Dealing With Stress
What is coping ability?
Coping ability is the way that we actually handle situations. It's really simple, its like how do you cope? You need to develop a whole range of strategies, and the first one is: know yourself. We all package our stress differently. So for example, I know if I get over tired or if I'm not too well or if I'm doing a bit more than I really should have been doing, because my family has a predisposition towards eczema, I will get tiny little bits of eczema at the back of my ears. Now, I don't have to wait until my whole head is broken out with it to recognize that, yes, I've got a little bit, I'm probably over tired, and let's do something about it. So I recommend that people look for their early warning signals and every one has one. Whether its been a bit more clumsy or a bit more forgetful; learn those. Once you understand what your early warning signals are, you can take corrective action.
What can affect our coping ability?
The kinds of things that tend to affect coping ability for individuals include simply not recognizing that something's going wrong. I mean, most of us rush around thinking it's our fault, saying, "I should be able to do this, I should be able to do that." Stop! Analyze what you're doing, work out if it's actually feasible, and if it isn't feasible then put an action plan in place. Talk to people, get some help. Everyone says, "Oh, I couldn't possibly do that," and they do a lot of what we call 'mind-reading.' So they'll already have written the script in their head without ever asking the other person in the first place. So that's one of the things that you have to do, you have to learn to ask for help.
Why can some people cope more effectively?
Where are we most likely to experience stress?
Most people experience stress in their work life, so, twenty-four seven lifestyle, lots of demands, you might have the sort of job where you're constantly on the go all the time and there just don't seem to be enough hours in the day. So work is certainly an area that people experience stress. But of course, your personal life can have stress too. You know, relationships end, or you might be moving house. I mean, we know, for example, that moving house is one of the most stressful life experiences that you can have. You might get that great promotion and you think its wonderful, trouble is it's on the other side of the country. So great you've got this new job but you've also left all your friends and your family behind you. So there's lots of different ways both in your personal life and in your professional life that you can experience stress.
How do I deal with stress at work?
If you want to deal with stress at work, the first thing you have to do, is to stand back from your situation. Write out a list of all the things you do, all the things you enjoy, and all the things that are difficult for you. Work out why you're having a problem. So is it, for example, just to much work. Now if that is the key, you need to go back to your manager and you need to actually have itemized this. Explain what the difficulty is and give him or her the problem because that's what they're paid for. If you're actually saying look we need to get this amount of reporting done a week, however, physically it is only possible to get this amount done, then your managers job is to look at that and work out how to deal with the other part that can't be done. It's not your problem. Now supposing your the manager will say " What do I do about it?" You take it to your manager because what most of us tend do is we think its our fault and organizations these days under health and safety are obliged to look after the emotional and psychological well fair of their employees. So, if the organization is asking more than is reasonable, it actually has a legal duty to take care of that, and I think we have to remember that but they won't know that if what you do is put the brave face on until you can't cope any more and then you are off sick because that is basically down to you not saying what's wrong.
How do I deal with stress at home?
How do I learn to say 'No'?
The people who are life's pleasers, in other words, all they ever want to do is have people think well of them and always say yes to something, are prime candidates for stress. It is a very simple thing, and if you imagine yourself wearing a doormat, what you've got on it is "Welcome", and if you do that people will take advantage of it. They don't mean to do that, but if you are smiling all the time, "Yes, that's no problem", etcetera, please don't be surprised if people take advantage. So the first thing you have to do is to learn to say "No", a simple word, but with which lots of people have problems. So really it's assertiveness training. One of the things you have to do when you want to say no is realise first of all, if you've trained yourself always to say yes it will be out of your mouth before you know what to do. So the first thing you do is develop the ability to say, "Just let me think about that and I'll ring you back in five minutes", or even, "I've just got to go to the loo, I'll be back in a minute," anything to get you out of that situation so you can stop. When you stop you then think, "Do I really want to do this and can I do this?" And if the answer is yes, great, say yes. But if the answer is, "Well no, I don't really want to do it," or, "I haven't got the time to do it," the next step is to formulate the response. One of the ways you can do that is always acknowledge something the other person said, for example, "I know you'd really like me to help you on Friday", so that's the first thing - you have said it in a sentence. You then use a link word like "however", "alternatively", or "on the other hand". Say "I know you'd really like me to help you on Friday, however...", and then you say what you think or feel. So that would be something like, "However I am afraid I am running around on Friday and I'm not going to get back until really late." So that's where you put the reason that you like for this. Now, if you want to, because it is something that you would like to help with but you can't, you can use an "and", and say "and, I tell you what, if we did it on Saturday I'd be more than happy to help". If the answer is no because you really don't want to do it, you just stop there, so it's like, "Oh, I really appreciate it that you would like me to help you on Friday however unfortunately I'm running around all day and I just won't be able to help you this time." And then you stop, you do not justify it, you stop at that point. You equally remember the breathing exercises, so it is a deep breath in and calm down. The other thing is you have to remember you have a right to say no, so if you don't want to be a doormat you have to help yourself, and that means you have to believe you have the right, and then you simply say no and you use the three stages that I've mentioned.
