Lecture 56- Life Skills-I — Transcript

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1. 0:16Namaskar friends,
2. 0:19we are going to start module 12 of the
3. 0:23stress management course and I am your
4. 0:26course instructor Dr. Shubraasha.
5. 0:30This module focuses on the basic
6. 0:34principle of health management which
7. 0:37goes like prevention is better than
8. 0:40cure.
9. 0:42Till now we have talked a lot about how
10. 0:45to reduce stress once it is created in
11. 0:49your life. But in this module I'm going
12. 0:52to discuss something which is deeply
13. 0:54related with how stress can be prevented
14. 1:00from being generated in our lives.
15. 1:04Obviously if we are living a relatively
16. 1:08stressfree life I use the term relative
17. 1:12because it is not possible to eliminate
18. 1:15stress altogether. However, if we are
19. 1:19relatively stress-free, means the level
20. 1:23of a stress present is much less than
21. 1:26our own coping abilities, then it is not
22. 1:29going to create much trouble for us. And
23. 1:32this is the aim of this module.
24. 1:36In this module, we will be talking about
25. 1:40life skills which are very important in
26. 1:4321st century.
27. 1:46This 21st century is characterized by
28. 1:51high pressure, workload, time
29. 1:54constraints, lack of social skills and
30. 1:58many other things like that.
31. 2:01Therefore, if we try to inculcate some
32. 2:05important life skills in us, this can
33. 2:09help us improving our efficiency for
34. 2:13day-to-day interactions with other
35. 2:15people and for managing our own routine
36. 2:19task more effectively thereby reducing
37. 2:23the level of stress substantially.
38. 2:27So with this goal let us start module 12
39. 2:32the life skills. This is lecture one and
40. 2:36we are going to talk about life skills
41. 2:40their basic concept. The key aspects of
42. 2:44life skills in stress management.
43. 2:47importance of life skills and we will
44. 2:50also talk about some quick stress
45. 2:53management techniques which are there
46. 2:56for immediate relief.
47. 2:59So let us begin our discussion.
48. 3:03Life skill is basically a set of skills
49. 3:07required to manage one's life in an
50. 3:10effective and productive manner and to
51. 3:14enhance one's quality of life.
52. 3:18So it is the set of a skill with which
53. 3:20we can do two things which are very
54. 3:23important. What are these things? First
55. 3:27we can lead our life in an effective and
56. 3:30productive manner. Effective means
57. 3:33whatever we are doing it must have a
58. 3:36positive impact. It must be capable of
59. 3:39yielding the desired outcome. If we have
60. 3:42put a lot of effort, we have consumed a
61. 3:45lot of time but the end result is
62. 3:48completely zero. It is not an effective
63. 3:51management of work. So in order to be
64. 3:55effective
65. 3:56it means we are ensuring the achievement
66. 4:00of our desired goal at least to a
67. 4:04satisfactory extent and productivity is
68. 4:08also linked to the same idea and the
69. 4:11second important thing that we can do
70. 4:13with the help of life skills is
71. 4:16enhancing one's own quality of life.
72. 4:20Friends, it is important to have a lengy
73. 4:23life, a long life, but it is equally
74. 4:26important to have a fulfilling life.
75. 4:30Adding ears to life merely will not do
76. 4:33unless we add life to those ears.
77. 4:37In order to do it successfully, we have
78. 4:40to have certain life skills with the
79. 4:43help of which we can work on the quality
80. 4:47of life that we have.
81. 4:50Similarly,
82. 4:51these abilities also help us handling
83. 4:56the challenges and demands of our daily
84. 4:59routine life.
85. 5:01See, it happens rarely that uh we come
86. 5:06across with very big problems. Sometimes
87. 5:08we can but mostly the things which keep
88. 5:13us puzzled which pressurizes us or which
89. 5:16really cause a lot of stress to us are
90. 5:19very minor. They are related to our
91. 5:22routine daily life. So if we manage our
92. 5:26life in a better way maybe we can do
93. 5:30away with this kind of a stress which is
94. 5:33produced on a daily basis and we have to
95. 5:36keep ourself in a struggling mode all
96. 5:39the time.
97. 5:42These skills and the abilities can be
98. 5:44related to our thinking that is the
99. 5:47cognitive domain or our behavioral
100. 5:49repertoire. Maybe we need to inculcate
101. 5:52to learn some new things or uh new ways
102. 5:55to do the old things. And of course
103. 5:59these are very essential for success in
104. 6:02different areas of life.
