Introduction
Coping Skills is the ability to deal with difficult situations: basically, to manage whatever the world throws at you. Coping skills are the skills that you use to achieve this. It is, therefore, possible to describe a wide range of skills and activities as coping skills. It is also clear that some activities and coping skills may be healthier than others.
Defining Coping Skills
Psychologists define coping skills or coping mechanisms as the conscious thoughts and behaviours used to deal with stressful situations.
“Life Coping skills are things that we can do in-the-moment, when we are feeling lousy, to help us turn down the volume of our emotions and avoid getting overwhelmed.
Coping skills are, therefore, very different from the basic fight or flight responses, which are generally subconscious and instinctive. Coping skills are developed or learned over time, from when we are very small children.
There are four main types of coping mechanisms (see box).
Four types of coping mechanism
Psychologists have defined four types of coping skills or mechanisms:
Problem-focused mechanisms deal with the problem and aim to change it. For example, if you are in a stressful situation at work, problem-focused mechanisms would include looking for a new job or talking to your boss about how to change your situation. In a relationship, you might talk to your partner about the problem, or decide that the only way to address your unhappiness is to split up.
Emotion-focused mechanisms enable you to deal with the emotions caused by the situation. This approach is useful when you either cant or dont want to change the situation, or simply need to calm down before you can deal with it further. These mechanisms include activities like taking exercise, having a hot bath, doing your hobby, positive self-talk, or practising mindfulness. You can also try other relaxation techniques.
Meaning-focused mechanisms are strategies used to understand and derive a meaning from the situation. Examples include seeing the benefits of your situation, for example, what you are learning from it. These are very useful for some people, but others find them much less effective.
Social mechanisms involve asking for help from individuals or the community more widely. They might include, for example, talking to a friend, or seeking professional help.
In any given situation, individuals may choose strategies from one or more of these types.
Your choice of strategy will probably depend on both you and the situation. What you decide is appropriate in one case may not be useful at another time. You may also find that you want to use an emotion-focused mechanism first, to help you calm down, and then move to a problem-focused mechanism to help you to address the problem.
There is also some overlap between the types of mechanism. For example, asking for help could be defined as both a social mechanism and a problem-focused mechanism.
The key with all coping skills is to find what works for you in particular situations.
Reactive and Proactive Coping Skills
Coping skills can be both reactive and proactive.
Reactive coping skills are those that help you to respond to the stress or situation in the moment.
Proactive coping skills help you to avoid meeting the stress or situation in the first place.
There is some evidence that people who prefer to use reactive coping skills are better able to deal with changing situations, and those who develop proactive coping skills prefer calm, settled situations. Generally, proactive coping skills such as planning for change are useful when you are facing predictable situations. When the situation is fast-changing and unpredictable, you need reactive mechanisms.
Healthy and Unhealthy Coping Skills
Coping skills can also be both healthy and unhealthy.
Generally speaking, healthy coping skills are defined as those that help you to either reduce your emotional distress, or deal with the problem. They may be mechanisms that soothe you in some way, or temporarily distract you.
Unhealthy coping skills, by contrast, are those that may help in the short term, but tend to store up problems for the future.
They include:
Drinking or using drugs as a way to numb your feelings. It is painful, but better to work your way through your emotions than use stimulants to avoid them.
Overeating: Comfort eating may seem like a good idea at the time, but becoming overweight is not a solution to anything.
Venting to others: Discussing your painful feelings over and over again may seem to help, but there is considerable evidence that you can get stuck. Sometimes bottling things up can actually be healthierand there is certainly a time to move on.
Avoiding the situation. Distracting yourself is a healthy coping strategybut only for a short time. Continuing to avoid or ignore a problem or stressful situation is not healthy. It is far better to address it.
In children in particular, signs of being unable to cope, or developing unhealthy coping mechanism may include behaviour such as tantrums or, later on, antisocial behaviour. Children are often unable to express their emotions in words and use behaviour instead.
Developing Healthy Coping Skills
There are many ways that you can develop healthy coping skills. These include:
1. Take time to develop some emotion-focused strategies to calm yourself
You will probably find that you have a preference for one strategy or another, especially in certain circumstances. However, it is useful to have a range of skills available. For example:
Spend time developing your ability to live in the moment and appreciate the here and now through mindfulness. Mindfulness techniques can be helpful when you want to avoid worrying about the past or future and simply concentrate on the present.
Learn to manage your inner dialogue so that, at times of stress, it will be positive rather than negative. Depending on where you are starting, it may take some time to start to develop a more positive inner dialogue.
2. Develop the skill of asking for help
This can be one of the most difficult skills to master, and many people never manage it.
Our page on Transactional Analysis gives some ideas about how you can reach out on an Adult to Adult level. This will make this process easier and avoid you feeling like a child asking a parent for help. You may also find our page on asking for help useful.
3. Develop healthy behaviours to give you a head start on dealing with stress. It is a fact that stress is easier to manage if you are mentally and physically healthy.
