Coping Solutions Updates


	Coping Solutions Update Titles Coping Solutions Update # 7: Healthy Self-Esteem Coping Solutions Update # 6: Reasons for Not Committing Suicide Coping Solutions Update # 5: Goal Setting Coping Solutions Update # 4: Problem Solving Coping Solutions Update # 3: Support System Coping Solutions Update # 2: Overcoming Negative Emotions Coping Solutions Update # 1: Adaptive Coping Coping Solutions Updates Coping Solutions Update # 7 Healthy Self-Esteem by Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. quitdrinking.com Self-esteem is an extremely important concept in the mental health field. In my opinion, a person must have healthy self-esteem in order to be truly healthy and happy from the psychological point of view. Unfortunately, many people don't have healthy self-esteem. Self-esteem can be defined in many ways. I define self-esteem as how much a person values himself or herself. That is, self-esteem is how a person thinks about himself or herself. Self-esteem affects how a person feels and behaves. Healthy self-esteem results in positive feelings about the self and positive behavior. A person has healthy self-esteem when he or she views the self as having intrinsic value or worth. Additionally, a person with healthy self-esteem views everyone else as having intrinsic value or worth too. A person with healthy self-esteem thinks "I'm okay" or "I'm a good person" and "you have value or worth as a person too." You might ask what justifies my view that each person has intrinsic value or worth. There are many ways to answer this question. My justification for the view that each person has intrinsic value or worth is that I choose to define it this way. In my opinion, this is the most adaptive or functional way to view self and others. Furthermore, I would add that viewing self and others as having intrinsic value or worth is consistent with the teachings of Christianity, the Constitution of the United States, and the assumptions of democracy. A person with low self-esteem thinks "I'm not okay" or "I'm a bad person." Low self-esteem results in negative feelings (for example, depression and anxiety) and negative behavior. In my work as a clinical psychologist, most of the people I see have low self-esteem. A multitude of factors can cause low self-esteem. Some of these factors include being the victim of physical, sexual, or emotional abuse, thinking in negative, maladaptive, or dysfunctional ways, and behaving in negative, maladaptive, or dysfunctional ways. Chronically abusing alcohol and/or drugs will usually cause a person to have low self-esteem. Extremely low self-esteem can result in suicide. Healthy self-esteem does not include thinking that one has more intrinsic value or worth than others. Thinking that one has more intrinsic value or worth than others is what I refer to as pathologically high self-esteem, is unhealthy, and can cause a person to behave in an arrogant manner, treat others badly, and get into conflicts with others in addition to causing other major problems. Thinking that one has more intrinsic value or worth than others can cause racism and physical assaultiveness. For people with low self-esteem, the goal is for them to increase their self-esteem to a healthy level. For people with excessively and maladaptively or dysfunctionally high self-esteem, the goal is for them to lower their self-esteem to a healthy level. In order to intentionally change for the better in life, having the awareness that things need to be improved and exerting much effort are required. People with low self-esteem can increase their self-esteem by increasing their perceptions of their intrinsic value or worth, lowering their expectations for themselves, developing and practicing spirituality, and engaging in a multitude of positive behaviors consistent with the view that they have intrinsic value or worth. One of the best ways for a person with low self-esteem to increase his or her self-esteem is to help others and is a frequently recommended strategy. People with low self-esteem usually want to increase their self-esteem but people with excessively and maladaptively or dysfunctionally high self-esteem usually don't want to lower their self-esteem to a healthy level. If and when a person with excessively and maladaptively or dysfunctionally high self-esteem wants to lower his or her self-esteem to a healthy level then it can be done by modifying perceptions of the intrinsic value or worth of self and others, humbling oneself, developing and practicing spirituality, getting to really know less fortunate people, empathizing with less fortunate people, and helping and serving less fortunate people. Modifying one's self-esteem is not easy. However, the good news is that having awareness of a need for improving self-esteem, knowing the appropriate goals for self-esteem development, knowing how to improve one's self-esteem, having motivation to improve one's self-esteem, and working on improving one's self-esteem will usually enable a person to develop improved self-esteem. Developing a healthier level of self-esteem can help a person make progress towards achieving the goals of improved psychological health and increased happiness. Copyright Ó 2007 Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. Coping Solutions Update # 6 Reasons for Not Committing Suicide by Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. quitdrinking.com Many people think somewhat seriously about committing suicide at least once during