Managing

Emotional
Mayhem
The Five Steps for Self-Regulation

by Dr. Becky A. Bailey

800.842.2846
P.O. Box 622407, Oviedo FL 32762
ConsciousDiscipline.com
 MANAGING EMOTIONAL MAYHEM

Introduction

Meet Your New BFF:

“Hello, Self-Regulation!”

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve promised myself I’d calm down before
speaking when angry, only to find myself yelling at those I love most. I also
find myself wanting to lose weight, feeling disappointed with the numbers on
the scale and ordering a pizza to feed my unhappiness. I hear the voice of my
mother streaming out of my mouth, critically barking commands and ques-
tions… even though I know how hurtful this approach felt to me as a child.
Sound familiar? I wrote Managing Emotional Mayhem for parents and educa-
tors because I am ready to do things differently. Since you picked up this book,
you’re ready, too!

The Unregulated Life

As you can imagine, if we are unable to manage our emotional states in wise
ways, we probably aren’t very good at helping children manage theirs. “Shut up!
I don’t want to hear another word out of your mouth.” “Go to your room if you
can’t stop that ridiculous whining. You should know better than this!” “Grow up;
nobody said life is fair!” We, as adults, often find ourselves acting out our emo-

9
 tions on children, modeling the exact behaviors we find disturbing. Fueling this
fire are thoughts—of who did what, who was wronged and who is guilty—that
run wild in our minds like balls in a pinball machine scoring victim and villain
points. When our emotional buildup becomes too great to tolerate: Boom! We
erupt by verbally or physically attacking others to get temporary relief.

Ultimately, we feel regret for what we’ve said and done. We pile on the guilt
and shame until it obscures our true self from our awareness. We begin to
believe we are bad. We justify our actions by creating or reciting life scripts
in efforts to protect our worthiness. We base our scripts on how other people
made us act a certain way, “I never would have said anything if he hadn’t ____.”
Our scripts support our actions because we believe we were pushed beyond
a breaking point, “The child just kept going on and on; what else could I have
done!” We create life stories to support all sorts of punishments, “Sometimes
you just have to show them who is boss. You know it’s for their own good.”

The Cycle of Self-Sabotage

I Blame
Look what you
made me do

I Demand /
I Am Stuck Act Out
I am stuck in I demand the
the problem world go my way
Addictive Cycle
We sabotage
ourselves and our
own goals in an
attempt to self-
regulate

I Bury
I Medicate
I bury my feelings
in a life story/life I medicate the
script, separating distressing sensa-
from others as tions through
either victim or addictions
villain

10 Managing Emotional Mayhem | Introduction

We find ourselves drinking a little too much, eating a little too much, exercising
a little too much or working a little too much in efforts to break this cycle of
unregulated thoughts and feelings. These unconscious habits become our way
of regulating our emotional states. These quirky behaviors and life addictions
begin to eat away at our connections with others, ultimately impairing our re-
lationships and goals. We sabotage our own lives in an attempt to regulate our
emotions. What a vicious cycle!

The Answer to the Unregulated Life

We are fortunate to live in a time when research and neuroscience provide
concrete evidence to support an idea many have long felt to be true: Our rela-
tionship with our emotions shapes our brains, our potential for success and the
health of all our relationships. We need to make friends with all our emotional
states, not just the ones we’re comfortable with. We must become buddies
with the emotions that derail us.

Every conflict starts with emotional upset. To solve any problem, we must
manage the emotional upset first, and then move graciously into a conflict
resolution process that produces win-win solutions. Most of us can’t make it
through the emotional upset to resolve much of anything! We stay stuck in the
problem and wedded to our upset, searching outside ourselves for anything
to make us feel better. We give our emotional selves away with comments like,
“Look what you made me do,” “Look how you made your sister feel.” We make
others responsible for our internal emotional states. “You’re driving me nuts.”
“You’re disrupting the learning for all the other students in this classroom.”
We cling to the idea that others must change for us to feel happy or peaceful,
meaning we must control others instead of connect with them. I think we all
know how well that has worked for us in the past! As we look at children, we
feel compelled to examine and improve our own emotional wellbeing so we
can help them develop the healthy emotional compass necessary for lifelong
success.

