Practise
Dialectical Behavior Therapy gives you concrete moves for four situations: staying present, surviving a crisis wave, working with a strong emotion, and asking for what you need. Everything below is a hands-on tool — scroll, or jump to what you need.
Full-programme DBT — therapy, skills group, coaching, and a clinician team together — has strong evidence for crisis-level emotion. Practicing skills alone is a different, thinner-evidenced thing.
Dialectical Behavior Therapy was developed by Marsha Linehan, first published in full in 1993, originally for people with recurrent self-harm and borderline personality disorder. "Dialectical" refers to its central tension: accepting yourself exactly as you are right now, and working to change, held at the same time rather than as a contradiction. The skills below are organized into four modules — mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation, and interpersonal effectiveness — each built for a different kind of moment.
Reach for TIPP and Self-Soothe when an emotion has spiked past the point where thinking helps and you need the body to come down first. Reach for PLEASE and opposite action when a feeling is strong but not a crisis, and you want to work with it rather than be run by it. Reach for DEAR MAN, GIVE, and FAST when the actual problem is a conversation — asking for something, saying no, or holding a boundary without losing the relationship or your own self-respect.
Linehan's original randomized trial (1991) and the 2006 comparison against treatment by community experts, Kliem et al.'s (2010) meta-analysis, and the Cochrane review of psychotherapies for borderline personality disorder (Storebø et al., 2020) all support DBT. Well-supported
The caveat, and it has to be prominent: that evidence base is for full-programme DBT — individual therapy, a skills group, phone coaching, and a therapist consultation team together — studied mainly in populations with borderline personality disorder and self-harm. Practicing skills alone from a webpage is a different intervention. Skills-training-only has its own, thinner evidence base (Valentine et al., 2015), and Linehan's own 2015 component analysis found the skills group specifically carried real effect on its own — genuinely encouraging, but it belongs in its own tier. Promising
TIPP's temperature component is the weakest-evidenced single item here, and the one with real physical risk. Promising at most — see the safety note in the TIPP section below.
Well-supported = backed by replicated randomized controlled trials · Promising = smaller studies or a single trial not yet replicated. Self-help, not a diagnostic or treatment tool.
Between the hot, all-feeling Emotion Mind and the cool, all-logic Reasonable Mind sits Wise Mind — where feeling and reason overlap and you just know what's right for you. Where are you right now?
Breathe in on the word "wise," out on "mind." Then ask yourself, honestly:
When arousal is too high to think, change your body chemistry directly. Pick one and follow the timer.
Want just this one, bookmarked? TIPP has its own page →
TIPP is a fast physiological brake, not a substitute for care. If you're having thoughts of harming yourself, or life feels not worth continuing, please reach a person now — see support & crisis lines. If you have a heart condition, are pregnant, or have an eating disorder, check with a doctor before using the Temperature skill specifically (cold water on the face affects heart rate).
Once the peak passes, ride out the rest without making things worse. Tap what you'll actually try — a short, concrete plan beats a long list.
Nothing picked yet.
Name it, rate it, check it, then decide: does this emotion fit the facts? If it doesn't — or acting on it won't help — do the opposite, all the way.
Slide to match the intensity in your body.
A strong emotion mind is often a tired, hungry, unwell emotion mind — and one with too few good moments banked. Build resilience before the hard day arrives, then tend the body once it's here. Check off what's handled today.
0 of 8 tended.
Fill in the first four and this builds your script. The last three (M·A·N) are how you deliver it.
Mindful — stay on point; broken-record if they deflect. Appear confident — steady voice, eye contact. Negotiate — be willing to give to get.
DEAR MAN gets the outcome. GIVE keeps the relationship. FAST keeps your self-respect.
Gentle · no attacks or threats. Interested · listen to their side. Validate · acknowledge their feelings. Easy manner · a little lightness goes far.
Fair · to yourself and them. (no) Apologies · don't over-apologize for existing. Stick to values · don't sell out to be liked. Truthful · no exaggerating or excuses.
These are coping and communication skills, not treatment, and not a substitute for working with a DBT therapist. If you're thinking about harming yourself, or the distress won't come down no matter what you try, please reach a person you trust or a crisis line — you don't have to get through it alone.
When the urge is loud and you have to get through the next twenty minutes.
This works best filled in before you need it. If you're at a 9 right now, use TIPP first and come back to this when the peak has passed.
Rate how strongly you want to act on this urge right now:
At an 8 or above, thinking it through comes second. Distraction first — the deciding can wait.
Choose a category for urgent distraction:
Same skill as the Self-Soothe & Distract section above — this version walks you through it category by category.
What acting on this actually costs, and what riding it out actually costs. Both are real.
You don't have to do this part alone, and you don't have to be in danger to call.
If you're in immediate danger, call emergency services.
Every recorded victory is one you can look back on. Stored only on this device.
This is a self-help version of a therapy designed to be delivered by a full clinical team — a supplement, not a replacement. TIPP's temperature step has real contraindications: a heart condition, pregnancy, or an eating disorder, where the dive reflex's drop in heart rate carries genuine risk — see the safety note above, and check with a doctor before using it specifically.
If you recognise yourself in the population DBT was built for — recurrent self-harm, suicidality, or emotional dysregulation this intense and frequent — the honest advice is a full programme with a clinician, not a webpage. That's not a brush-off; it's what the evidence above actually supports. Support & crisis lines can help you find that next step.
CBT skills tests whether a thought is true. ACT skills changes your relationship to a thought instead.