Check the Facts

Check out whether your emotional reactions fit the facts of the situation. Changing your beliefs and assumptions to fit the facts can help you change your emotional reactions to situations.

Facts

Many emotions and actions are set off by our thoughts and interpretations of events, not by the events themselves.
      Event → Thoughts → Emotion
Our emotions can also have a big effect on our thoughts about events.
      Event → Emotions → Thoughts
Examining our thoughts and checking the facts can help us change our emotions.

How to check the facts

1. Ask: What is the emotion I want to change?
• See identifying emotions.


2. Ask: What is the event prompting my emotion?
• Describe the facts that you observed through your senses.
• Challenge judgments, absolutes, and black and white descriptions.
• See "what" skills.


3. Ask: What are my interpretations, thoughts, and assumptions about the event?
• Think of other possible interpretations.
• Practice looking at all sides of a situation and all points of view.
• Test your interpretations and assumptions to see if they fit the facts.


4. Ask: Am I assuming a threat?
• Label the threat.
• Assess the probability that the threatening event will really occur.
• Think of as many other possible outcomes as you can.


5. Ask: What's the catastrophe?
• Imagine the catastrophe really occurring.
• Imagine coping well with the catastrophe (through problem-solving, coping ahead, and radical acceptance [these DBT skills are currently not included on our website]).


6. Ask: Does my emotion and/or its intensity fit the actual facts?
• Check out facts that fit each emotion.
• Ask wise mind.