It is therefore worth developing healthy behaviours such as exercising regularly, and eating a balanced diet. These approaches will set you up for managing and coping more effectively, and help you avoid unhealthy coping behaviours like overeating.
4. Learn to say no, and be more assertive about boundaries between work and home. One way to cope with stress is not to allow yourself to be driven or led into stressful situations. It is not always possible to avoid stress entirelyand nor is that entirely desirable.
However, being able to say no assertively will help you to maintain boundaries and avoid becoming overloaded.
5. Evaluate your coping mechanisms to assess whether they are healthy
Finally, it is a good idea to take time to assess the mechanisms that you use to cope, just to make sure that they are healthy. Useful questions for this assessment include:
Will this enable me to process what is happening and my feelings?
Ultimately, you need your coping strategies to enable you to support this processing, to work through the problem or situation.
Will this help me to deal with the situation, or am I just avoiding it?
Remember that it is fine to avoid a situation for a while, until you have regulated your emotionsbut ultimately, you need to be able to deal with it, and your coping mechanism must support that.
Will this activity avoid or create stress for me or for other people? If you are creating stress for you or others, this will ultimately make the situation worse.
Will this put me or others at risk of any harm? Again, you should not put yourself or others at risk of harm. You may need to be honest with yourself about this, especially if you are tempted by behaviours like substance use.
Can I afford this? So-called retail therapy, for example, can be fun and distracting at the right moment. However, it ceases to be much fun if you go into debt over it, or if you start skipping work or school to go shopping and get into trouble.
Developing Skills -If we want to cope up with the world, we need to develop some skills. Skills like linguistic, managerial, technical, etc. Therefore, to achieve these skills we need to work hard and polish our hidden skills.
Be Happy: We should be happy all the time. It helps to spread positive vibes. Happiness is the life force; it makes us tick. We must be happy at any cost. Thought the road is uneven we must count on our blessings.
Cultivate Emotional Intelligence- We always talk about IQ to progress in life but ignore EQ EQ is important to survive. If we are open to new ideas, able to face emotional sabotage, stay emotionally controlled no matter what the situation be, we can foster courage and cope up and achieve great results.
Take Risks: When we want to turn the gear of our lives for better outcomes. We must not be afraid to take risks. Risk-taking will make you bold and smart.
Make Learning an Ongoing Process- We should always have the zeal to learn new things. This will enhance our skills and knowledge.
Avoid Negative People: There are negative people all around. So, we should stay away from them. This will help us coping up and becoming watchful
Try to Be Hopeful: If we are hopeful and have a positive attitude, we can get whatever we wish. We must strive hard to fulfil our goals. Hope can make fulfil incredible dreams.
Develop Trust: We must dry to develop trust among family and friends and others. When we have trust among people our life becomes easier.
Build Up Confidence: Try to be cool and confident. If we have the key to confidence, we can unlock all doors and soar high in life.
Become Self-Motivated: Try to nurture motivation within. Dont wait for anyone to lift you. You lone can lighten the path.
Seek Help When you need help from someone dont hesitate. Take help from your friends, colleagues to resolve issues.
Dont Be Revengeful Dont let the animosity ruin you. It will only fill your heart with bitterness and harm you in turn. Instead try to, forgive others, it will cleanse our hearts.
Dont Feel Embarrassed: At times you may feel embarrassed if you come across an awkward situation. Dont take it to the heart and move with courage.
Cultivate Good Habits If you follow healthy habits and lead a balanced life you can always cope up in life.
Be Patient Patience can help us to overcome any hurdle in life. If we are patient, we can adopt the best coping strategy.
Be the samein success or failure: Getting too excited in successful events and breaking down in failures can weaken us. If we keep calm during trying times and achieving moments, we can adopt the best coping strategy and it will help us in inner growth.
Be Fearless: It is very important to be fearless because it will help us to remove obstacles and confront problems.
Be Adaptable It is said that survival of the fittest. So we must be adaptable to new surroundings and situations.
The above coping strategies will help us to succeed over others and become a winner.
ASSERTIVE SKILLS
Assertiveness is the quality of being self-assured and confident without being aggressive to defend a right point of view or a relevant statement.
What are assertiveness skills?
Assertiveness skills are communication strategies that allow you to convey information and ideas in an open and direct way while maintaining respect for the people to whom you're speaking.
Assertiveness allows you to explain your claims and decisions in a calm and confident manner. Assertive communication is ideal for many workplace communications because it can help team members resolve issues and create a more positive work environment.
Examples of assertiveness skills
When you're being assertive, you may be able to convey messages or ideas successfully.
Here are some examples of assertiveness skills:
Respect
It's important to be respectful when you're asserting yourself. This means sharing your thoughts and feelings while showing consideration for others. You can offer respect by listening patiently to others' opinions, carefully considering their viewpoints and recognizing the validity of their thoughts, even when they're different from your own.
