ABSTRACT
A particular cognitive skill known as "compartmentalization" involves the ability to separate elements of experience effectively. This skill can serve a person in many ways. It means, for example, that in your relationship with yourself, you are able to separate your thoughts from your feelings. Or, that you are able to separate your impulses from your actions, or that you are able to separate your personal life from your professional life. By establishing definite boundaries that clearly define each part of who you are, you are better able to choose which part of yourself you are going to respond to in a particular situation. If you think about the kinds of problems that you experience or see other people experience, so often it's because the person tends to get wrapped up in an element of experience that works against him or her. Consider, as an example, the person who is going to get on an airplane to travel somewhere and then starts generating terrible and detailed images of plane crashes in his or her mind. That's not the most useful image to focus on at that particular moment. The fact that a person has the images isn't so much the problem. Most people will consider the negative possibilities to some extent (if only because they are required to as the flight attendant reviews emergency procedures prior to departure), but they differ in how much they'll focus on them and amplify them.
