What are emotion regulation skills, and how can adults develop them? Read practical techniques for coping with intense feelings without suppressing them.
At ten in the evening, a short message from the manager lands in the office WhatsApp group: "Could you drop by my office at nine tomorrow morning?" There is nothing else in the message. The heart speeds up; the mind scans last week's report, a sentence said in a meeting, perhaps even the possibility of being let go. At midnight, sleep still hasn't come, and in the morning there is an unexpectedly angry shout at the child over a spilled glass of milk. In the meeting, the manager only talks about a new project. All of us sometimes feel swept along by our emotions. Emotion regulation skills are not about stopping this completely, but about being able to take hold of the rudder again. In this article we look at what this skill is, why it is less developed in some of us, which strategies work and which make the problem bigger, and concrete ways to develop this skill in adulthood.
What Are Emotion Regulation Skills?
Emotion regulation skills are a person's ability to influence, to some extent, which emotion they experience, when, how intensely, and how they express it. The phrase "to some extent" in this definition matters: emotions arise automatically, and it is not possible to switch them on and off with a button. But how we approach an emotion once it has arisen, how we interpret it and what we do can, to a large degree, be learned.
Emotion regulation is often confused with "emotional control". Yet the aim is not to suppress emotions, ignore them or never feel them. Emotions carry important information: anger signals that a boundary has been crossed, fear signals a danger, sadness signals a loss. Healthy regulation means being able to hear this information while responding in line with our values, without being crushed under the intensity of the emotion.
This skill works in two directions. Sometimes an intense emotion needs to be calmed; sometimes room needs to be made for an emotion that has been suppressed and not allowed to be felt. For some people the difficulty is anger rising rapidly; for others it is keeping everything inside without showing anything, and then paying for it with the body.
Signs That You Struggle With Emotion Regulation
The following experiences may indicate that you find it hard to manage your emotions:
- Reacting to a small trigger with disproportionate, intense responses and feeling regret afterwards
- Being unable to get out of an emotion for hours, even days, once you are caught up in it
- Your emotions escalating very quickly "from zero to a hundred"
- Not recognising, afterwards, what you said or did in moments of anger
- Constantly turning to food, shopping, your phone or alcohol to cope with difficult emotions
- Shutting emotions down completely so as not to feel anything, then exploding at unexpected moments
- Having frequent, draining conflicts in close relationships
- Often being told that you are emotionally "too much" or "too sensitive"
Experiencing a few of these signs from time to time is part of being human. Everyone's capacity for regulation drops under lack of sleep, hunger or intense stress. What matters is how frequent and how widespread this picture is.
Why Might Emotion Regulation Skills Be Underdeveloped?
We are not born knowing how to manage emotions. Babies learn to soothe their intense feelings with the help of adults: by being held, by a calm voice, by having their needs met. Over time this regulation from outside becomes internalised. When things go wrong in this process, the skill may be carried into adulthood incomplete.
The model you learned from. A child who grows up with parents who slam doors when angry, or who never show any emotion, may learn one of these two extremes about feelings. Children learn emotion regulation largely by watching.
Emotions being invalidated. In environments where sentences such as "Don't exaggerate", "What is there to cry about?" or "You have no right to be angry" are heard often, the child learns not to trust their own emotions. This can lead either to suppressing feelings or to amplifying them in order to be heard.
Temperament and emotional sensitivity. Some people naturally react to emotions more intensely and more quickly, and it takes them longer to calm down. This is not a defect; but when such a temperament meets an unsupportive environment, regulation difficulties can become more pronounced.
Trauma and chronic stress. Living under threat for a long time lowers the nervous system's alarm threshold. The person feels on alert at even the smallest uncertainty.
Everyday vulnerabilities. Lack of sleep, irregular eating, inactivity, physical pain and financial pressures intensify emotional reactions. For someone trying to make ends meet at the end of the month, working two jobs, or caring for both children and an elderly parent, a lowered threshold of patience is not surprising.
Strategies That Work and Strategies That Don't
Everyone uses some ways of coping with their emotions. But some of these ways bring relief in the short term while making the problem bigger in the long term.
Strategies that can create problems in the long term:
- Suppression: Forcibly holding the emotion and its expression inside. Although it may get you through the situation in the short term, it can increase physical tension, create distance in relationships and pave the way for the emotion to explode somewhere else.
- Rumination: Replaying the event in your mind over and over. The person thinks they are looking for a solution, but the emotion flares up again with every round.
- Avoidance: Staying away from everything that triggers the emotion. The space in which you live gradually narrows.
- Numbing: Suppressing the emotion through behaviours such as alcohol, overeating or staring at screens for hours.
More helpful strategies:
- Reappraisal: Interpreting the event from a different angle. Instead of "My manager is going to fire me", "I don't yet know why I've been called in."
- Acceptance: Instead of fighting the emotion's presence, being able to say, "I'm anxious right now, and this anxiety will pass."
- Problem-solving: If the situation causing the emotion can be changed, taking a concrete step.
- Social support: Talking to someone you trust reduces the intensity of the emotion.
- Redirecting attention: Turning your attention elsewhere for a short time; this works as long as it does not turn into avoidance.
There is an important point here: no strategy works in every situation. Healthy emotion regulation skills are not about using a single method everywhere, but about the flexibility to choose the method that suits the situation. Setting anxiety aside for a while in a job interview is helpful; never facing grief after losing someone close is not.
For adults too, regulation is not always something done alone. Just as in infancy we learned to calm our feelings in an adult's arms, in adulthood talking to someone we trust, hugging, or simply sitting quietly in the same room calms the nervous system. In psychology this is called co-regulation. Asking for help is not a lack of regulation skill but a mature form of it. What matters is that it does not become the only way, and that the person can also soothe themselves when needed.
