The simplest way to explain self-regulation or emotion-regulation is to think of a thermostat. A thermostat helps your home stay at the desired temperature. If your house feels cold, the thermostat signals for the heater to come on. Before your thermostat can work optimally or reach homeostasis (stability), you must set the desired settings, so it knows when to turn on and when to turn off. Once the temperature in your house reaches the set limits, it turns off. Self-regulation works in a similar manner. Your emotional thermostat has its ideal level of homeostasis to always keep you balanced. Self-regulation is what helps you come back to stability as designed by the standards that you have set previously as what you would consider your ideal self. When your emotional thermostat is off, it creates dysregulation in the body and a need to bring it back to balance or homeostasis. You can think of self-regulation as the chosen standard. Our overall expectations, values and goals.  If we don’t set the right goals, expectations, or values, self-regulation will be impossible. By practicing self-regulation, it allows you to regulate your emotions and impulses, so they don’t get in the way of you achieving your long-term interests. 

When self-value is low or when it drops suddenly, self-regulation comes in and helps you feel better about yourself whether other people like you or not. For example, let’s say you read a negative comment on one of your posts, self-regulation helps you to hold on to your value when other people’s behavior makes you feel devalued. When you feel devalued, you are more likely to act in ways that go against your long-term interests. When you don’t know how to self-regulate, it is easy for others to come and manipulate you, making you act in ways that go against what you believe. Once you allow people to get under your skin, it is a sure guarantee that you are going to fall to your detriment. When our self-regulation is low or off because of stress or anxiety, we feel powerless and vulnerable in the presence of people who want to hurt us.  

When talking about relationships with others, self-regulation allows you to hold value for the other person even when their behavior is less than desirable. Maybe they said something that upset you, or they acted in a way that was hurtful. You can forgive much quicker and see the whole picture instead of just focusing on the moment when they made you upset. When self-regulation is not there, people quickly become reactive. One negative feeling is contagious, and suddenly, people start to scream because they feel threatened and end up saying the wrong thing. When someone is anxious, it can be very contagious and make other people feel just as anxious if they don’t know how to self-regulate. Family members then start blaming each other for how they feel and see each other as enemies.  

Self-regulation should not be mistaken for an attitude of not caring, dismissing feelings, or taking the hurt but not reacting. Of course, you are going to feel hurt if someone who you have a close bond with decides to be disrespectful or hurtful in any way. After all, you guys have a relationship. You developed feelings, whether that is family, friends, or a significant other. To self-regulate doesn’t mean I don’t care what anybody says to me. It is not shutting people out completely, so they don’t hurt you again. Self-regulation is being able to see the good and the bad in the person. Deciding whether the good outweighs the bad. When somebody hurts you, it is not ok to say I’m fine, I’m fine, and I’m fine when you know that you are not fine. This attitude only leads to a sense of low value where other people’s feelings matter more than your own. You need to validate your emotions instead of just pushing them down. 

Self-regulation helps when people are feeling devalued and brings them up to a sense of being valued once again. When people feel devalued, it is easy to mistake value for power. What this means is that instead of taking care of self and doing something that makes the person feel better or more valuable, they choose to act in anger, screaming at loved ones, showing a condescending attitude, maybe even being passive aggressive among other things so they can win the argument. They might feel powerful in the moment, however, after the adrenaline passes, a sense of remorse, guilt, or depression might settle. As the person starts feeling uncomfortable with this new feeling, they choose resentment to justify their actions saying that the other person had it coming, and it was their fault that things went so wrong.  

When you learn to self-regulate, you decide how you want to feel and how you want to be treated. When your values are disrespected, this might make you feel helpless and hopeless. Self-regulation helps you by reminding you of your value and the things that are important in your life. Once you feel emotionally balanced, you can decide if the person can stay in your life, or if it is better to part ways. Self-regulation helps you to see when things are not right and to address those things even if it feels uncomfortable. Overall, self-regulation is essential to building healthy relationships with others and self. If you feel like you are having a hard time self-regulating or don’t know where to start, professional help is always available. The more you understand yourself and respect yourself, the more at peace you will feel.