105. 6:07So what happens with life skills? If you
106. 6:10look at these three small windows, they
107. 6:13can summarize the things for you. First,
108. 6:15these things are essential for personal
109. 6:18success and well-being. So, no matter
110. 6:21how we define success within home or
111. 6:24outside home, if we are uh capable of
112. 6:28managing our tasks successfully,
113. 6:32we must have life skills for the same.
114. 6:36Then it makes it easier to live by
115. 6:39improving our emotion regulation. You
116. 6:42can find it here. building positive
117. 6:45relationships with other people and
118. 6:48enhancing happiness and health the
119. 6:51positive health status of an individual.
120. 6:55So these are the four distinct
121. 6:57advantages of learning and practicing
122. 7:01life skills. And finally, it can reduce
123. 7:06our dependence upon counterproductive
124. 7:10things like substance abuse, aggression,
125. 7:14violence,
126. 7:16uh smoking or alcoholism.
127. 7:18Things like that can be much reduced if
128. 7:22we develop this particular set of skill
129. 7:26which we are referring to as life
130. 7:30skills.
131. 7:33Coming to life skill and stress
132. 7:36management. Basically for learning and
133. 7:39practicing life skills, it is not
134. 7:41necessary to be stressed. Rather it is a
135. 7:45way to avoid stress in future and in
136. 7:48present. If we handle the things more
137. 7:51systematically, more effectively, we are
138. 7:54probably avoiding the uh chances of
139. 7:59stress being generated in our life. But
140. 8:02what if it has been generated already?
141. 8:06Whether life skills are going to help us
142. 8:10reducing that stress level also? Yes,
143. 8:14definitely they can. Now how they can do
144. 8:18it? We can employ these life skills to
145. 8:23personal, social and work life.
146. 8:27Everybody has different domains of life.
147. 8:30Our personal life when we be with our
148. 8:32family or alone engaged in self-care and
149. 8:36doing many things related to that. Our
150. 8:39social life being with family members,
151. 8:42with friends, being in public places
152. 8:45and the work life where we are
153. 8:47preoccupied with the profession we are
154. 8:51in. We can employ the life skills in all
155. 8:55these three dimensions. Then if you
156. 8:59employ them successfully, it manages the
157. 9:03level of stress and it reduces the
158. 9:07stress level greatly.
159. 9:10This approach of applying life skills to
160. 9:13manage stress of your personal, social
161. 9:16and work life is known as life skill
162. 9:20stress management. We have learned so
163. 9:23many strategies and skills of stress
164. 9:25management and life skill stress
165. 9:28management is one of them.
166. 9:33If we want to manage stress through this
167. 9:35approach, we have to identify the cause
168. 9:39of a stress and then we must select a
169. 9:42suitable strategy with which we can
170. 9:46encounter that cause successfully.
171. 9:49Moreover, we have to modify our daily
172. 9:53habits. Daily habits are the big source
173. 9:57of a stress as well as healthy habits
174. 10:01are the very strong buffer against any
175. 10:04harmful consequence of a stress. So if
176. 10:08we want to reduce stress with life skill
177. 10:11approach, we need to modify our habits.
178. 10:15If I find a habit of mine that is
179. 10:19getting up late in the morning creating
180. 10:21a lot of stress because once I get up
181. 10:25late in the morning I left with I'm left
182. 10:28with very less time to complete my
183. 10:31important course. Many times I enter
184. 10:34late into my workplace which causes
185. 10:37additional stress because sometimes I
186. 10:39get negative remark from my boss or
187. 10:42simply I feel guilty when I step up the
188. 10:45stairs of my office late in the morning
189. 10:48when all others are working. It gives me
190. 10:51a sense of being inefficient, incapable
191. 10:54or a careless employee. Or sometimes I
192. 10:58may not be able to manage the very
193. 11:00important assignments at home and I keep
194. 11:03feeling guilty whole day that I have
195. 11:05missed some important things and others
196. 11:08will be suffering because of my
197. 11:10incapability.
198. 11:11So if this simple habit is making a lot
199. 11:14of stress for me, can I modify it so
200. 11:18that I can have a couple of hours extra
201. 11:20in the morning to complete all my
202. 11:23assignments comfortably and that to be
203. 11:26in time for my office also. Of course,
204. 11:29this is called life
205. 11:32skill management.