Emotions are like the weather: we cannot stop the rain, but we can choose to take an umbrella, where to wait and when to set off.
How to Develop Emotion Regulation Skills: Practical Techniques for Adults
The following techniques are inspired by methods used particularly in dialectical behaviour therapy and cognitive behavioural therapy. Rather than trying all of them at once, it is more realistic to start with a few that suit you.
Give the emotion a name
When an intense emotion rises, saying to yourself "I'm angry right now" or "This is shame" puts a small distance between you and the emotion. Naming helps the brain's emotional alarm settle a little.
Calm the body first
When an emotion is very intense, it is hard to calm down by thinking; you need to start with the body. Making the out-breath longer than the in-breath calms the nervous system. Splashing your face with cold water, walking briskly for a few minutes or tensing and relaxing your muscles in turn can also bring the intensity down.
Stop, step back, observe
Pause briefly before reacting. Take a step back and watch the situation like an outside observer: What is happening, what am I feeling, what do I need? Then carry on in a way that fits your values. This pause of a few seconds prevents many sentences you would later regret.
Let the wave pass
Emotions are like waves; they rise, reach a peak and fall. Reminding yourself that you do not have to do something about an intense emotion immediately makes room to watch its natural course. "This wave will pass; for now I'm just breathing."
Look for another explanation
When the emotion has eased a little, look at your interpretation: What other explanations could there be for this situation? What is the worst, the most positive and the most likely scenario?
Try opposite action
When an emotion is out of proportion to the situation or unhelpful, doing the opposite of what the emotion urges you to do can reduce its intensity. If unjustified anxiety wants you to withdraw, approach with a small step; if disproportionate anger wants you to attack, lower your voice.
Pay attention to how you talk to yourself
The inner voice that follows an intense emotion often opens a second wound: "You lost control again, you're a complete disgrace." This harsh criticism increases shame and paves the way for the next emotional outburst. Instead, saying "That was a hard moment; I didn't react the way I wanted to. What could I do differently next time?" both keeps responsibility in place and makes room for change.
Reduce vulnerability factors
Regular sleep, not skipping meals, moving during the day and limiting alcohol act as a buffer against emotional swings. Simple as they may seem, they are the foundation of emotion regulation.
Let us return to the late-night message at the beginning of the article. When the same message arrives, this time the person first names the emotion: "I'm anxious." Then they breathe out slowly for a few minutes and ask themselves, "What is the only thing I actually know right now?" The answer is simple: there is a meeting at nine in the morning, and its subject is unknown. When the mind starts producing scenarios again, they notice them, say "These are guesses, not information," and leave the phone in another room. The anxiety does not disappear completely, but it eases enough to allow sleep; and in the morning, when the glass of milk is spilled, instead of shouting they are able to hand over a cloth.
When Should You Seek Professional Support?
Emotion regulation skills can be developed on your own too; however, in the following situations working with a professional can make an important difference:
- If your outbursts of anger are damaging your relationships, your work or your bond with your children
- If you are turning more and more to behaviours such as alcohol, substances or uncontrolled eating to cope with intense emotions
- If you think your emotions often run you and you feel helpless
- If emotional swings noticeably affect your sleep, work and daily functioning
- If you are thinking about harming yourself, or doing so, to relieve emotional pain
If you have thoughts or behaviours of self-harm, do not carry this alone; in an emergency, call 112 (emergency services) without delay.
How Is Emotion Regulation Worked On in Therapy?
In therapy, work on emotion regulation usually begins with recognising emotions. Which situations trigger which emotions, how these emotions are felt in the body and which behaviours follow are explored together. In cognitive behavioural therapy, the automatic thoughts that feed the emotion are addressed and more flexible interpretations are developed. Through homework, new strategies are tried out in everyday life.
Dialectical behaviour therapy is an approach developed especially for people who live with intense, rapid emotional reactions, and it places emotion regulation at its centre. It teaches skills in mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation and interpersonal effectiveness in a structured way. For difficulties centred on anger, our article on anger management may also offer additional information.
The schema therapy perspective focuses on the unmet childhood needs behind emotional reactions and on a person's different "modes". When the vulnerable child side is recognised and met with compassion, the intensity of angry or detached reactions can decrease over time. It is possible to carry out this kind of work within individual therapy, either face to face or online.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does regulating emotions mean suppressing them?
No. Suppression means ignoring an emotion and holding it inside; regulation means noticing and accepting the emotion and giving it an appropriate response. Regulation involves hearing the emotion's message; suppression tries to silence that message.
I'm a very emotional person; can this change?
Your emotional sensitivity is most likely part of your temperament, and it actually carries strengths too, such as empathy and intuition. What can change is how you relate to intense emotions. With practice, the moments when emotions sweep you along can become fewer.
Can crying be part of emotion regulation?
Yes. For many people, crying is a natural way of releasing emotional tension and helping the body settle. Being ashamed of crying or trying to stop yourself often leads you to carry the emotion for longer.
How does emotion regulation affect my relationships?
Someone who can recognise and manage their emotions becomes less defensive in arguments, expresses their needs more clearly and can listen to the other person better. For this reason, this skill helps conflicts in couple and family relationships to be less draining.
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Eda Erkan Alapala
Klinik Psikolog. İstanbul Kent Üniversitesi Klinik Psikoloji Tezli Yüksek Lisans mezunu; bilişsel davranışçı terapi, çocuk merkezli oyun terapisi ve çocuk-ergen psikoterapisi alanlarında eğitimlerini tamamlamıştır.
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