How to Pass Your Own Stress Test during the Hard Times without being a Bank

2009-05-08T01:27:00.000-07:00

So the governments are giving the banks stress tests? What about us? This is as if material things are more important than us--is there any love here? One wonders. You may also be wondering where your next meal will be coming from, or whether you will get another job…

And you may not be sure whether you will get the custody of your child if you have just received a divorce notice. Then, this usually forgotten one (but equally important): you may have just been rejected by a loved one or a prospective love.

Such may be the diversity of the issues that you may feel boxed into at the moment--and you may be shy to seek help (not all of us go about cleaning our linen in the public)…

The bottom line of all this is that no single government may have offered you the stress test and least likely is a confidential one. In this situation you may be better off turning to the following strategies:

1. Turn to the Social Readjustment scale:

Scientists (they seem to care more) have developed an approach which assesses the effects of stressors according to life changes or events in our lives. On this scale, your crisis can be scored from zero to hundred depending on its rating. The more crises you are in the more the score. An additive score of 300 and above requires professional help.

2. Use the Burn out scale:

You may already be displaying signs and symptoms of stress but you may not realize their significance. This is understandable because most of the signs and symptoms are common for many other ailments including 'flu' (a sensitive area that we will not touch today). Such symptoms can be rated on the so-called Burn Out scale, thanks to the above guys once again.

3. Take Personality Tests:

Some personalities are known to deal with stressors more effectively than others--and understandably so. So finding out what your exact personality actually is will help you know where you stand. Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom…Tao Te Ching. One such test can be found at www.personality100.com if a psychologist is hard to come by.

Taking these tests is only a beginning. When we take tests, all of us want to pass. Passing these tests will mean that we deal with our stressors more effectively prior to these tests. One sure way is to engage in the following techniques:

4. Intellectualization

If you sit down and figure out your real problems, you will you will be better able to deal with your crisis. Instead of using emotion, be objective to calculate the issues at hand. This is known as intellectualization. Sit down, get a pen and jot some notes--make some divisions, subtractions and multiplications and additions. You may just solve the jig-saw puzzle. This way, you will be better able to cope with your stress meaning that you will be better able to score high on the tests.

5. Rationalization:

Rationalization may then need to be engaged, here you may have to re-adjust your thoughts and believes about life. You may have to come to terms with things you previously never considered highly. And those you believed in may have to be dropped altogether--that's life. This means that you will need to come up with plausible justifications for your new approach in life to convince yourself. This is called rationalization.

6. Modify Diet.

There are many other techniques available but for quick help we will limit ourselves to a few which must include dietary modifications. Foods containing caffeine must be avoided. Many of theses are popular including coffee, coke and chocolate and it may be hard to change. Alcohol and tobacco are obvious taboos in stress management.

All theses strategies and many more are conveniently explained in the concise and interactive book, 7 Proven Steps: How to Defeat Stress without Going through the Embarrassment of Counseling, available on Amazon and other major bookstores.

About the Author

Joe Theu M.D.,is a contributor to the Stress Management Today Newsletter and author of the book '7 Proven Steps: How to defeat Stress Without Going through the Embarrassment of Counseling'.

The Quickest Way to Cope with the Embarrassment of Job Loss, Foreclosure, and Bankruptcy Stress

2009-03-21T08:15:00.000-07:00

By Joe Theu

Friends,

I got a troubling text from a friend the other day. He wrote me a message saying he needed help dealing with the people. So I asked him: “whch pple?”

“Jst evryone,” he texted me back. Confused, I asked for more details, “why everyone?”

He replied, “please call back.” I hesitated, but remembering my obligations, I decided to call back—I mean I am supposed to be a friend, a counselor, a consultant, a doctor . . .

Here was his story--at least his side of it:

First, he apologized for sending me a “please call back.” He said he could not afford airtime to call me himself because of the downward spiral his life was now in . . .

He said that his problems started with rumors that there would be lay-offs at work. He said his first mistake was NOT sharing these rumors, which puzzled me because I believe that gossip or rumor mongering is bad. But he explained that he should have shared the rumors with his wife and family. Why? Friends, because the rumors quickly turned into grim reality . . .

He was retrenched. As a result, he couldn’t pay his mortgage. In a matter of weeks, he got a foreclosure notice, and so the spiral went on . . .

But he soon realized these were far from his biggest problems. First were feelings of blame. It took him days to disclose to his family that he had received the dreaded letter at work, so when the foreclosure notice came this week, his family was shocked. They hadn’t had a chance to absorb the news of his job loss.

Now he’s confronted with feelings of shame—he is so embarrassed, he can’t face the public. So when he came to me the other day, he needed help dealing with the people first: his family and the rest of us.

The whole world is in financial turmoil—not just the people on Wall Street. And while news of this drama was playing out on the news, my friend was busy watching sports on pay-per-view—now he’s another statistic. The truth is people often feel like they are different and somehow immune to the hard facts of the recession.

For anyone facing bankruptcy, foreclosure, or job loss, facing the people (both family and the community) can be the most difficult challenge. In situations like these, people feel embarrassed, overwhelmed, and unsure how to answer all the questions that inevitably come. But there are things you can do to overcome this challenge. Here are my suggestions.

1. Determine the REAL Problem

Firstly (ideally in the first few days), anyone facing a situation like this should engage in intellectualization to find out what his or her main problem really is. When my friend explained his problem, I immediately thought he was missing the point. What do you think?

2. Quantify the Problem

When I talked to my friend, I told him he should quantify his problem. One sure way to accomplish this is to look at how this crisis in his life measures on the Social Readjustment Rating Scale found in many psychology and stress books. On this scale, your crisis is given a score based on how much it would affect your life. This score is based on studies that were done around the world on people in similar situations and was shown to be a reliable and consistent way to measure human social crisis.

3. Determine Your Assets, and Use Them

The next step is to capitalize and build on your personality. I told my friend he could take a quick but detailed test available on www.personality100.com. This could help him recognize his strengths as a person, which he could use to fight any obstacles on his way to recovery.

4. Address Your Feelings

He should certainly practice repression; this should take care of his feelings of shame. This strategy allows you to be less clouded in your thinking so that rational thinking guides your decisions. Again, most psychology and well-written stress books should have a good explanation on how to employ this tactic.

5. Make a Plan

And last but not least, anyone facing job loss, bankruptcy, or foreclosure should resort to regression and craft short-term and long-term life goals. Making a plan, and taking action to execute it, will leave you feeling empowered with solutions, instead of trapped by complications.

Coping with Your Financial Stress

Financial problems may feel like the end of the world, but they really aren’t. If you find yourself in a problematic situation like my friend, you can use these five steps to overcome embarrassment and put your life on a new path to success!

About the Author

Joe Theu, M.D., is the author of the book: 7 Proven Steps: How to Defeat Stress without Going through the Embarrassment of Counseling, which describes these strategies well. The book is available on www.amazon.com and other major bookstores. If you’d like more information about how to cope with stress and about all these psychology strategies, visit www.conciseinteractiveseries.com.

Feel free to discuss on our blog.

manage your life crisis stress during recession

How to Pass Your Own Stress Test during the Hard Times without being a Bank

The Quickest Way to Cope with the Embarrassment of Job Loss, Foreclosure, and Bankruptcy Stress