?

Simply put, self-regulation is self-control. It is an awareness of our emotional state and the ability to interrupt, adjust, and initiate a change in our thoughts and actions to align a response that elicits cooperation. This definition is a bit reductionistic and doesn’t portray the complexity of the felt experience nor the process of changing from impulse to intentional response. It can be helpful to have some applicable tools to use self-regulation. 

How to Use It

Firstly we must have a standard, or a goal, of how we would like to respond in situations. For example, if your partner expresses concern about how much time you spend with friends, you lash out in anger and leave the room then perhaps the standard is to respond to your partner by validating their emotion and inquiring about their concern. Secondly, we must have a motivation to change, our “why” to change our response. The “why” should be intrinsically motivated and avoid any tendencies to “people-please” or “appease”. 

After establishing a standard and connecting to some intrinsic motivation, it is important to cultivate mindfulness of the different stages of the impulse. A look back on breaking down a trigger in the first article on ending negative cycles of conflict may be helpful. Mindfulness is a powerful tool that can feel empowering, however, it is not enough. We must have the strength and the capacity to contain the felt experience and emotional urges.

The first few processes have a cognitive top-down approach to making change, however, we have another process of bottom-up (our somatic experience) that needs tending to, as well. When it comes to impulse control, we are trying to avoid reacting from an emotional state that may make matters worse. However, that emotion is important in understanding why we are experiencing conflict and informs us which relational need is missing. For example, if you can experience anger without lashing out you may see it is saying, “ I feel misunderstood”. 

Using a bottom-up approach, the aim is to draw awareness and connection to the sensations we are experiencing in the body and process somatically to find inner harmony. For example, when your partner expresses concern over your spending habits, you feel your body get hot and experience pressure in your head. This is typically where one loses control over the impulse to react, so developing some control over the sensations is important. Furthermore, actively influencing bodily processes like heart rate, breathing, and muscle tension can help you find some physical relief and harmony, mitigating a response that worsens things. 

Awareness of how impulses manifest in bodily experience, thoughts, and actions will help develop emotional intelligence. More intelligence of our emotions leads to more empathy and a better understanding of our relational needs. The more frequently in touch we get with our emotional world and develop skills to feel, the greater our capacity to self-regulate. 

Being at Capacity

The aim is for progress, not perfection when it comes to being able to self-regulate and respond accordingly. We are human and have a large capacity for accomplishing things, yet we are not immune to failure. Know that mistakes are part of the process of developing awareness of how our impulses play out, each mistake is a new piece of the puzzle. 

It is helpful to examine if we are at capacity when we make mistakes. There are many factors to being at capacity such as life stressors, work issues, financial difficulties, health issues, loss of a loved one, or any other major life change. Or something simpler is contributing to our being at capacity ie: lack of sleep, underfed, or physical discomfort. Addressing these factors first will often give us a greater capacity to move through the top-down and bottom-up processes.

Grow Your Capacity

• Mindfulness Exercises (Mind and Body)

• Breathing Exercises

• Cold Therapy

• Heat Therapy

• Light Therapy

• Journaling

• Taking time for yourself

• Eat Healthy

• Hydrate Properly

• Exercise Regularly

• Get Adequate Sleep