Self-regulation is the foundational component to emotional wellbeing and

lifelong success. Self-regulation is the conscious and unconscious ability to
regulate our thoughts, feelings and actions in service of a goal. It has been

Meet Your New BFF: “Hello, Self-Regulation!” 11

 called “self-control” or “impulse control,” and these terms are still often used
interchangeably. Regulating our thoughts, feelings and actions is different than
attempting to control them. We cannot control our emotions any more than
we can control the weather. However, we can manage our emotions just as we
have learned to bring an umbrella along when it’s raining or a heavy coat when
it’s cold. When we learn to regulate our emotions, we can benefit from the
wisdom and moral compass they provide. Without healthy emotional devel-
opment, we listen to the guidance of the loudest voice in the room instead of
the quiet voice within us. For young children, the loudest voice is that of their
parents. As they grow up, the voices change to peers, commercialism and ulti-
mately their life partners. The self so vibrant at three years old disappears into
self-doubt long before age thirty-three.

Emotions perform many survival functions within the body. The most power-
ful one is that of integration. Integration is the process of linking differentiated
parts together to function as a whole. Our lungs and heart have specialized
and differentiated functions, yet we would die if they were not linked together
(integrated). Workers in an office have specialized jobs, yet the company fails
if they do not communicate well with each other. People of varied ethnicities,
who are uniquely differentiated by culture and tradition, enrich communities.
Yet, if a community of mixed ethnicities cannot integrate, that community can
become weakened by racism and intolerance. The children within a school are
unique, but willingness suffers, school climate sours and children are less likely
to reach their potential unless they are linked together by a sense of belonging.
Integration is essential to the health of our bodies, communities and schools,
and ultimately the survival of our planet.

Using the metaphor of a business, integration is a management responsibil-

ity. The Director, Principal, Coordinator or CEO has the responsibility to ensure
each different department upholds its unique responsibilities and works well
with the other departments. Our emotions serve management responsibili-
ties in our brain. They integrate our nervous system in such a way we become
a fine-tuned, motivated organism that can be mindful of our thoughts, feel-
ings and actions, see from other people’s perspective, solve problems, set and
achieve goals, and connect with others. Emotions are the bridge we must cross
to get from any problem to its solution. My emotions allow me to become the
best Becky I can be and simultaneously contribute to the world in a healthy

12 Managing Emotional Mayhem | Introduction

way. Without access to my emotions, I could easily distort my image of myself
to such a degree that I could not contribute to society. In the most extreme
situations, I would feel entitled to feed off of or in someway damage the soci-
ety that sustains me.

How aware are we of our emotions? My best guess is that many of us have
the emotional development of a toddler. Do you find this statement shock-
ing or validating? A toddler knows basically two states of being: pleasant and
unpleasant. Life is good when I am fed, dry and loved. Life is bad when I am
hungry, wet or alone. Ask adults how they are feeling. You generally get two
answers: fine and upset. Life is good when it is going my way and upsetting
when it is not. Isn’t it time we upgraded our emotional awareness?

In this book, you will learn the five steps for self-regulation. These five steps
are I Am, I Calm, I Feel, I Choose and I Solve. These steps allow our emotions
to perform their integrative duties, and to become the bridge between prob-
lem and solution. We must learn to navigate this bridge if we are going to
have healthy relationships with our children, life partners and each other. Until
we learn a better way and become conscious of habitual reactions, our out-of-
control emotions, thoughts and behaviors will become part of another genera-
tion that continues to say, “Do what I say, not what I do.” At some point, we must
decide the buck stops here: I will break the cycle. I will do things differently than
was done to me. I will engage in a cycle of success instead of sabotage.

This book is designed to gently step you through a process that will help you
shift from sabotage to success. Once we, as adults, have strengthened our skill
set, we can begin the process of coaching our children. Check out the goals
and the coaching methods you will learn. It’s a powerful program, just as we
are powerful people.

Meet Your New BFF: “Hello, Self-Regulation!” 13

 The Self-Regulation Success Cycle

I Am Triggered
I am angry

I Solve I Calm
Win-win solutions Breathing and
are abundant noticing nonverbal
Success Cycle cues

Ability to self-
regulate and connect
with others

I Choose
I Feel
Reframing the
problem with Identify and name
positive intent and the feeling shifting
connecting with from I am angry to
others I feel angry

Goals
The overall goal of this book is to achieve better self-regulation for ourselves
and our children. See if these specific goals match your most heartfelt desires
for personal growth and for the children in your care. Place a check in each box
that aligns with your values.