206. 11:34Similarly, if I try to look for uh the
207. 11:38range of these life skills, I find them
208. 11:41varied and many. But basically, these
209. 11:44varied life skills belong to three
210. 11:47different categories. One is known as
211. 11:50thinking skills that is the problem
212. 11:52solving and creativity skills. Basically
213. 11:56uh these are the skills which uh is
214. 12:00highly connected with the cognitive
215. 12:03aspects of our uh life. The way we
216. 12:06process information, the way we make
217. 12:08decisions, the way we solve the
218. 12:11problems.
219. 12:12Next set of skills are known as social
220. 12:17skills and emotional skills. So in
221. 12:19social skills, communication and
222. 12:22relationship development and maintenance
223. 12:25is very important and in emotional
224. 12:28skills selfawareness and emotion
225. 12:31regulation is of prime importance.
226. 12:34Right?
227. 12:36So this segment will be elaborated very
228. 12:40soon in the coming lecture. But before I
229. 12:43talk about more longlasting changes that
230. 12:46must be made, let us take you to a drive
231. 12:50of some quick strategies that can reduce
232. 12:55the stress or at least experience of a
233. 12:58stress immediately
234. 13:01and leave the individual better able to
235. 13:05focus on long-term strategies to manage
236. 13:09stress.
237. 13:11So let us see what are these. Here are
238. 13:14the three quick strategies which can
239. 13:17give you relief from an intense stress
240. 13:21experience.
241. 13:23First one of them is deep breathing. The
242. 13:26second one is of course practicing
243. 13:28mindfulness and the third one is
244. 13:30progressive muscle relaxation. So these
245. 13:33are the first, second and third
246. 13:37techniques that can be employed quickly
247. 13:40within few minutes and you can find the
248. 13:43results immediately.
249. 13:46So let us talk about them a little more.
250. 13:49So the breathe breath deep
251. 13:52this is the exercise designed by Harvard
252. 13:56Medical School and they say that
253. 14:01uh breath can control
254. 14:03the level of stress that we experience.
255. 14:07So we must take a deep breath.
256. 14:12I can close my eyes. You can close your
257. 14:14eyes. Then you can imagine yourself
258. 14:16relaxing and you can take a deep breath
259. 14:20in four in the count of four and then
260. 14:24you can exhale it again in the count of
261. 14:27four means inhale the air and keep
262. 14:32counting 1 2 3 4 slowly
263. 14:37hold it for a moment. Maybe you can
264. 14:40count 1 and two and then start exhaling
265. 14:45again on the count of four. That is 1 2
266. 14:503 4 and you pushed all the air out.
267. 14:54Okay. So this is the technique of deep
268. 14:58breathing which can be repeated unless
269. 15:02the person starts feeling relaxed.
270. 15:08The second is of
271. 15:11mindfulness.
272. 15:13This is a very effective technique. We
273. 15:15have been talking about it off and on.
274. 15:18And uh mindfulness is a practice of
275. 15:21being aware of the present moment. Many
276. 15:24times what happens that we are stressed
277. 15:27because we have been thinking about what
278. 15:29has happened in the past which was
279. 15:32unpleasant which was emotionally
280. 15:34arousing and I'm still living in those
281. 15:38past moments only experiencing the same
282. 15:42kind of emotion.
283. 15:44Another possibility is I'm imagining a
284. 15:48future course of happening. What can
285. 15:52happen in future? what would be the
286. 15:55flavor and color of my future? How do
287. 15:59I'm going to tackle those things? So if
288. 16:02I'm too much absorbed thinking about
289. 16:04future and suppose the the imagery that
290. 16:08I'm having is negative, it is
291. 16:10pessimistic, it is uh hopeless, not
292. 16:14according to what I think it should be,
293. 16:18again I will be feeling stressed.
294. 16:21Sometimes people are so imaginative that
295. 16:25they can simply elaborate upon an
296. 16:29interaction
297. 16:31which has happened to them in a manner
298. 16:35which actually reflects their own
299. 16:37thinking instead of what it was actually
300. 16:43what it actually was.
301. 16:47For example, if I had an argument with
302. 16:52one of my friends, the argument was not
303. 16:55very intense. It was just uh one or two
304. 16:58minutes long. But
305. 17:02my attention is now caught into that
306. 17:06interaction only. And now I'm arguing
307. 17:09and counterarguing
308. 17:11from the side of my friend also. And
309. 17:14then I'm elaborating this argument on
310. 17:18and on and on in a way which makes me
311. 17:22feel distressed.
312. 17:25So why I'm telling all these examples?
313. 17:27Because many times the cause of a stress
314. 17:31is not present in our real time. It is
315. 17:36in our imagination and we are not living
316. 17:40in the real moment in the present
317. 17:42moment.
