DBT Tools

DBT Tools

DBT

Overview of DBT

Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is a type of cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) developed by Dr. Marsha Linehan in the 1990s and adapted by Drs. Alec Miller and Jill Rathus for adolescents.

Focus

Mindfulness

Often our minds get pulled in a whole bunch of different directions. Mindfulness, in DBT, is focusing on one and only one thing while intentionally paying attention to what is happening right now, without judgment.

Middle

Walking the Middle Path

One of the goals of DBT is to “walk the middle path.” This means avoiding thinking in terms of black and white and instead look for the grey.

Understand

Emotion Regulation

Emotion regulation skills focus on understanding emotions, building resilience, and decreasing both vulnerability and suffering through skill use.

Maintain

Interpersonal Effectiveness

Not only do our relationships impact our emotions, our emotions impact our relationships. The interpersonal effectiveness skills help us create and keep positive and healthy relationships.

Respond

Distress Tolerance

Bad things happen to all of us at some point or another. And sometimes it even feels like a lot of hard things are happening back to back or all at once.