Goals for Adults

In this book, we will learn to (mark the goals you want to achieve):

Develop our own self-regulatory skills, providing the opportunity

❑ to put a pause between stimulus and response. This pause halts

our knee-jerk reactions.

14 Managing Emotional Mayhem | Introduction

 Develop greater awareness of our selves and children, including
identifying emotional triggers and accurately naming the feelings
❑ involved. This awareness allows emotions to naturally complete
their integrative function.

Respond to children’s acting out and emotional upset in an at-

❑ tuned way at the moment the event is occurring. This adult re-
sponse will foster children’s development of self-regulation skills.

Coach children to independently use the five-step self-regulation

process. As we coach children, we increase their ability to utilize
❑ the skills while simultaneously strengthening the same skills within
ourselves.

Managing Emotional Mayhem is part of a more comprehensive practice

called Conscious Discipline. Conscious Discipline is a complete self-
regulation program that integrates social-emotional learning and disci-
pline. It is based on current brain research, and scientifically and practi-
cally empowers adults and children to transform conflicts into oppor-
tunities to learn critical life skills. If you aren’t familiar with Conscious
Discipline and wish to learn more, a visit to ConsciousDiscipline.com
would be a helpful starting point.

Goals for Our Children

From our learning, we will then be able to help children (mark those you want
for your children):

To recognize they have been triggered and begin the self-

❑ regulation process.

To begin calming themselves, creating the opportunity to

❑ self-regulate.

Meet Your New BFF: “Hello, Self-Regulation!” 15

 To name their feeling states and to be able to recognize the feeling

❑ states of others. This skill is the foundation for the development of

empathy and compassion.

To select and conduct calming and/or engaging strategies in order

❑ to shift from an upset state to an optimal learning state.

To learn how to address the upsetting event with greater life skills
❑ and solve their problem.

To develop social awareness, responsible decision-making and

communication skills aimed at fostering healthy relationships and

❑ goal achievement. As children repeat the five-step process again

and again, their moral compass directs them in healthy ways to
communicate, make decisions and problem-solve.

Coaching Methods
Coaching during teachable moments. In the world of young children, emo-
tional upset is triggered every day. Limits are set, rules are enforced and the
world does not always go their way. Instead of dismissing children’s upset,
sending children to time out, giving rewards or removing privileges, we can re-
spond to these moments in a way that transforms conflict into cooperation. In
Conscious Discipline we call these “teachable moments” instead of “discipline
disruptions.” Teachable moments require us to coach children to change their
internal emotional states first. Then we teach a new behavioral skill. When we
focus on internal states first and behaviors second, we create an opportunity
to use conflict as a tool for learning social and life skills. Adults are empowered
to seize these discipline disruptions as teachable moments in order to provide
children with new social-emotional and self-regulatory skills.

16 Managing Emotional Mayhem | Introduction

 I never knew how powerful my response to my kids’ upset could possibly
be. I truly thought my job was to get them to behave properly. If I got
them in bed on time, out the door on time, to say please and thank you,
and finish their homework, I’d have this parenting gig down. One day my
oldest started running his mouth (as usual) and instead of giving him a
stern look and reminding him how rude he was being, I said, “You seem
angry. You were hoping you could spend more time with your friends this
afternoon.” His whole being changed! I changed, he changed and since
then our relationship has changed. I love my new BFF – self-regulation. If
I had not calmed down and seen past his mouth (one he learned mostly
from me, I admit), I would have never been able to help him.

Wishing you well,

Toni, mother of 3 boys

Coaching in the Safe Place. The Safe Place is one of the core social-emotional
learning structures in the Conscious Discipline philosophy. It is an area in the
home or classroom where children can practice using self-regulatory skills. If
you are not familiar with the Safe Place, I invite you to explore Shubert’s Class-
room at Conscious Discipline.com to see images and video of this essential
structure. We will also learn much about the Safe Place in Chapter 5.

Going to the Safe Place to practice self-regulatory techniques when emotions

are triggered is crucial for success. This is because the brain is state-depen-
dent. The brain can only rewire itself for behavioral changes through repetitive
actions conducted while experiencing a given state. A child can sing about
anger, role-play anger management skills and identify angry faces, yet may be
unable to regulate her own angry feelings and actions. This is because she can
only learn to regulate her anger when an angry brain-body state is activated. In
the Safe Place, children experience intense emotions and handle them in such
a way that their brains actually become wired with new behaviors based on
self-regulation strategies.

