Fertilizing Your Emotional Garden With DBT: The ABCD Metaphor

Greetings, and welcome to the eighth video in this module on emotion regulation. Let’s continue our garden analogy.

In a real garden, we need to plant the right seeds, do some weeding, make sure we have the correct soil, have a plan for pest control, and act opposite when we feel like neglecting or even destroying the garden. In a real garden, there is one final thing we need to do. Fertilize.

With regard to our garden of emotions, we need to fertilize daily with the emotional chemical ABC, not to mention supplement D. So let’s start fertilizing. Okay. So what does ABCD stand for? Well, the A stands for add positives. The B stands for build mastery. The C stands for cope ahead. And D stands for do something personally meaningful. So let’s talk about each one of those in turn in a little more detail.

Linehan, M. M. (2015). DBT skills training manual (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.,Reutter, K. (2019). The dialectical behavior therapy skills workbook for PTSD: Practical exercises for overcoming trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder. New Harbinger Publications.

Okay. So add positives refers to scheduling at least one positive event every single day. The idea is, don’t just wait for something randomly positive to happen or not happen. No. Instead, make sure something positive happens every single day. How? By scheduling it ahead of time. Make sure it’s on your schedule. So for example, if the only thing positive that’s going to happen in this particular day is enjoying a cup of coffee or seeing the sunset, well, make sure you have your cup of coffee or make sure you see the sunset.

Linehan, M. M. (2015). DBT skills training manual (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.,Reutter, K. (2019). The dialectical behavior therapy skills workbook for PTSD: Practical exercises for overcoming trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder. New Harbinger Publications.

Build mastery refers to practicing a skill or becoming more proficient at something every single day. And the idea is do something in which you can measure your progress so you can see how you are growing or improving in a certain area. So the purpose of building mastery is to foster a sense of self-efficacy, or self-agency, or self-empowerment. In other words, build a sense of competence or confidence, in other words, an internal locus of control, right? So I can see with my own eyes that I am doing this behavior and it is resulting in this outcome, and this outcome is getting better every single day. So this is especially critical for people who have experienced helplessness, whether actual or learned.

Linehan, M. M. (2015). DBT skills training manual (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.,Reutter, K. (2019). The dialectical behavior therapy skills workbook for PTSD: Practical exercises for overcoming trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder. New Harbinger Publications.

Cope ahead refers to making self-care part of your normal daily routine, in other words, coping before you are in a state of crisis. So the idea here is, don’t just wait for the next crisis before you start coping. No. Start coping now. In fact, coping just becomes your new way of doing life whether you're triggered or not. So as we know, coping ahead has a preventative effect. The more you cope ahead of time, the less you’ll be triggered in the first place. Coping ahead also refers to fostering a future orientation. In other words, identify goals, and plans, and dreams, ambitions, aspirations for the future. In other words, identify goals and plans and dreams, ambitions, aspirations for the future.

Linehan, M. M. (2015). DBT skills training manual (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.,Reutter, K. (2019). The dialectical behavior therapy skills workbook for PTSD: Practical exercises for overcoming trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder. New Harbinger Publications.

And then finally, do something meaningful refers to engaging in activity which is consistent with your goals or values. So remember the ultimate goal of DBT is build a life worth living. So how do we do that? Once again, the key is to do something personally meaningful every single day.

Linehan, M. M. (2015). DBT skills training manual (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.,Reutter, K. (2019). The dialectical behavior therapy skills workbook for PTSD: Practical exercises for overcoming trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder. New Harbinger Publications.

Okay. So now, let’s summarize a few of the key points we made in this video. Point number one: in a real garden, we need to plant the right seeds, do some weeding, make sure we have the correct soil, have a plan for pest control, and act opposite when we feel like neglecting or even destroying the garden. In a real garden, there’s one final thing we need to do, fertilize. With regard to our garden of emotions, we need to fertilize daily with the emotional chemical ABC including the supplement D.

Point number two: this acronym stands for add positives, build mastery, cope ahead, and do something personally meaningful. Add positives refers to scheduling at least one positive event every single day. Build mastery refers to practicing a skill or becoming more proficient at something every single day.

And cope ahead refers to making coping skills part of your normal daily routine before you are in a state of crisis. And do something meaningful refers to engaging in activity which is consistent with your goals or values as you build your life worth living.