their lives. Few of them commit suicide. Committing suicide is an abnormal behavior. Everyone is born with a very strong will to live. The will to live is extremely hard to shut down which happens when a person commits suicide. When people become suicidal, it is usually because they are experiencing a high level of psychological pain combined with a high level of hopelessness. Given this, two strategies I use to help suicidal people choose to not commit suicide include helping them decrease their psychological pain and increase their hopefulness. Additionally, I try to help them identify their reasons for living and reasons for not committing suicide which can help them choose to not commit suicide. A reason for not committing suicide is that relatives and friends are devastated by suicide. When a person commits suicide, it is terribly hurtful to the person's mother, father, spouse, children, brothers, sisters, and friends. The loved ones of someone who commits suicide feel shock, depression, and grief, often feel guilty about not preventing the suicide, and sometimes feel quite angry with the person who committed suicide. Sparing relatives and friends this terrible experience is a reason for not committing suicide. Another reason for not committing suicide is that God does not want people to commit suicide. God wants people to turn to God for strength in their time of need and doing this could help the suicidal person immensely. Christianity teaches that people should find meaning in their suffering which is an argument against suicide. For those believing in the afterlife, there is the question of how suicide would be evaluated in the afterlife. This is another reason for not committing suicide. Being highly suicidal is a temporary experience. With the appropriate professional help, a suicidal person can improve to the point that he or she feels much better and is glad to be alive which are reasons for not committing suicide. Life is a miracle. Each of us is extremely fortunate to have been born and living provides each of us with wonderful opportunities which are reasons for not committing suicide. Committing suicide is a negative example of how to respond to life's problems and makes it more likely that others would commit suicide including parents, spouses, children, siblings, and friends. These are reasons for not committing suicide. I believe it makes sense for a suicidal person to try every possible good alternative to suicide before actually committing suicide. This is because suicide is final and some good alternative to suicide could make the person happy and glad to be alive. It would be especially tragic were the suicidal person to have the potential for finding such a good alternative but then never finding it due to committing suicide first. One good alternative to suicide is devoting one's life to a worthy cause such as helping sick, homeless, and/or hungry children. Once a person commits suicide his or her life is over and no one benefits from the person's actions again. Thus, the person and everyone else loses out. Devoting one's life to a worthy cause instead of committing suicide allows the person to turn a negative (suicidal state) into a positive (helping others) which has obvious value. Additionally, it is quite likely that the suicidal person will find meaning in helping others and as a result will experience life as being more positive and be glad he or she did not commit suicide. There are a multitude of reasons for not committing suicide and the challenge for the suicidal person is to find the reasons for living which will keep him or her alive. Every suicidal person should get immediate mental health treatment to help him or her avoid the terrible tragedy of suicide. Obviously, I support living and am against suicide. I hope that this update will help suicidal people choose to live instead of die and will help everyone who comes into contact with a suicidal person. Copyright Ó 2007 Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. Coping Solutions Update # 5 Goal Setting by Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. quitdrinking.com Many people have never learned the value of setting goals. Without goals, we are likely to make limited progress in life. Living without goals is like sailing a ship without a rudder. The ship will be directionless. A lack of goals can result in moving in a negative direction. Goals give us direction in life and positive goals give us a positive direction. The choice of goals is a very personal decision. Each person is responsible for setting his or her own goals. We are much more likely to work hard on accomplishing goals that we set for ourselves as opposed to goals set for us by others. Goals should be challenging to motivate us to work hard on achieving them but they should be achievable. Among others, we can set goals for ourselves in the following areas: 1. Physical (for example, diet and exercise) 2. Family 3. Housing 4. Social 5. Educational 6. Occupational 7. Financial 8. Spiritual 9. Recreational Once a challenging but achievable goal is established in a given area, the next step is making a realistic plan for achieving the goal. Objective outcome criteria should be established which can be used to determine whether or not a given goal is achieved. A benefit of having a goal for a given area is that it can motivate us to work hard on accomplishing the goal. Once a goal for a given area is achieved, a new goal for the area can be formulated if indicated and