Mental Health Coping Skills

Friday, October 10th was World Mental Health Day which is a great reminder to take care of yourself.

Coping skills help you tolerate, minimize, and deal with stressful situations in life. Managing your stress/anxiety will help you feel better physically and psychologically, and it can impact your ability to perform your best.

When you’re feeling distressed, ask yourself, "Do I need to change my situation, or do I need to find a way to better cope with the situation?”

Problem-based coping is helpful when you need to change your situation, perhaps by removing a stressful thing from your life. For example, if you’re in an unhealthy relationship, your anxiety and sadness might be best resolved by ending the relationship (as opposed to soothing your emotions). If you can’t end it, setting up boundaries and limitations

Emotion-based coping is helpful when you need to take care of your feelings when you either don’t want to change your situation or when circumstances are out of your control. For example, if you are grieving the loss of a loved one, it’d be important to take care of your feelings in a healthy way (since you can’t change the circumstance).

Be mindful of unhealthy coping such as drugs/alcohol, using food as a coping strategy, overspending, etc.

Have healthy coping skills such as boundaries/limitations, having a good support system, selfcare, making sure your basic needs are met, mindfulness, etc.

For more information, please visit www.dianelang.org