Managing our emotions, managing each other

How to keep calm and carry on when you or someone you know is triggered at work

Welcome to the first in a series of four posts about "managing ourselves," which covers regulating emotions, setting boundaries, reframing, and letting go. I started writing these on Twitter to prepare for a talk at Dev World, but then I realized Twitter is a walled garden these days! So I started expanding the threads into longform here. I hope you’ll find them useful. Please let me know what you think.

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I have seen many "how to get a job" and "how to be a leader/manager" talks. They are almost always "how to impress people" and "how to take care of others" talks. But I haven't seen many talks about "being a better person." It seems essential to your success after getting a new job or a promotion!

I'm "not normal." Some things seem more effortless for others. With a decade of various forms of coaching and soft skills study while working in opensource communities, hierarchical Big Tech structures, and startups, I have learned a few helpful things I'd like to share.

I want to preface by underscoring that I can still improve. I still frustrate others, have to clean up my messes, and sometimes cannot get to a "yes." But, I cannot credit all my success to luck nor discount the measurable progress I have made since I began this journey.

We are not perfect people. Nor can we expect others to be perfect. We can only do our best. And that starts with managing ourselves and taking responsibility for our 50% of the relationships we form.

Emotional regulation and dysregulation

Let's start with emotional regulation and its antithesis: dysregulation. If you aren't aware of your emotions or have a small "emotional vocabulary," being dysregulated might feel like being "hyper/upset/mad/sad/bad" to the point of feeling overwhelmed.

And that's what makes it "dysregulation." When I was younger and saw it in the adults in my life, I called it "inconsolable"—there was nothing I or they could do to get them into a different state. They were stuck there until they ran out of steam or a stronger emotion came.

It is important to note that when you're dysregulated, others can't bring you back down to earth (nor is it their responsibility). You're in a state where no one can help you. Even you will need help getting out of there because you're overwhelmed and thus out of commission.

We often treat dysregulation as a failing of character: "They're so emotional." "She took it too personally." "He threw a tantrum." But it has physical roots in brain structure and chemistry. Managing our emotions takes a lot of energy and stable childhood environment with emotionally mature role models!

(I have several times talked to an engineer in a state of dysregulation who could not let go of a decision they felt was an affront to their sense of self (it often comes back to a threat to the self). Reason, objectivity, their ability to calm down and chill—not present!)

People with ADHD can have trouble managing emotions because of the amount of concentration it takes. People on the autism spectrum as well. People who experience PTSD or CPTSD can have this issue as well, thanks to changes in brain makeup that happen after traumatic events.

None of these things make a person bad or "no good," though we can only see a person's actions and not their inner causes. When I see someone dysregulated, I see someone who needs a time out, not my judgment or escalation.

Regulating our emotions

Do you get emotionally dysregulated? How do you get in control when you're out of control? I'm sure you can remember once when you were so upset that you did something you regretted. Maybe you blamed someone else for "making you feel that way." The first step is to own your feelings.

No one makes you feel anything. Your feelings are your responses to external stimuli and the stories you tell yourself about them. Humans are great at telling stories (more on that when we get to framing). Feelings come before thought, even. They are not objective truth.

(Take note, this makes the non-apology "sorry for making you feel that way" even more ridiculous! Apologize for the stimuli you provided, not for another person's feelings. You can acknowledge how they feel, though: "I see you are upset. I'm sorry I took your charging cable.")

Own your feelings

The first step to combating dysregulation is to take responsibility for your feelings. It is no one's job to comfort you or "make" you feel better. When you're dysregulated, even you can't make yourself feel better! How would anyone else? Your feelings are your own, no one else's.

Become aware of changes in your emotional state

Learn to catch yourself in a dysregulated state. It can be hard to be aware when you're dysregulated. It sneaks up behind you and puts a bag over your head. You can: Practice mindfulness (use those labels to identify rising emotions). Have a safe word. Ask a friend or trusted partner to let you know when they notice you’re heading to an inconsolable place with a choice phrase like, “time out” or “danger zone.”

Have an emergency plan

Create an emergency re-regulation procedure. Here are some things you can do when you're emotionally out of control and can't be trusted with professional relationships:

• Minimize contact with others. Cancel all your meetings for X hours. Put your phone in a drawer. When you're dysregulated, you want to minimize harm to others. Refrain from talking to reports, bosses, partners. Wait to respond to tickets. Don't try to address any grievances. You need to be in the right headspace. You can create a to-do list for anything you think of and get back to it.

• Get active. "Burning off steam" is a great way to evict cortisol and adrenaline from the human circuitry—the sources of our "fight or flight" reactions that do our social interactions no good. Keep a pair of weights by the desk and pump some iron, Beat Saber, or go for a lap.

• Check in with reality. Go through a file of objective truths—quotes about good work you’ve done, observations from friends and family.

