5 DBT Skills for Anxiety

Kat Schultz
20 minutes ago
3 min read

A person walks away from the camera down a country road with their hands on their head

Many folks struggle with frequent anxiety and anxiety disorders. Symptoms can range from bothersome to debilitating. Luckily, Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) has skills for every situation, including when you're feeling anxious.

DBT is a synthesis of Cognitive Behavior Therapy and Zen Buddhism. It incorporates the foundation of CBT with mindfulness skills. It's used to treat emotion dysregulation and self-destructive behaviors, among other mental health struggles.

There are more than 5 DBT skills that may help with anxiety but here are 5 to try first:

Self-Soothe

Self-soothe is a Distress Tolerance skill that involves using your 5 senses to soothe your emotions. Perform activities that stimulate or soothe your senses of sight, smell, taste, touch, and hearing. Examples may be using essential oils, listening to calming music, resting under a weighted blanket, or taking a shower or bath.

Mindful Breathing

Breathing exercises can activate your parasympathetic nervous system and calm you down. To practice this Mindfulness exercise, focus on your breathing for a few minutes. If your mind wanders, gently guide it back to your breath. You may want to count your breaths (paced breathing) and if so, try to lengthen your exhale to make it longer than your inhale.

Check the Facts

Check the Facts is an Emotion Regulation skill that's help in fact-checking your anxiety thoughts. It's not designed to immediately relieve anxiety, so using Check the Facts when having a panic attack, for example, may not be the most effective choice. We often can't access rational thinking at all in that state. However if your anxiety is less acute, Check the Facts can help you find Wise Mind and a more balanced state. To use the skill, identify the emotion you want to change, identify the prompting event and your thoughts, interpretations, and assumptions about it, work through and imagine yourself coping with worst-case scenarios, and then ask Wise Mind if your emotion and its intensity fit the facts.

Wise Mind ACCEPTS

Wise Mind ACCEPTS is the skill used to distract yourself from distress. ACCEPTS is an acronym that stands for Activities, Contributing, Comparison, Emotions, Pushing Away, Thoughts, and Sensations. There are many examples for how to use each one and you can select a few to try. You might watch a favorite show, do a Thought Defusion exercise, check in on a friend, compare your present with a time you were doing worse, and more. Make sure to check in regularly with your emotions so you know when to stop distracting before it turns into avoidance - that's what the Wise Mind in the name is for!

TIPP

TIPP changes your body chemistry to change your emotions. It's an acronym that stands for Temperature, Intense exercise, Paced breathing Paired with muscle relaxation. Choose one method at a time to try. You might put your face in a bowl of ice water or use an ice pack on your neck for temperature. A brief stint of jumping jacks works well for intense exercise. For the Ps, focus on your breathing and hold your breath for a few beats before making your exhale longer than your inhale. Then squeeze your fists or other muscles on the inhale and release on the exhale. Be aware of your physical limits when using this skill and only use it briefly.

Try one or more of these DBT skills when you're feeling anxious to relieve your distress. If one isn't as effective as you'd like, try another!

We teach these exercises as part of our DBT trainings for mental health providers and you can learn them for yourself in our self-paced DBT skills course.