318. 17:44Instead of that we are either living in
319. 17:46the past or living in the future or we
320. 17:50are too much engaged mentally in an
321. 17:53imagined world where we are arguing and
322. 17:55fighting and just trying to extract
323. 17:58meanings of somebody's statement or
324. 18:01somebody's action.
325. 18:04If I try to focus my attention away from
326. 18:08all these hypothetical things,
327. 18:10imaginative things and focus on where I
328. 18:15am right now, what I'm doing at this
329. 18:18particular moment,
330. 18:21I may feel relaxed immediately because
331. 18:24my present scenarios my the present
332. 18:27moment where I'm living in which I'm
333. 18:30living is probably not containing
334. 18:33anything is stressful. I was carrying
335. 18:37the load of stress from the past or I
336. 18:40was simply borrowing the load of stress
337. 18:42from the future.
338. 18:44Okay? Or I was busy with enhancing the
339. 18:48load by imagining different kind of
340. 18:51consequences or situations in my mind.
341. 18:55So coming back to my present moment
342. 18:59will it will really help me
343. 19:03sensing that the level of stress is
344. 19:06probably not so high as I think it is.
345. 19:11The technique is effective and even if I
346. 19:15be mindful for five to 10 minutes
347. 19:18intentionally, consciously by putting in
348. 19:21efforts, I can find substantial
349. 19:25reduction in stress that I was going
350. 19:28through.
351. 19:31The third quick technique is known as
352. 19:33progressive muscle relaxation.
353. 19:37This is a popular technique of stress
354. 19:39management where the muscle groups of
355. 19:43the body from top to toe are
356. 19:47sequentially
357. 19:50uh tensed and then relaxed.
358. 19:52This exercise make them comfortable and
359. 19:58uh we can have a sense of soothing
360. 20:02comfort and relaxation by doing this
361. 20:05exercise.
362. 20:07which will definitely help reducing the
363. 20:11experience and pain of stress.
364. 20:16However, if we are not successful to
365. 20:20deal with the stress
366. 20:22by implementing life skills or by
367. 20:26utilizing the quick techniques of
368. 20:28managing stress, we must not hesitate to
369. 20:32consult a professional.
370. 20:34This professional can be a counselor or
371. 20:37a therapist who is well trained in
372. 20:40conducting such kind of sessions and
373. 20:43therapies. And whenever we find ourself
374. 20:47overwhelmed with the stress, it is
375. 20:50important to seek professional help.
376. 20:54When do we find ourselves overwhelmed?
377. 20:58When stress and anxiety starts impacting
378. 21:01our daily life and they significantly
379. 21:06interfere with the fulfillment of our
380. 21:10daily tasks.
381. 21:12If they cause some kind of impairment in
382. 21:16our daily life, we will call it an
383. 21:20overwhelming level of anxiety and
384. 21:23stress. So if this happens with me
385. 21:27frequently or this has happened to me
386. 21:31once and now it continues
387. 21:34it is the right time to seek the help
388. 21:37and advice of a professional.
389. 21:42So the takeaway lessons that we have
390. 21:45learned from this particular lecture is
391. 21:49it is better to prevent stress being
392. 21:53generated in our life than to cure it
393. 21:58once it is generated and we are
394. 22:02very much affected by its presence.
395. 22:06How can we do this prevention? By
396. 22:09learning correct habits or modifying the
397. 22:12pre-existed one in the desired way, we
398. 22:17can bring about long-term changes in the
399. 22:21way we live our life so that we can
400. 22:24enhance the quality of our life and
401. 22:27reduce the stress present in our current
402. 22:31scenarios.
403. 22:33Moreover, we can also learn some quick
404. 22:36stress management skills that can help
405. 22:39me have a quick relief whenever I am in
406. 22:43a stressful situation.
407. 22:46But at the same time, I should realize
408. 22:49the fact that maybe some stress will not
409. 22:54be managed in this way. So for that part
410. 22:58of a stress we must not hesitate
411. 23:01contacting a professional who is more uh
412. 23:05equipped with different kind of tools
413. 23:08and provide a customized package of
414. 23:11intervention strategies, intervention
415. 23:15programs
416. 23:16in order to improve upon our situation.
417. 23:22So with this
418. 23:24here are some references that we can see
419. 23:28in order to enhance our knowledge about
420. 23:31the subject.
421. 23:33A few more references. Thank you very
422. 23:36much for your patient listening.