Hi Everyone! I’m Jay, Doug and his methods are powerful. He has helped my wife and I substantially work through conflict and we have implemented his affect labeling with our children and have great success with it. Thank you for inviting me into this community! Doug’s work is a staple and a core component to the work that I do training on how to stabilize nervous systems. An area I have challenges with are gratitude and empathy towards myself. Being married with younger children there is always a new challenge and conversation to correct with affect labeling!

I think we all saw the video and u can find it on YouTube. My main Question is how, at some point, after the initial non-rationale response do you actually explain there is a nail in the head? Or is the point to just to de-escalate?

Not sure if everybody has had the opportunity to check out these classroom videos “there is gold in those hills”.

When Laurel Kaufer and I started the Prison of Peace Project, we did not set out to teach emotional intelligence. We were devising a curriculum that would help life inmates become good mediators as quickly as possible. Since we guessed that they did not have strong interpersonal skills, we decided to spend 4 weeks teaching them how to listen. We did not expect what happened. We observed that by learning to listen to core messages and emotions, the inmates became substantially more emotionally intelligent. This has occurred in every inmate cohort we have trained in both men’s and women’s prisons. By around the eighth week of training, the inmates go through a transformation that is remarkable and beautiful to witness. As they regain their humanity, they see themselves and their peers with new insights. They become compassionate and understanding. It is hard to believe that life inmates can change like this, but it is true. Emotional intelligence comprises 5 basic skills: 1. Awareness of emotions. 2. The ability to modulate emotions. 3. The ability to make behavioral choices in spite of emotions. 4. The ability to recognize emotions in others. 5. The ability to be empathetic with others. Most emotional intelligence training starts with self-awareness. We found that starting with empathic listening developed emotional intelligence without having to teach emotional intelligence. As the inmates learned to pay attention to the emotions of others so they could reflect those emotions back, they learned to pay attention to their own emotions. Eight weeks into the training, inmates report that they find themselves affect labeling themselves when they experience a strong emotion. This is helping them calm themselves down and make good choices about how to respond to their emotional triggers. As you learn to listen to and reflect on the emotions of those around you, you will become more aware of your own emotions. As you develop emotional self-awareness, you will find yourself being less reactive and more conscious about your choices in the heat of the moment. You will find a calmer more relaxed life awaiting you. Teach the techniques to your children and watch them grow this way too!

All of you may or may not have seen the assassination video of Charlie Kirk. I do not recommend anybody does if they have not.For an example many people that have seen or heard I-immediately went into survival brain dominance regardless of political positioning. This makes a person more impulsive, reactive, explosive, impatient, irritable, depressed, abandoned a multitude of things. It also makes this individual more susceptible to brainwashing, hypnotism and neural linguistic programming not in one’s favor. What are the antidotes well a big one is labeling the emotions the way Doug teaches how to do it. Just by calling out the emotions, the intense and mild regardless of whatever side of the political fence person’s on helps them tremendously. You would not believe how many people I’ve seen with blank stairs on auto pilot. Affect labeling helps get the thinking brain up to speed to assist in the balance of survival brain dominance. I highly recommend meeting with Doug watching his training videos, reading the books that he recommends. The loudest noise besides pain receptors for our minds and bodies are unprocessed, unrecognized and invalidated emotions.