Distress Tolerance Made Easy: Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills for Dealing with Intense Emotions in Difficult Times

by Sheri Van Dijk, Matthew McKay, Jeffrey C. Wood

Based in proven-effective DBT, a take-anywhere guide to help you balance emotions and stay cool—even when life feels intense . No matter how #blessed you are, sometimes life can feel downright overwhelming. Whether it’s a breakup or divorce, the loss of a job, or even a global pandemic, you may need a little extra help managing the difficult emotions that can arise when things are not going so great. Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is a proven-effective and evidence-based treatment that can help you find balance and improve your ability to handle adversity without losing control and acting destructively. This potent and portable guide focuses on one of the core skills of distress tolerance. With this book, you’ll learn that you are strong enough to weather life’s storms. You can handle whatever stress or setback life throws your way. And you can face your own difficult thoughts and feelings head on—without avoidance, anger, or despair. Life happens. But you don’t have to get pulled under. With Distress Tolerance Made Easy , you’ll learn tons of tips and tricks to help you keep your cool—even when those emotional triggers strike. Why not keep a copy on your nightstand, in your glove box, or on your work desk? You never know when you’ll need it!

Genres: Self Help, Psychology, Nonfiction, Mental Health

152 pages, Paperback

Published December 1, 2023

About the author

I am a psychotherapist working at Southlake Regional Health Centre and in private practice. I have a Master's degree in social work, and specialize in treating psychiatric disorders using dialectical behavior therapy and mindfulness practice.

I have written several books that help readers use DBT skills to treat emotional problems, including The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook for Bipolar Disorder, The Bipolar Workbook for Teens (co-author), Don’t Let Your Emotions Run Your Life for Teens, and Calming the Emotional Storm; and am the author of DBT Made Simple, a book that aims to teach clinicians how to use DBT with their clients diagnosed with a variety of emotional problems.

I'm just putting the finishing touches on my sixth book, which teaches teens DBT skills to help them be more effective in their relationships; look for this book to be published early in 2015.

In 2010 I won the R.O. Jones Award at the Canadian Psychiatric Association Annual Conference for my research on using DBT skills in a bipolar disorder group, published in the Journal of Affective Disorders in March, 2013.

Visit me at www.sherivandijk.com.

Reviews

[Adarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Impressively this book really does lay it out as easy as they possibly could. It's a small book in size, text, and pages but amazingly every page holds useful information, there is so very little you will leave behind. It felt like the book held my hand along the way, feeding me the information in such a succinct manner, laying out numerous examples for me to choose which felt best and resonated most and then providing a scenario of it's own to show me how it would look in day-to-day life applying the example to an emotional flare up(as I call it.)

[Quinn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Meh. I found "Atlas of the Heart" by Brené Brown far more informative and accurate for exploring and naming emotions.

The skills were useful, although mostly familiar from other sources.

The meditations were alright. I got more out of the meditations from "The Science of Enlightenment" by Shinzen Young. These would probably be good for folks new to meditation though.

[Taylor Kundel-Gower · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quick, easy to read, useful skills.

[angeline]

DNFed 10%

I didn't realise this was going to be a how-to step-by-step guide on distress tolerance skills. I thought it was going to be about the general concept and its place in therapy.

[h · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good little book with a bunch of helpful info. I knew this stuff already (great for beginners) but I still find it helpful to have everything summarized and easily accessible.