The Problem with "Calm Down": Rethinking Regulation Through Energy Instead of Emotion

In this session, Dr. Jacquelyn Fede and Dr. Amy Laurent, the team behind Autism Level Up, join host Greg Santucci to talk about energy, and how to help kids find the right energy for the moment they are in. Jacquelyn is an autistic advocate and developmental psychologist, and Amy is a developmental psychologist, occupational therapist, and co-author of the SCERTS Model.

They share how a personal regulation crisis led them to shift the conversation from emotions to energy, an approach that is concrete, observable, and accessible to people for whom emotion words have never quite landed. Together with Greg, they walk through the energy meter and how to adapt it, why every energy level has a place in the day, and how to build a classroom culture where different bodies and different needs are simply the norm. They are candid about assumptions, about meeting teachers where they are, and about writing goals and plans that start from what a learner actually wants and needs.

Educators, therapists, and parents will come away with practical tools for noticing and shifting energy, language for talking about regulation without forcing an emotion label, and a way of thinking about capacity that stretches across the whole day. Grounded in developmental research and in Jacquelyn and Amy's lived and clinical experience, this session offers a hopeful, usable path toward regulation that works with real bodies rather than against them.