desired. An advantage of setting goals is that we will feel good emotionally and increase our self-esteem after we make progress on accomplishing a goal. In summary, setting positive goals in the main areas of our lives will give us a positive direction in life. Goals should be challenging but achievable. Setting challenging but achievable goals will motivate us to work hard on accomplishing the good things in life. Goals should be revised on an ongoing basis as indicated. We will feel good emotionally and increase our self-esteem after we make progress on accomplishing our goals. Copyright Ó 2007 Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. Coping Solutions Update # 4 Problem Solving by Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. quitdrinking.com Everyone faces challenges in life. Problem solving is a method for adaptively coping with challenges. Problem solving methodology includes the following steps: 1. Define the problem. 2. Identify a multitude of possible solutions for the problem. 3. Evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of each possible solution. 4. Pick the best possible solution. 5. Implement the best possible solution. 6. Evaluate the effectiveness of the implemented solution. 7. Repeat steps 1 through 6 again if necessary. After awareness that a problem exists has been developed, the first problem solving step is to define the problem which means developing a good understanding of the nature of the problem. Describing the nature of the problem in writing on a piece of paper can be helpful. The second problem solving step is to identify a multitude of possible solutions for the problem. This important step involves creatively thinking of ways to solve the problem. Brainstorming is used during this step. Any solution having even limited potential for solving the problem should be included. This is not the time to be critical. It can be helpful to list the potential solutions on a piece of paper. The third problem solving step is evaluating the advantages and disadvantages of each possible solution. It can be helpful to list the advantages and disadvantages (positives and negatives or pros and cons) of each possible solution on a piece of paper. The fourth problem solving step is to choose the best possible solution. This involves making a judgment as to which solution is the best considering the advantages and disadvantages of each solution along with a consideration of the problem situation and who is going to implement the solution. It can be helpful to assign a plus or minus relative numerical value to each advantage and disadvantage which can be combined to give a summary score for each possible solution. Assuming that a higher score means a relatively more positive solution, then the solution having the highest summary score would be considered to be the best of the compared possible solutions using this methodology. The fifth step is to implement the best possible solution. The sixth step is to evaluate the effectiveness of the implemented solution. Sometimes implementing the best possible solution will completely solve the problem but at other times it will not. If the degree of the remaining problem justifies exerting continued effort in an attempt to completely solve the problem, then steps 1 through 6 should be repeated. Repeating steps 1 through 6 is the seventh problem solving step. At some point in the problem solving process, it may become apparent that the problem cannot be completely solved. If the problem cannot be completely solved or eliminated, then an option for adaptively coping with this situation would be to develop acceptance. Copyright Ó 2007 Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. Coping Solutions Update # 3 Support System by Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. quitdrinking.com A fundamental and very important strategy for adaptive coping is developing and using a healthy support system. Life is full of challenges and a well-developed support system helps us get through the rough times and is there to celebrate the good times. Supportive friends and relatives help us put things in perspective and can offer some excellent suggestions for effective problem solving. They serve as a sounding board that allows us to ventilate which everyone needs to do. They make us feel needed which is positive for everyone to feel. They provide us with the opportunity to help others and we benefit when we help others. It is beneficial to us to have supportive people with whom we can do fun and relaxing activities that rejuvenate us. Developing a healthy support system requires effort. We need to assertively reach out to others. In order to motivate others to reach out and support us, we need to take the initiative to reach out and support others. Not everyone will respond positively to our initiatives. This should be expected and we should not allow this to upset us. If we reach out and support enough other people, then at least some of them will respond positively. The people who respond positively to our initiatives and the people who take the initiative to reach out and support us are the people with whom we should pursue further involvement. Pursuing this strategy over time will enable a person to develop a healthy support system. In order to maintain our relationships with the people in our support system, we need to nurture the relationships and consistently prove ourselves over time to be trustworthy and dependable to these people. In summary, each of