RIDE THE WAVe SKILL

SESSION ONLINE VERSION

Theme song: Watch “Catch a Wave” video.

MINDFULNESS “RIDE THE WAVE” EXERCISE

Step 1: Be aware of a particular emotion. In a non-judgmental and mindful manner, recognize the feeling that you are experiencing. Name the feeling and think of it as part of you, but not all of you. (Pause 15 seconds)

Step 2: Experience your emotion like waves in the ocean. Float on your back with less intense feelings or ride the waves of a stronger emotion on a surfboard trying to keep your balance and just observe your emotion -- knowing that it will last only a little while and then will subtly subside. (Pause 15 seconds)

Step 3: You can’t stop a strong wave from coming towards you. Try not to push the feeling away or take hold of it. Don’t try to control it too strongly or make the feeling bigger than it is either. Instead, ride out the wave of emotion in an appropriate manner. (Pause 15 seconds)

Step 3: Remember, this feeling is only one part of you. This emotion should not force you to react in any certain way, especially in a way that is harmful to you. Recall moments when you experienced more positive emotions to remind yourself that they will return soon enough. Like a wave in the ocean, this feeling will take its course. (Pause 15 seconds)

Step 4: Accept and tolerate your emotion. Try not to assign positive or negative thoughts to this feeling. (Pause 15 seconds)

Step 5: Fully accept that this feeling is part of you right now, but it is only temporary. Try pretending that your feeling is a “guest” in your home, who you can tolerate “hosting” for the time being. (Pause 15 seconds)

Discuss: What was your experience like? What did you notice? ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Review your commitments from the PLEASE – DBT skill session:

·      Complete the Weekly DBT Diary. 

·      Come prepared to the next session to share your experience using DBT skills.

Watch “The Other Side of Heaven” video.

1. Start thinking about your emotions like the ocean. Sometimes calm, peaceful, serene. Other times full of crashing waves like this scene from “The Other Side of Heaven” film. With the ocean, it is the weather that might cause changes—high winds or still, sunny days can make a difference. Sometimes we can see a storm brewing that might whip the waves up, other times changes may happen with little warning. Things that happen in our personal environment, like problems with friends or family and stress about school or work, may affect our emotions. Like ocean waves, our emotions may at one moment be calm and at another moment a raging storm. We might experience small emotional ups and downs that we can float along on or big emotions that might sweep us away. We can let our emotions push us around or we can learn how to ride out our feelings and not let them crash over us.

Discuss: If you have ever surfed, what are the qualities or skills you need to have?___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2. A surfer doesn’t fight the powerful ocean wave that comes their way; they move with the wave, riding its natural tide. DBT’s Ride the Wave skill is just like riding a surfboard during the emotion – knowing that it will last only temporarily and then subside. This skill helps you feel less emotionally vulnerable and more in command of your emotions. It helps you learn how to experience emotions like a wave without “drowning” in them and feeling like you are a victim of your emotions.

Watch: “Cast Away” video.

3. Surfing emotions can be extremely useful when it is important to inhibit action linked to an emotional urge like Tom Hanks “Cast Away” film character jumping off a raft in the middle of the ocean. The mindfulness exercise that began this session is the essence of this DBT skill. It encourages us to experience our emotions like waves in the ocean. As part of your experience open yourself to the flow of the emotion. Do not try to get rid of it, push it away or reject it. Don’t cling to the emotion, rehearse it, hold on to it or amplify it. Like Tom Hanks’ characters love for Wilson, don’t assume that your emotion is irrational or based on faulty perceptions or distortions.

4. Trying to build a wall to keep emotions out always has the effect of keeping emotions in. It is like trying to keep the ocean off the beach by building a wall of sand. The ocean inevitably seeps through and pools behind the wall because it is unable to go back out to the ocean quickly. However long your ride lasts experience the physical sensations of the emotion as fully as possible. Watch to see how long it takes for the emotion to go down or the quality of your experience to change. Remember you are not your emotion and do not need to act on the emotion. Also, remember times when you have felt different. Respect your emotion. Let go of judging your emotion. Practice willingness to and Radical Acceptance of your emotion

Watch: “Soul Surfer” video.

