Coping in a Fast-Paced World
Dr.Craig Nathanson
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Stress
- Reduces the national economy by $500 billion
- Leaves almost half of all adults with health problems
- Causes between 60% and 80% of industrial accidents
- In the workplace, stress is primarily caused by incompetent management
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People Who Experience Stress…
- selectively perceive information
- fixate on a single approach to a problem
- adopt a crisis mentality
- consult and listen to others less
- rely on old habits
- are less able to generate creative thoughts
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Stress
- What is stress?
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Stress
- Has there been an increase in stress in people’s lives?
- Change ambiguity uncertainty
- Pressure time, workload, expectations
- Changes in organizational in Work structure, nature of work, technology
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When Is Stress Bad?
- When the imbalance can’t be resolved
- role conflict
- role ambiguity
- When the stress is long-term
- burn-out syndrome
- When the individual’s stress reaction is ineffective
- coping that “numbs” the experience of stress
- coping that doesn’t change the situation
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Reactions to Stress
- Alarm
- increase in anxiety, fear, sorrow or loss
- Resistance
- attempt to control stress using defense mechanisms
- Exhaustion
- stop trying to defend against stress; stress related pathology occurs in this stage
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Stress and the Individual
- Assumption: Stress is something one does to oneself
- stress is internally generated by worry, doubt, anxiety
- some individuals experience stress as a chronic state, or generate stressful experiences
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Stress as a Person/Situation Interaction
- Assumption: Events trigger stress, but people respond to stress differently
- Resiliency factors moderate stress
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Stressors
Reaction
Resiliency
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Personal Characteristics Influencing Stress
- Hardiness:
- commitment, challenge, internal locus of control
- Physiological resiliency:
- cardiovascular health, dietary control, rest
- Social Support:
- close emotional ties, common experiences, supportive interactions, mentors, teams
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Managing Your Own Stress
- Recognize and observe your own stress reactions (e.g. irritability, muscle tightness, fatigue, sleep disorder, distractibility, confusion, etc.
- Learn to reframe
- Do you realize that
- Isn’t it great that
- Events can trigger but it’s the meaning we place on the words or event which causes the stress
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Developing Resiliency
- Some stressors will not go away
- Resiliency increases capacity to withstand negative effects of stress
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Managing Your Own Stress (cont.)
- Take care of yourself
- balance your life, align what’s most important to you…
- build physical resiliency through exercise, diet and rest
- build psychological resiliency through hardiness, small wins, and relaxation
- process and integrate thoughts and feelings through writing and spiritual activities
- build social resiliency by developing supportive relationships
- Great example of what you can do
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The Ten slices of life (Nathanson)
- Study (education)
- Health (sleep/exercise)
- Community(volunteer)
- Wage(primary job)
- Family(time with family)
- Home(duties at home)
- Fee(what you can sell)
- Hobby(spare time)
- Leisure(doing nothing)
- Mind(brain work)
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The Ten slices of life cont.
- Add up the available hours in a month (672)
- Figure out the hours and % for each category
- Look at where you spend your time now
- Look at where you plan to spend your time 5 years from now?
- Observations?
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Managing Your Own Stress (cont.)
- Align your goals with what you prize the most
- Create 3-5 five year, < one year and daily goals which align to what you prize the most
- Follow your vocational passion
- Your perfect day! Talk about it
- Laugh at yourself
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Group exercise
What do you do as a way to relieve stress?
As a result of this discussion, what new healthy ideas might you use to relieve stress?
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Summary
- Stress is always present
- The challenge is how you deal with it
- How you recognize it
- How you react to it
- How prepared you are for it
- What you do to deal with it and lower your reaction to it
- The good news is the strategies you use are up to you
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