In a world where stress and crisis situations seem ever-present, developing distress tolerance skills can be life-changing. These skills aren’t just about “managing stress”; they are essential tools for navigating life’s toughest moments with resilience and clarity.
Whether it’s the daily pressures of work, unexpected life events, or intense emotions, knowing how to handle distress is crucial to maintaining mental and emotional health.
For anyone who feels they struggle to cope with anxiety or overwhelming feelings, distress tolerance skills provide actionable steps for enduring difficult situations without making them worse. Unlike many general stress-relief methods, distress tolerance offers targeted techniques you can use immediately during moments of high tension.
Understanding Distress Tolerance
Distress tolerance is more than simple coping. While coping involves handling daily challenges, distress tolerance is designed to manage intense, uncomfortable emotions in moments of crisis. These skills help prevent impulsive reactions, self-destructive behaviors, and emotional outbursts, offering instead a structured approach to navigate through distressing situations with intentionality and focus.
The Four Core Distress Tolerance Skills
When we face a distressing event, our natural response may be to react impulsively, which can worsen the situation. To counter this, Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) outlines four core distress tolerance skills designed to break this cycle:
- Distraction – Redirecting your focus.
- Self-Soothing – Comforting yourself with the five senses.
- Improving the Moment – Shifting your perspective to make the situation feel manageable.
- Thinking of Pros and Cons – Weighing the benefits and consequences of potential actions.
Let’s look at these four skills in depth, breaking down how they can transform our approach to stress.
Skill #1: Distraction – Giving the Mind a Detour
Distraction isn’t about running away from problems; it’s about momentarily redirecting attention to prevent impulsive reactions. This is incredibly valuable in crises, especially for people who tend to panic or feel overwhelmed by emotions. Distraction offers the mind a temporary break, allowing emotions to settle before addressing the issue with a clearer head.
Practical Examples of Distraction Techniques:
- Activities – Engage in an activity that requires focus, like cleaning, organizing, or starting a small project. Physical tasks are especially effective because they draw both your mind and body into the present.
- Contributing to Others – Volunteering or helping someone else can be a powerful distraction. It shifts focus away from yourself, providing a sense of purpose and perspective.
- Comparisons – Sometimes, comparing the current situation with past experiences can help put distress into perspective, reminding you of past resilience.
- Sensation-Based Distractions – Try holding an ice cube or taking a cold shower. Physical sensations like these can snap you out of an intense emotional state.
Skill #2: Self-Soothing – Engaging the Senses to Calm the Mind
Self-soothing through the five senses—sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell—is about offering yourself comfort during high-stress situations. By nurturing a sense of safety, self-soothing can reduce the feeling of being overwhelmed, helping you regain a balanced state of mind.
Examples of Self-Soothing Techniques:
- Sight – Look at calming images, a favorite piece of art, or even a scenic picture on your phone. The brain’s response to beauty can help ground your emotions.
- Sound – Listen to your favorite music, sounds of nature, or guided meditations. These can serve as auditory anchors, drawing you out of distressing thoughts.
- Touch – Engage with comforting textures, such as a soft blanket, your pet’s fur, or even placing your hand over your heart. The sense of touch can remind you of your physical presence, pulling you back from emotional overwhelm.
- Taste and Smell – Sipping a warm tea or inhaling a pleasant aroma can have an instant calming effect. Foods like mint or ginger can be particularly grounding.
Skill #3: Improving the Moment – Changing Your Perception
The mind is powerful, and how you perceive a situation can greatly impact how distressing it feels. Improving the Moment is about finding ways to make the current situation feel more tolerable, not by changing the facts but by changing the perception of the situation.
Effective Techniques to Improve the Moment:
- Imagery – Visualize a safe space in your mind, whether it’s a real place or an imagined one. Imagine the details—the sounds, smells, and sights—to transport your mind away from stress.
- Meaning – Find a purpose in the pain. Reflecting on how you might grow from the experience or what you might learn can make a difficult moment feel valuable.
- Prayer or Spiritual Practice – For those who are spiritual, prayer can offer a sense of surrender and relief. Meditation or reflection can also help bring inner peace.
- One Thing in the Moment – Focus on one single thing that’s in front of you right now. Concentrating on something small, like the texture of your clothing or the pattern of a wall, can anchor you in the present and ease distress.
Skill #4: Pros and Cons – Making Choices Under Pressure
When distress is high, the urge to make impulsive decisions increases. But often, these reactions can lead to regrets or complications. Weighing pros and cons can help clarify what’s at stake, making it easier to take intentional actions instead of reacting on impulse.
Pros and Cons Technique in Action:
- Identify the Urge – For instance, if you feel like quitting a difficult project out of frustration, consider the immediate relief versus the long-term consequences.
- List Pros and Cons – Write down both short-term and long-term pros and cons of acting on that urge and of resisting it.
- Pause and Reflect – Take a few deep breaths after reviewing the list. Often, seeing options on paper makes the logical choice clearer and can ease emotional decision-making.
Facing Resistance: Why Learning Distress Tolerance Can Be Hard
Learning distress tolerance isn’t easy, especially when our natural instinct is to avoid pain. Practicing these skills means facing uncomfortable feelings rather than escaping them, which can feel counterintuitive.