Honesty
Assertive communication is open and honest, meaning you readily answer questions, offer all relevant information and provide supporting details as requested. This may involve sharing your research with others on your team or offering your opinions when asked.
This also means providing your thoughts when it's appropriate. Honesty and integrity are necessary for direct and accurate communication in the workplace.
Accountability
Being assertive may involve defending your own rights and the rights of others. This can also mean taking personal responsibility for your actions and staying accountable for what you've said or done. For instance, you may tell others when a workplace error results from your miscalculations, then lead the team's efforts to remedy the issue.
Self-control
Self-control allows you to maintain assertiveness in a calm and respectful way. Having self-control can help you communicate your thoughts while remaining aware of other people's feelings and reactions. When confronted with an unhappy client, for example, self-control can enable you to respond patiently and politely so that you can resolve the issue in the best way possible.
How to improve assertiveness skills
Assertiveness skills can equip employees to communicate clearly and maintain positive professional relationships with those around them. Here are some steps you can take to develop your assertiveness skills:
1. Assess your personal communication style
To improve your assertiveness, start by assessing your current style of communication. Consider whether you express yourself openly at work and whether you offer and accept feedback often. Recognizing opportunities for improvement can help you determine where or when to practice being more assertive.
2. Practice your delivery
It's helpful to practice important communications ahead of time with a friend or coworker to make sure your message is both direct and respectful. You can ask for feedback to improve your delivery for future interactions. Practicing common interactions may prepare you to respond effectively when you face them at work.
3. Share your thoughts
It's important to provide your opinions and ideas openly so you're contributing to workplace discussions. When you have a thought or proposal that you believe could be useful, consider sharing it with your coworkers or managers. This can help you develop the confidence to share your viewpoint more regularly
4. Maintain control of your emotions
Try to stay calm during confrontations by practicing even breathing and keeping your voice steady. You can also implement stress management techniques outside of work, such as regular workouts, meditation or journaling, to help you maintain a peaceful demeanor. Controlling your emotions can lead to more productive conversations in which everyone can share their ideas freely.
Passive, Aggressive and Assertive
Assertiveness is often seen as the balance point between passive and aggressive behaviour, but its probably easier to think of the three as points of a triangle.
Being Assertive
Being assertive involves taking into consideration your own and other peoples rights, wishes, wants, needs and desires.
Assertiveness means encouraging others to be open and honest about their views, wishes and feelings, so that both parties act appropriately.
Assertive behaviour includes:
Being open in expressing wishes, thoughts and feelings and encouraging others to do likewise.
Listening to the views of others and responding appropriately, whether in agreement with those views or not. See our page on Active Listening.
Accepting responsibilities and being able to delegate to others. See our page on Delegation Skills for more.
Regularly expressing appreciation of others for what they have done or are doing. See our page on Gratitude and Being Grateful.
Being able to admit to mistakes and apologise.
Maintaining self-control. See our page on Self-Control for more.
Behaving as an equal to others.
Some people may struggle to behave assertively for a number of reasons, and find that they behave either aggressively or passively instead.
Being Passive
Responding in a passive or non-assertive way tends to mean compliance with the wishes of others and can undermine individual rights and self-confidence.
Many people adopt a passive response because they have a strong need to be liked by others. Such people do not regard themselves as equals because they place greater weight on the rights, wishes and feelings of others. Being passive results in failure to communicate thoughts or feelings and results in people doing things they really do not want to do in the hope that they might please others. This also means that they allow others to take responsibility, to lead and make decisions for them.
Being Aggressive
By being aggressive towards someone else, their rights and self-esteem are undermined.
Aggressive behaviour fails to consider the views or feelings of other individuals. Those behaving aggressively will rarely show praise or appreciation of others and an aggressive response tends to put others down. Aggressive responses encourage the other person to respond in a non-assertive way, either aggressively or passively.
There is a wide range of aggressive behaviours, including rushing someone unnecessarily, telling rather than asking, ignoring someone, or not considering another's feelings.
Good interpersonal skills mean you need to be aware of the different ways of communicating and the different response each approach might provoke. The use of either passive or aggressive behaviour in interpersonal relationships can have undesirable consequences for those you are communicating with and it may well hinder positive moves forward.
Conclusion
Developing healthy coping skills is very much a matter of right time, right place.
It is worth experimenting with a wide range of techniques and approaches, so that when the time comes, you have the right technique in your toolbox.
On the other hand, Being assertive involves taking into consideration your own and other peoples rights, wishes, wants, needs and desires.
Some people may struggle to behave assertively for a number of reasons, and find that they behave either aggressively or passively instead.
REFERENCE:
https://www.verywellmind.com/forty-healthy-coping-skills- 4586742
https://www.infinitemindcare.com/single-post/2016/12/18/A-List-of-Coping-Skills-for-Anger-Anxiety-and-Depression.
https://www.skillsyouneed.com/ps/assertiveness.html
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