De-Escalate: Learn How to Calm an Angry Person in 90 Seconds or Less

Edward G.: Good read on a lifetime of experience and study. It delves into work and family experiences that are helpful in dealing with upset people.

United States on Jul 03, 2023

Inday Fritz: This book is completely unrealistic. In a perfect world validing someone’s feelings they will agree with “yeah!” like in the book. Sure validating someone’s feelings is a good way to deescalte, but the way this book suggests you do it is a great way to escalate somebody even more by parroting how they feel and reminding them how crap their lives are

Australia on Mar 24, 2023

Catherine N: I’ve tried applying these techniques on the job (Correctional Officer) with, for the most part, positive results. Techniques are easily adapted to multiple work/home settings and situations.
Definitely added to my verbal de-escalation toolbox.

Canada on Oct 05, 2021

Bella: I was introduced to this book by a parent’s group, following advice on how to deal with very volatile children.

I decided to buy it because I also run workshops teaching people to handle situations where people are hostile or aggressive, and I though it might give some helpful advice for both situations. I was totally unprepared for how straight-forward and insightful this book would be. It is easily the most useful method of dealing with aggression that I’ve seen. The book is really clear, and the concept is incredibly simple; so simple you think it can’t possibly work. But it does.

He spends chapters adding detail about how to use this method in different situations and where it can be applied effectively, but like all methods that talk to subconscious reactions it mostly takes practice to use the method. The language might need to be modified - some of the situations and the ways that he approaches them wouldn’t work so well in the UK, where people interact a little differently. I use the same method and modify the words.

The first time I tried it I thought the other person would be furious that I was trying to psycho-analyse them. They were not....

United Kingdom on Oct 01, 2019

Kevin Crenshaw: I've faced pretty intense situations as an interim executive and change-agent-when-its-hard. This book holds the key to succeeding when it's toughest. It's earned a permanent place on my bookshelf.

The first key should have been obvious but it wasn't: never, ever reason with someone who is upset. "You can't reach the mind until you calm the heart" (from Neverboss, mine). Agitated people are like riders on rampaging elephants (to borrow the analogy from Switch by Heath/Heath). First calm the heart (elephant), then you can reach the mind (rider). Otherwise, you just get trampled.

FIRST de-escalate, THEN reason or negotiate. But HOW exactly do you calm a rampaging elephant?

This book has the brilliantly simple answer. It works immediately, and it's fully compatible with Never Split the Difference (Voss)—another book that's earned a permanent place on my bookshelf.

You don't even need to read this entire book to start putting it to use. But you'll want to. :)

United States on Jul 08, 2019

Chris T.: This book helped me increase my awareness, and use simple steps/responses to be able to handle conflict/ emotional confrontations. Simple guide that everyone can and would use as a life skill with family, friends and strangers.
Real world stuff that you are practicing after only a few pages and wanting more.
Hats off to Doug for dedicating his time to those in most need, at the prison and those not at peace.
I also read his book Elusive Peace, so relative to today’s need in politics and life.... taking the time to build the relationship to gain trust so peace has a chance. Should be reading for every child or American. Thank you.

United States on Jan 18, 2019

Adequatehuman: This taught me some de-escalation techniques I wasn't aware of and also made me cognizant of my own shortcomings as a communicator. I didn't know that people must be able to name their emotions before they can turn off their "anger switch", and that some people are incapable of naming emotions because they weren't taught to as children (cough cough TOXIC MASCULINITY FTW) and are therefore purely reactive. I've used this on my kids and also on some complete strange kids who were about to get into a fight. Haven't tried it in any political arguments, LOL. This book has also completely shown me how arguments on Facebook will never come to any good, because people can't turn off that anger switch in an online forum as easily.

United States on Apr 27, 2018

Joy: So the scientific research keeps telling us that people don't change their minds based on facts. Removing facts from the arsenal of the fact-based community is like regulating AR-15s for 2nd Amendment rights advocates. What exactly are we supposed to do if we can't make evidence-based arguments?!

Here is my hypothesis: People cannot be swayed by facts UNTIL their emotions are heard and calmed. If we first de-escalate the emotions, we may then be able to create a safe space in which facts /can/ be heard.

This book offers a strategy for doing this along with many examples in varying environments from relationships, to work, to kids. The author claims this is a simple and easy skill to learn and use, but to be honest it looks like ninja warrior emotional jiu-jitsu to me. "Affect labeling" requires the "emotional granularity" to first hear the most likely emotions in a person's tone of voice. This requires having a decent list of emotions you can recognize and label. Second, and far more difficult, you then have to be able to step back and in the moment infer possible reasonable root causes for those emotions.

However, I think it is valuable to work on developing...

United States on Feb 26, 2018

Staedler: Out of all the books that exist out there on the subject of self-help through awareness and understanding of the self, there is none better than this one. This is because it tackles the most fundamental problem. In the West, we typically have no idea of the emotional landscape we are in, preferring to suppress and invalidate our own emotions and the emotions of others. This ignorance is pandemic. Typically, for anything you do, emotions motivates this physical action, then conscious awareness finally arrives at the end to justify the actions taken driven by emotion in self-talk. Hence, the decisions made by most everyone are rooted in their foundations of emotional instability and not in cogent appraisal. It's why things are the way they are - urgent action needs to be taken en masse. This book educates in the most direct way in which to tackle this problem. The techniques are revolutionary. The story of their development through the "Peace Prisons" is inspirational. This is a work that nobody should be without as the tools here make critical foundational changes and expand perception. Essential reading for anyone and everyone.

United Kingdom on Dec 05, 2017

J.V.Ouellette: Very instructive for peoples that deal with Angry peoples

Canada on Nov 13, 2017