Learning to balance emotions: The Goldilocks Principle
Therapy often focuses on helping us to manage our negative emotions. A helpful framework for understanding this process is the “Goldilocks” principle, where the goal is to temper our emotional states to be: “not too little, not too much. Just right”.
Like the 3 bears, we have 3 major, negative emotions inbuilt into us: anxiety, anger, and self-criticism. Contrary to the belief that these emotions are inherently negative, the truth is that they are actually warning systems, designed to protect us. Anxiety, anger, and self-criticism may feel uncomfortable, but they are crucial for keeping us safe.
• Anxiety is a protective mechanism designed to alert us to danger: a built-in warning system that keeps us vigilant and prepared. When anxiety is excessive, it can paralyze us, getting in the way of us reaching our goals. So, we don’t apply to a job because we’ve decided we don’t stand a chance of getting it. On the other hand, too little anxiety can make us reckless and put us at risk of danger. So, we climb without ropes or training!
• Anger is our response to violations of personal boundaries. It’s a way to assert ourselves and ensure our needs are met. When expressed in moderation, anger can help us stand up for ourselves, whereas uncontrolled anger can be destructive and suppressed anger leave us feeling exploited.
• Self-Criticism serves to protect others’ boundaries and our relationships. It helps us reflect on our behaviour and make necessary changes, apologising when we have behaved unfairly towards others. On the contrary, excessive self-criticism can lead to low self-esteem, making us ruminate and blame ourselves for any situation in which we made a mistake.
So, the key is not to “get rid of” these emotions but to harness them and stop them misfiring. We need to find the “right” balance, just as Goldilocks did with the porridge, chair, and bed – although, ironically, breaking into a house you don’t own is a perfect example of having “too little” self-criticism!
Applying the Goldilocks Principle in Therapy
Therapy can help regulate our negative emotions, encouraging us to neither ignore nor exaggerate our emotional responses. This balance can be achieved through various therapeutic techniques:
1. Schema therapy helps us to understand how deep-rooted patterns from childhood can cause misfiring of our emotional states. It examines maladaptive schemas or core beliefs, such as “I’m not good enough” or “Others are out to attack me” that trigger intense emotional responses in response to certain situations, such as criticism from others. This understanding allows us to develop healthier coping mechanisms and to learn to regulate our emotions.
2. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy helps to reframe our thoughts, to ensure that anger is not catastrophized, anger is not unbridled, and self-criticism is not relentless. It also focuses on behavioural changes that help us control our emotions so that we can reach our goals, rather than have our “too much” emotions thwart them.
3. Interpersonal therapy focuses on balancing relationships, examining the practical and emotional support that we give to and receive from others, ensuring that we are not being exploited and are, instead, optimising the support we have around us.
4. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy encourages us to observe and accept our emotions without judgment. It promotes mindfulness and, through values-based actions, helps shift focus from emotional distress to purposeful living.
5. Dialectical Behaviour Therapy teaches skills that help us tolerate distress and increase interpersonal effectiveness, reducing emotional reactivity. Breathing and relaxation techniques help moderate intense emotional responses, allowing us to engage with our emotions in a more measured way.
Emotions can be friends not foes
Understanding that emotions have a protective role shifts the therapeutic approach from suppression and overwhelm, to acceptance and balance. When we recognise that anxiety is there to protect us from harm, that anger helps assert boundaries, and that self-criticism promotes social harmony, we can appreciate our emotions, instead of fearing them. We can also learn how to control them, so that they are “not too much and not too little, just enough”.