The 4 Ds: Urge Control Technique
Today I’m gonna pass along one of the basic techniques that I teach my clients for controlling their urges - the 4 Ds. These techniques can be used by everyone to improve their self control and make sure you stay on track.
When someone comes through my door, a good number of them have attempted to quit something and have failed. Most of the time, I find that they are only using 2 “tools” to control themselves - harsh self talk and distraction. Part of the definition of having a gambling, porn or gaming addiction is the difficulty in quitting and repeated failed attempts at trying to get your addiction under control.
Truth is, when you attempt to reduce your use, you will encounter urges.
These urges can be triggered by something you see or hear, but they can also just occur independently. Urges are part of the equation of keeping your use under control and also in preventing relapse.
For someone with a gambling problem urges tend to sound like:
“I feel like going for a lucky spin”
“I’m feeling lucky, time for a slap”
“I’m super stressed, I’ll play the pokies to help me relax”
For those with a gaming problem they sound like:
“Just one more game, then I’ll start my assignment”
“Its already 5am, I might as well play til morning”
“I’m so bored, I’ll just play a round”
And for those with a porn problem they often sound like:
“Just a little more porn, then I’ll go to sleep, it helps me sleep”
“Nobody will know, I’ll just check out something new”
“I’m really horny, I’ve got to find that perfect clip”
These might be the typical thoughts when you experience an urge, desire, compulsion, pull or whatever you want to call it. There is a harsh reality here: the more we act on our urges, the stronger they become. Partly, because habits are strengthened by repetition and, partly because we reward the negative pattern with the pleasure of use and enforce the beliefs which support the urge.
Now, odds are you’ve fought your urges at some point in your past with self-talk and willpower such as…
“Come on, you don’t need this right now”
“Get yourself together”
“Be strong”
Now this works, but it’s often pretty tiring to only rely on willpower. So it’s worthwhile to build some other tools that might help manage and support you to surf out those urges.
Source: Jen Theodore, Unsplash
I call them the 4Ds.
Deep [breath]: it sounds simple but it’s often overlooked. Take 4 deep breaths, deep belly or abdominal breaths. Observe and accept that you are having an urge, attempt to let the urge pass. Sometimes our urges are impulsive or there is a sense of haste/agitation. Breathing in this way, forces your body to slow and calm down, allowing you to attempt a different action or counter the thought. Clients who can “ground” can deal with low intensity urges in this way.
Distract [yourself]: Sometimes our urges are triggered by the sight/sound/memory of our crutch, but when we really analyse the situation, we often only need to distract ourselves for a few minutes for when the urge peaks. It can be a substitute activity, listening to a favourite song, eating a nice meal, leaving your room for 20 mins etc.
Delay [then delay]: This is the moderately advanced trick of essentially jedi mind tricking yourself using expert level procrastination. When an urge is unbearable, make a mental promise to use tomorrow night at 8 pm, you’ll notice that the pressure might be off for a little bit, at least enough to not use that day. Congrats, you’ve bought yourself 24 hrs. Now, come 5 pm tomorrow, reassess your urge and jedi-mind-trick yourself once again and delay for another time period. If possible, increase the time in between as you go, from 1 to 3 days from now to a month from now and so on.Keep practicing your delay skills and soon you’ll find that your urges can be tricked and delayed pretty often. Its procrastination for urges.
Decide [after completing the thought]: for most, urges are incomplete thoughts. If you continue challenging and completing the thought, you can generate the emotional state that makes it easier to say no and reduce the urge. Think about the most negative consequences and unpleasant emotions that you experienced when you used i.e. did you feel intense guilt after gambling away the rent, did you feel shame when you lied to your loved one, did you feel worried about being caught? Generate that memory and emotion when you experience the urge. Think through and play it forward, you should notice that the urge is reduced, and you can keep focused on the things you want to do. When you get more advanced, you can build on this and think about the benefits if you overcome your addiction as well.
For some it sounds like “I feel like gambling, but the last time I felt like gambling, I lost all of my paycheck and I felt miserable. and sick, I worried for a week. I don’t want to lose any more money, I don’t want to feel miserable and sick, I’m saving up for a car and saying no to gambling means I’ll get that car at the end of the year.”
I’ve seen these skills work but ONLY with days and months of practice.
It’s also important to master all of the skills and understand when they are effective:
I use Deep [Breath] as my swiss army knife for low level urges and emotions
Distract [yourself] is useful for when there is a time frame for the urge, such as driving past the usual gambling and drinking spots. For people with porn and gaming problems, sometimes it’s distracting themselves until the start of their sleep ritual or a partner returning home from work.
Delay [then delay] is useful when those urges are lingering and building, and more resistant to stay than usual. Delaying can often release just enough mental pressure that you need to fight the urge.
I personally recommend really practicing Decide [after completing the thought] because it proactively reduces the urge.
The benefit is that you get to productively use all the negative emotion from the adverse consequences that your problem has caused and literally reinforce the lessons you’ve learned from your problematic use.
I’ve had clients say that [Decide] really “beats down the urge” and helps remind them why they are cutting back.
I like to think that skilfully using the negative emotion and memory of a consequence is extracting the maximum utility of your life experience to help you towards a meaningful life and I think that’s one damn good use of negative emotion!