My Dialectical Behavioral Therapy
skills mentor Charles Holton introduced me to a sneaky deep tool I use daily. He
wrote on a white board the words ‘dolphins!’ and ‘rhinoceros.’ He drew circles
around each, a line through ‘rhinoceros’, and then an arrow pointing at
‘dolphins!’ He said, “It’s easier to think about dolphins than to not think
about rhinoceroses.” (He contends that it was polar bears and dolphins, and I remember it differently. Ah, human memory…)
The idea here is that it’s easier to
direct one’s brain toward something than away from something. When I get caught
in a cul-de-sac of thinking and notice it feels yucky or stuck or I need a
break, I use ‘dolphins’ as a trigger, especially in my journaling, to remind
myself to return to something positive.
A common phrase when I go off on
uncomfortable tangents is: ‘circling back, this time with more dolphins…’ Other
variants: ‘dolphinology,’ ‘so, how about those dolphins?’ ‘how can I dolphin this?’
Sometimes I’ll imagine, and describe in detail, swimming with dolphins.
Some metaphors and symbols really
work well for me, especially the more I like and use them. This is one of the
ways I can consciously develop/program positive triggers, like a song that
might lift my mood, or that I listen to when I do a compassion meditation (see
my post on compassion for a description of the ‘tonglen’ practice I use) to help prompt the feeling. Everyone is different, so substitute whatever positive thing you find it easy and desirable to visualize or thing about for ‘dolphin’ and give it a whirl. Brain hacking!
Sometimes it can be hard to
‘dolphin’ myself out of something pervasively negative, particularly if it’s a
problem that really needs validation and action to address it, rather than
being ignored. Approaching it from a more ‘where can I find the dolphins in
this situation?’ can be useful, or at least provide some needed respite.
This is one of the ways I look for
to make things easier, to introduce more positivity even into the really
distressing tasks and places in life. Not to take away from the seriousness of
the situation or invalidate my pain, but to make it easier on myself and get
through it. It’s helpful for me to have a choice when I get stuck in a moment,
a feeling, a thought, that sucks, and fighting it just makes it worse.
