Transformational Coaching (Module 5)

Important role of emotions - 15

Emotions create movement. They make us feel like doing something. They facilitate learning. They can hurt as well as help.

What is an emotion? - 16

Don’t judge negative emotions as being bad. They all serve some purpose (e.g. survival emotions).

There is still debate about what an emotion “is”, but there is agreement it involves interactions between physiology, feeling, and context.

5 Survival Emotions (fear, anger, disgust, shame sadness), 2 Attachment emotions (love/trust and excitement/joy), and 1 Potentiator (surprise/startle). Energy from survival emotions goes inwards. Energy that come from attachment emotions goes outwards into nurturing and creating.

Be careful not to “label” someone with an emotion. Behaviour typically suggesting ‘anger’ may actually be fear. A client may think they demonstrated anger, when others interpreted it as passion/love.

EMOTION DESCRIPTION/CHARACTERISTICS

FEAR Tense, nervous, jittery, anxious, cannot concentrate

ANGER Frown, rigid movements, hot, agitated, detached, disrespectful

DISGUST Breathing, expression, morality, distancing self

SHAME Warm, blush, apologetic, lowered head, lack of eye contact

SADNESS Crying, bored, defensive, frustrated, withdrawn

SURPRISE/STARTLE Stopping, freezing, expression

TRUST Easy-going, direct open, expressive

EXCITEMENT Laughing, excited voice, energetic, bouncy

The developing brain - 25

Genes and experience determine synaptic connections. Early interpersonal relationships are a primary source of experience.

When a connection is used repeatedly it becomes “permanent” (neurons that fire together, wire together). Whenever we learn something new we’re changing the wiring (plasticity). Plasticity declines after adolescence.

The limbic system is a discrete part of the brain that generates mammalian emotions. It is only in mammals.

Our emotional system - 28

Emotional Stimulus is received by the Thalamus.

Thalamus then sends signals to both the Cortex (“high road”, slow and considered) AND the Amygdala (“low road”, quick and dirty)

Amygdala can then trigger and automatic fight-or-flight response “Amygdala Hijack”. The amygdala is activated in response to emotional stimuli.

Emotional Regulation - 39

This is the capacity to modify an emotional experience. When done effectively, it can be used to cultivate emotions that are helpful and manage emotions that are harmful. This requires the activation of a goal to UP or DOWN-REGULATE either the magnitude or duration of the emotional response. This goal can be activated in oneslef (intrinsic regulation) or in someone else (extrinsic regulation). Once a clear goal has been activated, many different processes may be recruited that are explicit (trying to look calm when presenting) or implicit (shifting attention away from the unpleasant) [Note to self: How might ‘learned helplessness’ play into effective emotional regulation? When someone experience emotions for so long without an ability to control their environment to regulate them, how might that affect their ability to realise that they have it within their control to recognise what emotion they are experiencing and what actions they can then take to UP/DOWN-REGULATE accordingly?' … what steps would an individual with learned helplessness need to take to develop learned helpfulness and so regulate their emotions to their advantage?]

Continuum of Emotion Regulation:

Explicit Implicit

Conscious _______________________________________________________________ Unconscious

Effortful Effortless

Controlled Automatic

source: Gyurak et al 2011, Mauss et al 2007

Process Model - 41

Each step in the process of generating an emotion is a potential target for regulation.

Situation Selection

Situation Modification

Attention Deployment

Cognitive Change

Response Modulation

SITUATION ATTENTION APPRAISAL RESPONSE

+_________________+_________________+______________+_______________+

Source: Gross and Thompson, 2007

You can avoid the situation, remove yourself from the situation, change the situation, ignore the situation, change how you think about it or suppress the response.

Regulation Strategies:

Up-regulation - Increase the positive (usually). Savour positive experiences. Consider 3 things you are glad you have. Use music or visualisations.

Down-regulation - Decrease the negative (usually). There are different forms of down regulation:

Suppression = behaviour orientated, modulation of response
Appraisal = cognitively oriented, modulation of cognition
Different strategies have different outcomes. ERQ assesses individual differences.

Outcomes of regulation:

Suppression leads to:

Decreased positive emotion experience, worse memory, less liking from partners.
Does NOT decrease negative emotion experience, increased partner blood pressure.
Greater amygdala activation.
It consumes an enormous amount of energy.

Reappraisal leads to:

Decreased negative emotion experience, no impact on enhanced memory, no detectable adverse consequences for social affiliation.
increased positive emotion experience
no impact or decreased amygdala activation.

Up-regulating emotions:

Cultivation of positive emotions helps to build lasting resources that, in turn enhance life satisfaction, increase the likelihood of experiencing future positive emotions, and foster resilience to negative ones (Quiodbach et al 2010)

Positive Emotion Regulation:

Research suggests there are 2 primary strategies:

Savouring - Behaviour display (i.e. facial expression). Efforts to be present (attention). Capitalising (celebrating). Positive mental time travel (remembering/anticipating).
Dampening - Suppression (shyness, modesty). Distraction. Fault Finding. Negative mental time travel.
The wider range of strategies adopted

Neural base of cognitive control of emotion:

Reappraisal of highly negative scenes:

reduced subjective experience of negative affect
increased activation of the lateral and medial prefrontal regions
Decreased activation of the amygdala and medial orbito-frontal cortex.

Research suggests the pre-frontal cortex is involved in constructing reappraisal strategies.

Mental States and Performance - 49

High Energy/Positive Attitude:

This is the ideal state for peak performance: Alert, Lively, Stimulated, Enthused, Calm mental state, Relaxed body, Focused “I can do it”. No threat.

High Energy/Negative Attitude:

This is moderate performance: Fearful, Accelerated mental state, anxious, tense, angry, tunnel vision, frustrated, trying. “I want to, but I’m afraid I won’t be able to.” Threat.

Low Energy/Positive Attitude:

This is poor performance: Fatigued, Lazy, Leisurely, Lackadaisical, Calm mental state, no tension, unfocussed. “I want to, but not all that much.” No threat.

Low Energy/Negative Attitude:

This is very poor performance: Bored, Uninterested, Irritated, Depressed, Variable calmness, Some tension, Unfocused. “I’d rather be doing anything else but…” Mild Threat.

Source: Adapted from “Mental Toughness Training” by Jim Loehr

Dysregulation:

The symptoms of many psychiatric illnesses involve inappropriate emotional responses and/or inffective emotion regulation (PTSD, phobias: hyper-responsive emotional appraisal.

The Amygala can be hyper-responsive. The ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC) may be hypo-responsive.

Depression may be caused by a failure to reappraise.

Anxiety disorders and emotion circuitry:

Patients with any of the three disorders (PTSD, Social Anxiety, Specific Phobias) showed a greater activity in the amygdala and insula, structures linked to negative emotional responses. Patients with PTSD showed hypo-activation in regions linked to emotion regulation.

Unregulated system:

In ‘normal’ individuals the following are all impacted by regulatory capacity:

Cognition, Perception, Memory, Relationships, Motivation, Attention, Insight, Problem Solving, Physiology, Decision Making, and Stress.

Summary: Really effective coaching works at an emotional level.

Reintroduction to transpersonal approach - 57

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Bi-focal vision - 61

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2 Dimensions of growth - 63

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The egg diagram - 68

Sub personalities - 76

Imagery and Visualisation - 107

Coaching and Motivation - 120

The Will - 123

Integrating a transpersonal approach - 140

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