Meet Your New BFF: “Hello, Self-Regulation!” 17

 Unifying Parents and Educators
Parents and educators have spent generations speaking different languages
when it comes to discipline. Educators have demanded parents make their chil-
dren behave at school, while parents have repeatedly said, “We don’t have this
problem at home.” At our best, we’ve gained a bit of insight from each other
in 15-minute parent-teacher meetings and the occasional school event. At our
worst, we’ve pointed fingers of fault at each other’s perceived deficiencies. It
is long overdue for us all to get on the same page. I believe that integrating
home and school is an essential step in societal growth. Self-regulation and
impulse control do not emerge spontaneously. They are skills, learned not only
through families and cultures, but also through schools and teachers (Nagin
& Tremblay, 1999). I wrote this book in hopes of literally bringing parents and
educators together on the same page. Page by page, we can improve our own
self-regulation skill set and learn ways to help children develop healthy skills
for themselves. May we take the fingers we point at each other and instead link
them together in a commitment to become the best adults we can!

My intent is to unite homes and schools in a common goal of social-emotional

success; however, I recognize that each group has unique concerns and logis-
tics. For this reason, I have developed two specialized self-regulation toolkits,
one for parents and one for educators. These toolkits are an extension of this
book, and are based on the Feeling Buddies. The Feeling Buddies are eight
simple gingerbread dolls with precise emotions expressed on their faces: an-
gry, sad, scared, happy, frustrated, disappointed, anxious and calm. The adult
teaches children how to help their Buddies self-regulate. In doing this, both
adult and child practice and teach the same process to themselves. The Bud-
dies are occasionally mentioned in this book, and are a valuable part of the
self-regulation process. My hope is that this book will inspire you to continue
your journey with self-regulation. The Feeling Buddies Self-Regulation Toolkit
for Educators and the Feeling Buddies Self-Regulation Toolkit for Parents pro-
vide the means to that end.

18 Managing Emotional Mayhem | Introduction

Whether you are an educator or parent or both, one thing I know for sure is
that feelings can sometimes be overwhelming for us all.

Book Overview
There are no accidents. You have purchased this book at precisely the right time
and will get from it exactly what you need. Whether you choose to delve deeper
by adding a Self-Regulation Toolkit to your journey is a personal decision. This
book alone will set a solid course, and may be all you need to right your ship.

This book contains five chapters. Chapter 1 provides foundational information

about self-regulation. Many of you may not be overly familiar with this term. You
probably have guessed it is related to impulse control, self-control and emotion-
al control, but is there more to it? In Chapter 1, I will reveal and explore the many
facets of self-regulation. Chapter 2 will ask you to clean out your proverbial
closet by reflecting on your relationship with your emotions and how you were
disciplined as a child. Chapter 3 begins to fill your closet with a new understand-
ing of the messages of feelings. Chapter 4 guides you through the five-step self-
regulation process so you can begin to practice and model what you ultimately

Meet Your New BFF: “Hello, Self-Regulation!” 19

 expect from children. Chapter 5 provides you with the information and dialogues
to coach children through the five-step self-regulation process.

I started this introduction by sharing ways my own thoughts, feelings and ac-
tions often sabotage what I most desire. In the pages since, we’ve dipped our
toes in a pool of new knowledge and self-reflection. Take a moment to ask
yourself, “Do my thoughts, feelings and actions support my most valued goals
or sabotage them? Am I on the success cycle or the sabotage cycle?” I have
already committed myself to do things differently. Are you ready to join me? If
so, our journey starts now. Enjoy the ride!

Commitment: I commit to managing my inner mayhem. I

am willing to do things differently, accept what is and move
forward toward solutions. I will no longer blame others for
my upset or demand life go my way. I understand this prac-
tice will strengthen all my relationships, including my rela-
tionship with myself. It reveals to me my basic worth, which
is hidden beneath guilt that I am ready to release.

Signed: Date: Starting right now!

I willingly commit to join Becky on this essential journey.

Signed: _______________________ Date: ____________

20 Managing Emotional Mayhem | Introduction