  We present an interaction scheme to control counter-rotating terms in the
quantum Rabi model. We show that by applying a sequence of $\pi/2$ phase kicks
to a two-level atom and a single mode quantized field, the natural dynamics of
the Rabi model can be interrupted in a way that counter-rotating transitions
can be significantly enhanced. This is achieved by a suitable timing of the
phase kicks determined by a phase matching condition. If the time between
successive kicks is sufficiently short, our scheme is turned into a dynamical
decoupling problem in which the effects of counter-rotating terms can be
strongly suppressed under ultrastrong coupling.