One major challenge is that distress tolerance doesn’t offer instant gratification. While distraction and self-soothing may provide immediate comfort, the deeper work of improving the moment and weighing pros and cons requires effort and patience.
The Science Behind Distress Tolerance
Our brains are wired for survival, and in moments of distress, the amygdala—the brain’s fear center—can take over, leading to what’s known as “fight or flight.” Distress tolerance skills help re-engage the prefrontal cortex, the brain’s decision-making area, allowing for more reasoned and measured responses.
With consistent practice, distress tolerance skills strengthen emotional resilience, making it easier to navigate future crises without reverting to impulsive or harmful behaviors.
Advanced Techniques: Expanding Distress Tolerance Beyond the Basics
While DBT offers a solid foundation, you can deepen your distress tolerance practice with more advanced techniques:
- Radical Acceptance – Accepting the current situation without judgment can reduce suffering. This doesn’t mean approving of a difficult situation, but rather acknowledging it as reality.
- Mindfulness of Current Thoughts – Notice distressing thoughts without attaching to them. This form of mindfulness lets you observe thoughts like passing clouds, reducing their intensity.
- Visualization of Self-Compassion – Imagine yourself as a friend in distress. What words would you offer them? Use that same compassion toward yourself, which can prevent self-criticism and support self-soothing.
Transforming Your Relationship with Distress
Mastering distress tolerance is not a one-time fix but a journey toward emotional resilience. It’s about learning to pause, understand your feelings, and respond thoughtfully rather than react impulsively. The goal of distress tolerance isn’t to avoid difficult emotions but to move through them in ways that support long-term well-being and growth.
By cultivating these skills, you can transform the way you experience and respond to life’s toughest moments, creating a solid foundation of emotional strength. With time, distress tolerance becomes more than a tool for crisis—it becomes a way of life that empowers you to meet any challenge with grace and resilience.
Call to Action
Start small—try a self-soothing technique today, or practice one minute of radical acceptance. These skills will not only help you survive tough times but will empower you to thrive, turning life’s challenges into opportunities for growth. And remember, the journey toward distress tolerance is a gradual one, but every small step you take brings you closer to lasting calm and resilience.
FAQs About Distress Tolerance Skills
1. What is the difference between distress tolerance and stress management?
Distress tolerance is a specific set of skills designed to help you endure and manage intense emotional distress in the moment, especially during crises. Unlike general stress management, which focuses on reducing or eliminating stress over time, distress tolerance teaches you how to handle emotional discomfort without reacting impulsively or engaging in self-destructive behavior. It’s about staying present with the discomfort and finding ways to cope in the short term, while stress management typically involves long-term strategies to reduce stress levels.
2. Can distress tolerance skills help with anxiety and panic attacks?
Yes, distress tolerance skills are particularly helpful in managing anxiety and panic attacks. When you experience a panic attack, your body enters a heightened state of fight-or-flight. Using distress tolerance skills, like distraction or self-soothing, can help you ground yourself and interrupt the cycle of escalating anxiety. For instance, engaging your five senses through self-soothing techniques or using the “Pros and Cons” strategy to weigh whether to act on panicked thoughts can shift your focus and reduce the intensity of the experience.
3. How long does it take to become good at distress tolerance?
Mastering distress tolerance skills is a process that takes time and consistent practice. Initially, it may feel difficult to implement these techniques when you’re in the midst of a crisis. However, the more you practice, the more natural these skills will become. For most people, it takes several weeks to months of dedicated effort to start feeling comfortable with these techniques, but over time, they can become second nature, helping you respond more effectively to stress.
4. What are some signs that I need to work on my distress tolerance skills?
If you find yourself frequently reacting impulsively during stressful situations—such as yelling, withdrawing, or turning to unhealthy coping mechanisms like substance abuse—this could be a sign that you need to develop better distress tolerance skills. Additionally, if you often feel overwhelmed by strong emotions or find it difficult to cope with discomfort without trying to escape it, distress tolerance skills could help you gain better control over your emotional responses and enhance your emotional resilience.
5. Are there any long-term benefits of practicing distress tolerance skills?
Yes, practicing distress tolerance skills has several long-term benefits. Over time, these skills can help you build emotional resilience, reduce the frequency of emotional outbursts, and prevent self-destructive behaviors. By learning how to stay grounded during intense emotions, you’ll also improve your overall mental health, increase self-control, and develop better relationships, as you’re able to manage difficult emotions more effectively. In the long run, this leads to a greater sense of well-being and emotional stability.
6. Can distress tolerance be used for all types of distress, not just emotional ones?
While distress tolerance skills are primarily aimed at emotional distress, they can also be helpful for managing physical discomfort or mental fatigue. For example, if you’re experiencing physical pain or discomfort, using techniques like distraction (engaging in an activity to divert attention from the pain) or self-soothing (breathing exercises, mindfulness, or gentle touch) can provide relief. Similarly, when facing mental fatigue, practicing distress tolerance can help you remain focused and calm until you’re able to rest or recharge.