us can benefit greatly from having a healthy support system, assertively reaching out and supporting others will help us develop our support system, and nurturing our relationships with people in our support system on an ongoing basis is necessary to maintain our support system. Copyright Ó 2007 Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. Coping Solutions Update # 2 Overcoming Negative Emotions by Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. quitdrinking.com Everyone wants to feel good emotionally but achieving this goal on a regular basis is not easy. Everything has a cause and a negative feeling or emotion is no exception. Negative emotion can be caused by each of the following: 1. Physical dysfunction 2. Negative stress 3. Maladaptive or negative thinking 4. Maladaptive or negative behavior The role of physical functioning, stress, thinking, and behavior in causing negative emotion will be examined briefly. Physical problems can cause negative feelings. For example, a chemical imbalance in the brain can cause depression. Other examples include hyperthyroidism causing anxiety and chronic alcoholism causing depression directly due to biological factors. Biological factors can directly cause anger in addition to anxiety and depression. A negative stressor can also cause negative emotion. A negative stressor can cause a person to experience depression, anxiety, and/or anger. The way a person thinks can also cause depression, anxiety, or anger. The relationship is that negative or maladaptive thinking causes negative emotions. Depression, anxiety, and/or anger can also be caused by negative behavior. In order to improve how one feels emotionally, a person can make changes in one of the four causes of negative emotion, namely, physical functioning, stress, thinking, and behavior. Taking good care of one's body is one way to emotionally feel as good as possible. Eating a healthy diet, getting plenty of sleep, and getting an adequate amount of exercise are ways of taking good care of one's body and thus feeling good emotionally. In order to feel as good emotionally as possible, avoiding the abuse of alcohol and abstaining from illicit drugs are recommended biological strategies. Taking psychiatric medication is a biological strategy for overcoming negative emotions that is used by many. Effectively managing stress is a second strategy for overcoming negative emotion. Some negative stressors can be eliminated and there are times when eliminating a negative stressor is the recommended strategy for feeling better emotionally. Most negative stressors in life cannot be eliminated and when this is the case or when eliminating a negative stressor is not recommended, then the next best thing to do is to manage the given negative stressor as well as possible. The third strategy for overcoming negative emotion is to eliminate confused and maladaptive thinking. The natural human tendency is to think negatively which is why so many people are unhappy. However, it is possible to learn adaptive ways of thinking and by doing so a person can make progress in overcoming negative emotion. The fourth strategy for overcoming negative emotion is to behave in adaptive or positive ways. Adaptive behavior includes developing and using one's social support network and identifying and getting more involved in positive activities. Being assertive, as opposed to being passive (defined here as not taking care of oneself) or being aggressive (defined here as hurting others without justification), is a recommended strategy for overcoming negative emotion and for feeling good emotionally. In short, taking good care of one's body, effectively managing stress, and thinking and behaving in adaptive ways will decrease negative emotion and will increase positive feelings. Making positive changes in how one cares for one's body, manages stress, thinks, and behaves is not easy but with effort and practice can be done. The results in terms of decreasing negative emotions and increasing positive feelings make it worth the effort. Copyright Ó 2007 Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. Coping Solutions Update # 1 Adaptive Coping by Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D. quitdrinking.com In the Coping Solutions Update published at quitdrinking.com, I plan to describe positive or adaptive strategies and skills for coping. I define coping as how a person responds to a problem. There is a multitude of possible ways to cope with any given problem. Some are positive or adaptive and some are negative or maladaptive. The challenge for each of us, when we are faced with any given problem, is to choose the healthiest way to respond. The highest level of mental health functioning is achieved when a person uses the most adaptive strategies for coping. On the other hand, a relatively lower level of mental health functioning is exhibited when a person uses maladaptive coping strategies. Coping is a cognitive behavioral process which can be improved by developing one's abilities through learning and practice. That is, healthy coping strategies and skills can be learned and can be improved through practice. Whether or not a person develops his or her coping strategies and skills is largely dependent on the degree to which the person is willing to work on accomplishing this goal. It is my sincere hope that editions of the Coping Solutions Update will help its readers make progress on accomplishing this goal. Copyright Ó 2007 Stephen T. Skiffington, Ph.D.