The importance of coping strategies when dealing with stress
“The cure for pain is in the pain,”
a quote that I read somewhere and got stuck in my mind. In fact, I believe it holds a powerful message about self-exploration, reflection and growth mindset. Bottomline is: there are no shortcuts to a balanced life.
Overwhelmed? Stressed? Cannot cope?
We all struggle at some point in life. There are moments we might feel we cannot make it orwill not make it through. Either when a relationship breaks down, we fail on a course, do not get the promotion we worked for or something else; as a matter of fact, we all hurt. Through life, we all encounter a number of challenges and situations we find hard to endure. While going through them, we try to avoid or get rid of difficult thoughts and feelings. Pain is no fun.
Coping (or not) depends in your current headspace and mindset.
Stress, which can be projected through an emotional or physical tension, arises from how you intepret life’s happenings as they take place. When reaching unbearable levels, we might avoiding the situation as an escape. This is called: avoidance coping.
Avoidance coping — also known as avoidant coping, avoidance behaviors, and escape coping — is a maladaptive form of coping in which a person changes their behavior to avoid thinking about, feeling, or doing difficult things (Very Well Mind, 2020).
Avoidance coping involves dodging the conflict rather than confronting the situation. While avoiding stress might seem like a solution to become less stressed it does have always that effect. More often than not, confronting a problem or dealing with the source of stress is the only way to effectively reduce the stress it causes.
Strive for “stress management” rather than “stress avoidance”.
We cannot always avoid stress, but we can manage it with effective coping techniques.
Identifying avoidance coping with: D.O.T.S.
D: distractions
O: opting out
T: thinking your way out
S: substance abuse or self-harm
Each one of these leters represent various avoiding categories we can fall into:
D — Distraction: what do you do to distract yourself from a conflict or stressful situation? (e.g. binge viewing Netflix, infinite scrolling on social media, reading, playing computer games, do sport, gardening, gambling, among others.)
O — Opting out: what important and meaningful things do you avoid, quit, procrastinate, escape or withdraw from? (e.g. it can be either tasks, activities, events or people.) Remember: Non-important and meaningless things can be opted-out and that is alright.
T— Thinking strategies: how do you to think your way out from hurting? (e.g.: some strategies with negative connocations are worrying, dwelling on the past or fantasising about the future, thinking of ‘what-if’ scenarios, imagining escape or revenge scenarios, ‘thinking something is not fair, blaming yourself, others, or the world. Positive thinking or affirmations are also considered negative thinking strategies, as judging, criticising or overanalyzing yourself, focusing too much in analysing others, strategising, making to-do lists or repeating inspirational sayings.
S — Substance abuse or self-harm: what substances do you consume to avoid or get rid of pain? (e.g.: could be confort food or compulsive eating, caffeine drinks, alcohol, tabacco, recreational drugs, naturopathic and herbal remedies or prescription medication among others.)
Coping strategies as processes to manage stress
Avoidance behaviors revolve around not wanting to hurt or experience pain. A common symptom is anxiety. The most effective way to get past this fear is to learn techniques that will help you control your symptoms. Coping skills can help you keep your anxiety in check, by helping you control your thoughts, feelings, and actions before, during, and after stressful situations. Through the vast research on the subject, it has been identified over four hundred strategies and multiple classifications (Skinner et al., 2003; Machado et al., 2020).
They can be grouped under these main categories:
- Problem-focused, when you pro-actively deal with the source of the stress, versus emotion-focused which is reducing stress by regulating your emotions.
- Approach towards the source of stress, which means alleviating the problem directly, versus avoidance, putting distance between oneself and the source of stress.
Annual Review of Psychology published a paper that analysed over fourty studies, finding out that coping strategies fit under 12 mutually exclusive coping families, represented in the diagram below (Skinner & Zimmer-Gembeck, 2007).
Positive Psychology concludes that techniques and strategies have a focus (e.g., actions, social resources), a coping family that shares the same action tendency (e.g., problem-solving, negotiation), and a way of coping (e.g., surrender, emotion regulation).
Focus on which coping strategies work for you.
Adaptive coping strategies are the ones considered to be healthy and effective in managing stressful situations. Only you can define what works for you. Find out which methods you use, and how they work in the long term. It is important that you do not start judging these methods as ‘good’ or ‘bad’, ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, ‘positive’ or ‘negative’. Keep it simple. Ask yourself what is workable and suits you like a glove.
Types of coping strategies
Good Therapy groups the different coping strategies into five types:
Support
Talking about a stressful event with a supportive person can be an effective way to manage stress. Seeking external support instead of self-isolating and internalizing the effects of stress can greatly reduce the negative effects of a difficult situation.
Relaxation
Any number of relaxing activities can help people cope with stress. Relaxing activities may include practicing meditation, progressive muscle relaxation or other calming techniques, sitting in nature, or listening to soft music.
Problem-solving
This coping mechanism involves identifying a problem that is causing stress and then developing and putting into action some potential solutions for effectively managing it.
Humor
Making light of a stressful situation may help people maintain perspective and prevent the situation from becoming overwhelming.
Physical activity
Exercise can serve as a natural and healthy form of stress relief. Running, yoga, swimming, walking, dance, team sports, and many other types of physical activity can help people cope with stress and the aftereffects of traumatic events.
Seek for help
If you experience stress and do not know how to cope, a psychologist, therapist or another mental health professional can help you develop and improve your coping skills. Seek for support of your general practitioner if you would like to have further information. Mental health professionals create a safe, non-judgmental environment for people to explore the coping methods they rely on and determine how they help or hinder stress management.