134 Don’t Let A nxiety Run Your Life
AVOI DA NC E
As we reviewed in chapter 3, not only can you choose to
actively avoid certain objects or situations that elicit feelings
of anxiety, you can choose to actively avoid emotions.
Avoiding emotions is negatively reinforcing (see chapter 3)
because it’s associated with escaping from emotions you per-
ceive as unpleasant or unbearable. Although avoidance pro-
vides some immediate relief when you feel anxious or
worried, you deprive yourself of the chance to learn how to
appropriately cope with the emotion and fully process it. If
this happens often enough, you eventually lose the ability to
properly process your emotions, solve problems, and cope
well with negative thoughts and emotions.
•••The emotion regulation strategies presented in this chapter
all represent ways of actively choosing to manage your emo-
tional responses. The important thing to remember is to try
to mindfully utilize more adaptive strategies, such as reap-
praisal, problem solving, acceptance, and decentering, as
opposed to maladaptive strategies, such as suppression and
avoidance. Also, know that old habits are hard to overcome
and that effective emotion regulation is best accomplished
with practice!
The mindfulness skills presented in this chapter are
meant to be used in any situation, no matter how busy you
are. Use them in combination with the specific emotion reg-
ulation strategies we illustrated to help you handle stressors
more successfully. The key is to be f lexible in your use of
strategies. Using mindfulness will help you become more
conscious of the present moment so that you can assess what