• What LifeSkills: Observe--just notice without getting caught in the experience; Describe--put words on the experience; Participate--become one with your experience.
• How LifeSkills: Nonjudgmental--see but do not evaluate; One-Mindful--do one thing at a time; Effective--do what needs to be done in each situation.

• Behaviors to decrease: Problems experiencing or identifying a sense of self; sense of emptiness, boredom or intolerance of being alone; problems in maintaining your own feelings, opinions, and decisions around others; feelings of helplessness, hopelessness, or worthlessness.
• Behaviors to increase: Mindfulness in Everyday Living ... learning to go within to find yourself. Learning to observe--with no intentions of changing or improving anything. Observing and accepting life just as it is, with all its pleasures, pains, frustrations, disappointments, and insecurities which will enable you to become calmer, more confident and better able to cope with whatever comes your way.

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Intrapersonal Effectiveness ... Learning to Love Yourself

You will learn how to appreciate and love yourself through the identification of values, beliefs, and development of a personal life mission statement, as well as exploring affirmations and new ways of thinking.

• LifeSkills: Approval of self, affirmations, deserving, beliefs and values, self-messages, new ways of thinking, meaning and life purpose, spirituality.

• Behaviors to decrease: Problems experiencing or identifying a sense of self; feelings of helplessness, hopelessness, or worthlessness.
• Behaviors to increase: Intrapersonal Effectiveness ... identification of self; identification of beliefs, values, and purpose; self-esteem enhancement.

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Interpersonal Effectiveness: Winning at Relationships

You will learn how to apply interpersonal problem solving, social, and assertiveness skills to modify aversive (unpleasant/uncomfortable) environments and to obtain your goals in relationships, while retaining your self-respect and the respect of others. LifeSkills include:

• Behaviors to decrease: Unstable relationships; difficulty maintaining relationships; conflict in relationships; panic, anxiety, and dread over relationships ending; frantic attempts to avoid abandonment.
• Behaviors to increase: Interpersonal Effectiveness ... assertiveness and problem solving; learning to deal with conflict situations, to get what you want and need, and to say no to requests or demands; maintaining self-respect and others liking you and/or receiving acknowledgement and respect.

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Emotional Regulation: Identification and Effectiveness

You will learn to focus on the nature of your emotions and identification; you will also learn how to experience emotions without becoming overwhelmed or frustrated through self--valuation, which will result in decreasing the intensity or changing the emotion.

• LifeSkills: Reduce vulnerability (SLEEPS™), build mastery, positive emotions for the short- and long-term, letting go, opposite to emotion, after effects.

• Behaviors to decrease: Emotional sensitivity; ups and downs; moodiness; emotional reactions; negative emotional response.
• Behaviors to increase: Emotional Regulation ... emotional control; reducing the intensity of emotions; learning that emotions are a natural part of you ... you can have more control and learn to modulate emotions so that you are more balanced between the highs and lows of your emotional reactions.

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Distress Tolerance and Clutter Clearing: Acceptance of the Here-and-Now

You will learn that loss, pain, and distress are part of life; they cannot be entirely avoided or removed, thus you will learn lifeskills that are effective for the "moment" to decrease the intensity of the emotion. In addition, the effects of clutter on your emotional and physical well-being will be explored.

• LifeSkills: Distract (Wise Mind ACCEPTS), self-soothe using the senses, IMPROVE the moment, declutter and organization, pros and cons, willingness, turn the mind, ACCEPTANCE and commitment.
• Behaviors to decrease: Impulsiveness in eating, spending, sexual promiscuity, fast driving, etc ; self-sabatage and self-damaging acts, suicidal behaviors or threats.
• Behaviors to increase: Distress Tolerance ... learning to tolerate stress, survive crises, and accept life as it is in the moment; pain and distress are part of life and cannot be entirely avoided or removed. In addition to developing a more organized life to enhance your emotional and physical well-being.

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You are doing the best you can.

You want to develop an authentic quality of life.

You need to do better, try harder, and be more willing and motivated to consider healthy choices ... committed to taking action.

You may not have caused all of your problems, but you need to take responsibility to resolve them anyway.

You need to develop healthy behaviors and explore choices in all relevant experiences of your life.

You cannot fail in therapy/coaching if you are willing and committed to learning and practicing healthy lifeskills daily.

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Man is made by his belief
As he believes, so he is.

__Bhagavad Gita__
An ancient Sanskirt text comprising some 700 verses of the Mahabharata. Sacred by the majority of Hindu traditions.

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DBT Assumptions About
Counseling/Therapy
and LifeSkills Coaching

The most caring thing I can do is to challenge you to be open to choices that bring you closer to you own ultimate goals and life purpose.

Clarity, precision, and compassion are of the utmost importance.

Our therapeutic/coaching relationship is a real relationship between equals.

Principles of behavior are universal, effecting me no less than you.

It is not my intent, but I am human and I can fail.

The therapeutic/coaching process can fail even when I cannot.

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