The three steps

When you or a friend catch yourself in a dysregulated state, take the following steps: Minimize the damage, identify the emotions, and address the problem.

1. Minimize the damage by following your emergency plan above. Have it written down somewhere so you can put it into action as quickly as possible.

2. Identify what you’re feeling. Now that you own your feelings, learn to call them by their names, like a pet. It's hard to be in control of a raging beast when you don't even know its name. Names are powerful. I keep a deck of emotion cards that I use to identify what I'm feeling. There are charts, too. Don’t try to assign causes. That’s just shifts your attention away from where it should be: your feelings. Write these down. Journal them.

3. Address the problem. When you're in a regulated state, own your behavior and apologize earnestly to anyone impacted. Then, work backwards from you emotional state and objective truths to try to uncover what the trigger was: "When X happened, I felt Y. I responded with Z." If another person was involved, you might do this exercise with them, with their permission.

Plan ahead

If you know that a particular situation is going to be dysregulating (having to pick up kids from an ex, giving a difficult presentation, firing someone), you can schedule a time to be dysregulated.

I used to have a regular meeting with a formidable partner. Every time it came around, I knew for the hour afterward that I would be particularly "feisty." So I blocked that hour and went to a community garden to dig holes. It was the most productive hour of that day, and my reports never knew.

Over the long term, there are ways to get better at regulating your emotions. It may be more challenging for some people, but it is very possible! In addition to mindful meditation and the steps shared above, dialectical therapy and sometimes medication CAN get you there.

Dysregulation is like a personal hell for you and can damage relationships with the people around you—especially those who depend on you. The first step to regulating your emotions is admitting that sometimes, neither you nor anyone else is in control. But you can take steps to limit the instances of those situations and limit their impact.

Dealing with people who are in a dysregulated state

Dealing with dysregulated people involves a similar set of measures as dealing with yourself: minimize the damage, identify the emotions, and address the problem.

1. Minimize damage to the dysregulated person, yourself, and the people around you. When a person you're dealing with is dysregulated, they might not realize they're not at their best. To protect them as well as yourself and others from their behavior, give them an adult time out: tell them to take five, take the rest of the day off, and hold off on the next meeting.

2. Identify the emotions. When dealing with a dysregulated person, label the behavior, not the person with expressions like, "It seems like you feel upset right now," and "He needs a moment." Do not dismiss their feelings or label the person: "You're blowing this out of proportion." "He's an asshole."

3. Address the behavior and its trigger. Only try to address the behavior once they're regulated again. When they are, try to get to the core of the trigger using "I noticed [behavior]. Can you tell me why you did that?" And then listen. Let them peel their own onion. At the end, ask, "What can we do differently?" It's their emotions, so they need to do their own work. You're just holding them accountable to themselves. But you also might uncover ways to make a better workplace or interact more productively with this person.

Regardless of your position of authority in relation to a dysregulated person, the last thing you want to do is escalate their emotions. This can sometimes be counterintuitive.

Obviously, you don't want to bite back at someone towering in rage, but you also need to avoid trying to comfort someone full of woe by telling them a sad personal story. Mirroring a dysregulated person's emotions can escalate the situation.

Dealing with superiors in a dysregulated state

This conversation can be tricky if the person holds power over you. Are they chewing you out in a meeting room? Blowing up at you? You may not want to be under a person who engages with you in a state of dysregulation. But, there are ways to navigate this.

Remember the big three: minimize the damage, identify the emotions, and address the problem:

1. Minimize the damage. Often you cannot dismiss a person in power. While they are dysregulated, you may be compelled to stand in the storm of emotions with them. In this situation, respond with the complete regulation of your own emotions. Suppress the urge to retort, to lament, to lean into their emotions. These are THEIR emotions. If there are people you can dismiss in the area, do so and offer to convey any important points at a later time.

2. Identify the emotions. Reply objectively. Keep a smooth face. It may not be safe to acknowledge their emotions just yet. Only do so if you have a good relationship with this person. Otherwise, hold off on the “It seems like you feel X” conversation until they’re regulated and get out of there with a promise to revisit this.

3. Address the behavior. This can be very difficult with a person in power. This is where you figure out if you have a functional or dysfunctional relationship. Wait until they’re regulated, until you can talk privately. You may need to set boundaries. They may not like you setting boundaries.

The unfortunate truth is that dysregulation looks like ferocity or passion, and many business leaders have been rewarded for their maelstrom of emotions. In such situations, you may be punished for expecting the person in power to be accountable for the fallout of their behavior. In such a situation, you must do the emotional labor of defending your people from the impact of their dysregulation. In this case, “addressing the behavior” can look more like “taking measures to prevent shit from rolling downhill on your team,” which is beyond the scope of this piece.

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Thanks for reading this far! It means a lot to me that you have.

Please feel free to agree, disagree, comment, and share what's worked/not worked for you. Your feedback helps shape how I think about this.