Routines are useful to provide a sense of familiarity, as we mentioned last week. They can also be used as cues to help us do the right thing at the right time. Once a routine, or a habit is established, our brain can put that activity on autopilot, so that it is easier for us to do it without …
Coping with Change and Uncertainty
The year 2020 brought events and situations that none of us could have anticipated. Dealing with change and uncertainty is often difficult, and we have had a year like no other full of changes and unknowns. Studies have documented the profound effect of the pandemic on mental health and offered …
Resiliency and Flexibility
When it comes to coping with life’s challenges, resiliency and flexibility have some things in common. One of the dictionary definitions of resilience is the ability of a material to return to its original shape and size after being compressed or deformed. Hard, inflexible material has little …
Coping with a Pushy Person
Seriously pushy people are called bullies. You can probably imagine the tough kid on the playground, literally pushing people around. Most pushy people we interact with are boundary-pushers—people-pushers in the figurative sense. They are trespassers who do not recognize or do not respect …
Gratitude
The Thanksgiving holiday is a time when we typically think about all we have to be thankful for: family, friends, plenty, etc. But did you know that the simple act of frequently noting a few things we are grateful for can be a significant mood-booster? When we adopt gratitude as an everyday mindset, …
Forgiveness
Forgiveness is something we do for ourselves. Forgiving ourselves, first of all, and then others if we choose to, allows us to set aside the weight of hurt, anger, resentment and shame that weighs us down when we have felt hurt or wronged in some way. We can even build up resentment by not taking …
Resentment
Just as life often holds scrapes, breaks, strains, and accidents which affect our bodies, so our emotional lives and relationships often hit bumps. Sometimes cracks appear, which need to be mended. Sometimes walls are erected which keep us from communicating and furthering a relationship. Sometimes …
Group Problem Solving
If you are in a situation where several people need to decide something or come up with a plan, there’s a strategy that can help things flow smoothly while giving everyone a voice. It works like this: Use a notebook to record the details and …
Relationship Skills
Relationships can be enjoyable and helpful, or stressful, and are almost always some combination of both. Relationships take work. Being more skillful is like sharpening a cutting edge – the work is easier, and we are not working as hard to get the results we want. Being skillful in our …
Mindfulness
What is mindfulness? Mindfulness is the practice of bringing our awareness to the present moment, without judgment. We are usually taken up with our thoughts and feelings and reacting to them as we think and feel them. Mindfulness is a way of being in the present and simply observing ourselves. …
Practically Positive
The term “positive thinking” has been in our vocabulary for a while and has come to represent different things—everything from always having a smile, seeing the silver lining in every cloud, to the “think and ye shall receive” mindset. Aside from all the hype, though, research has shown many …
A Safe Place
One useful coping skill during times of stress is having a “safe place” we can go to whenever we need to. All we have to do is close our eyes and imagine ourselves there. Because of the way our brain works, imagining ourselves in that place can have the same effect on us as being there in …
Personal Space
In a previous post about boundaries, we mentioned how we use expressions about physical boundaries to apply to emotional boundaries: “He gets under my skin” or “Keeping someone at arm’s length.” The term Personal Space usually refers to physical space, but it can also mean an appropriate emotional …
Personal Narratives
Narratives: what are they? A narrative is a spoken or written account of events or a story. A personal narrative is a story we can express to ourselves or someone else about ourselves. There are several kinds and sizes of narratives—from our daily inner dialog, to our belief system and way of …
Self-reflective Questions
In a previous post we wrote about Self-Awareness. One way to get personal with coping skills is to get to know yourself better! If you are interested in life skills, and are reading these words, chances are you are interested in improving yourself or your life. Do you have a vague sense that things …
Personal Dialogue and PACE
Many people have an active monologue or dialogue going on in their thoughts – a monologue or dialogue with themselves. It can be a conversation that is well worth paying more attention to. Often, we don’t realize that changing what we say to ourselves, or how we say it can have a big impact on our …
A Personal Book
A personal book can take many forms—from a timeline or journal to a goal tracker, workbook, or picture book. It can also be used to write about thoughts and feelings or as a narrative about the past. They all have in common that they are about you, by you, for you and belong to you. They are all a …
Getting Personal with Coping Skills
Introducing some personal, close-to-home coping skills into our lives has serious advantages. With ourselves, we are operating in our sphere of influence. We can waste a lot of time trying to control others and be none the better for it. Even if we hope to contribute to world peace, the only …