5. Understanding our emotions helps us to change our emotional experience and our actions. Like an electrical circuit, if we can break the emotion circuit somewhere we can change the emotion or its intensity. Surfing emotions can be used to help with any addictive behavior or destructive impulse.  Think about your urges as waves. Instead of trying to stop their movement “urge surfing” uses DBT’s mindfulness skills to stay on top of the urge to engage in maladaptive behavior. As you experienced in the exercise at the beginning of the session observing and describing urges are the first steps in letting go of emotional suffering and getting “unstuck” from the urge cycle. Notice urges moment by moment, particularly how like a wave they evolve and shift over time. With this skill, we can learn to accept urges, cravings, and preoccupations without reacting to them, judging them, or acting on them. When we give into and engage in an urge we reinforce the link between having an urge and acting on it. Urge surfing detaches the urge from the object of the urge. Over time, the brain learns that it is possible to experience an urge without acting on it.

Discuss: Describe some common urges and objects of urges -- food, drugs, sex, casino, screens, self-harm, etc. -- that you have observed in yourself or others. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

6. Many thinking patterns that contribute to mental health disorders are habits that take single emotion events and reinforce them again and again until they feel chronic. Keeping the image in mind of you on a surf board riding the waves of an urge will help you remember that they don’t last forever. This urge will go away, as others have done before it. “Turning toward the pain, rather than away from it, allows you to connect with, and therefor address, your emotions, instead of allowing them to fester unresolved”, Joan Rosenberg, Ph.D. By exposing yourself to emotions, but not necessarily acting on them, you will find that they are not so catastrophic. You will stop being so afraid of them. Once you are less afraid, the fear, panic, and anger that you feel in response to your own emotions will dissipate.

Watch: “Life of Pi” video.

7. Lost at sea, Suraji Sharma’s “Life of Pi” film character had to learn to overcome his life-long fear of his family zoo’s tiger. Eventually, for him and for us intense emotions become naturally occurring parts of our existence that depending on how we respond to them, can overtake us or educate and enrich us. Emotional surfing, just like real surfing takes determination, balance, flexibility, strength and resilence. It’s challenging to accept our thoughts and manage our emotions AND if we can learn how to ride the wave we can prevent our urges from dictating our behavior. We can be more secure knowing that we have control over our behavior and learn how to make wise decisions in our everyday life.

8. Just as a surfer might experience fear as the waves approach, fear may also come over you. Rather than being engulfed by the waves, climb onto your board, paddle into position and stand firmly as the wave approaches. With practice you fill find that the waves will no longer take you down and that you can get back to shore. Next time, instead of pushing your feelings aside or trying to control emotion quickly, try to ride the wave. Recognize what you feel, let yourself experience it, know that it is only temporary, and accept the feeling is not you – only a part of you in the moment. Once you know how to ride the wave, you should have the skills to surf any emotion that comes your way. Remember “surfers rule”.

Watch: “Surfers Rule” video, by Brian Wilson.

It's a genuine fact that the surfers rule

It's plastered on the walls all around the school now
(Surfers rule, Surfers rule)
Becoming just as common as a golden rule now
(Surfers rule, Surfers rule)
Take it or leave it but you better believe it
Surfers rule

They burnt it in the grass on the football field now
(Surfers rule, Surfers rule)
Just try to make them cool it and they'll never yield now
(Surfers rule, Surfers rule)
Take what you've heard now and go pass the word now
Surfers rule

It's a genuine fact that the surfers rule

A woody full of Surfers pullin' long side a wagon
(Surfers rule, Surfers rule)
The Hodaddies sittin' while the Surfers are draggin'
The Surfers are winnin' and they say as they're grinnin'
Surfers rule

Surfers rule
(Four Seasons you better believe it)

Watch: “Ride the Wave End Credits” video.

As we roll the Ride the Wave - DBT Skill end credits think about what is the most important thing you learned in this session and what will you do differently because of what you learned. Write your thoughts below.

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Session Commitments

Surf an intense emotion or urge using the “Ride the Wave Practice Handout”.

Complete the Weekly DBT Diary.

Come prepared to the next session to share your experience using DBT skills.