Stress, coping and medical procedures

Stressresponses arise when exposures to adverse life experiences outstrip protective psychosocial resources, leading to a failure of coping and adaptation – Lazarus RS. Stress and Emotion: A New Synthesis, 1st ed. London: Free Association Books; 1999

from Psychosomatic Medicine – Socioeconomic Status Differences in Coping With a Stressful Medical Procedure

Seventy-Eight Behaviours for Managers and Leaders

This morning a colleague invited me to fill in one of these anonymous 360-degree feedback forms. Being so acutely aware of my own “development points” I never really feel qualified to feed back on other’s professional behaviours, but people seem to keep asking me! While ticking the little boxes I had to work at staying focused, instead of becoming self-conscious of my own imperfections brought to mind by the questionnaire!

Even though my aim is to “downshift” and escape the corporate environment (often one of the most challenging environments in which to develop these behaviours) I will always have to be able to collaborate effectively, and will always want to behave in a way that is constructive and respectful of those around me. It still struck me that the list is a pretty thorough and proven memory aid for achieving that. Here is the list:

Mind Over Cancer

by Michelle Hancock

Not a day goes by that the word “cancer” doesn’t scare thousands of Canadians. Like a dreaded scourge, it hovers over us, presumably just waiting to claim its next victim.

But according to scientists in the growing field of mind/body medicine, the disease is not as much an external force as you might believe. Fear and anxiety–our thoughts and feelings–can impact our health just as much as a long list of cancer risk factors. “Psychoneuroimmunology”’ is the scientific term to describe the study of the mind/body connection. Carl Simonton, MD, is an oncologist who pioneered research in this discipline as early as the 1970s. His book, Getting Well Again (Bantam, 1978), shows how “an individual’s reaction to stress and other emotional factors can contribute to the onset and progress of cancer [while] positive expectations, self-awareness and self-care can ontribute to survival.”

Live your dreams

From “The Complete Athlete” by John Winterdyk and Karen Jenson:

Fear of failure (anxiety about not being able to meet an objective) and fear of success (anxiety about achieving a goal) are the largest barriers to active living. You can choose to give in to these fears or you can use them to your advantage. You must believe in yourself in order to be truly healthy and achieve your goals.

Following are some suggestions for overcoming obstacles and living your dreams:

• Discover your passion. What have you always wanted to do?
• Develop your goal and find your own way of achieving it. Don’t listen to people who say the word “can’t.”
• Take small, manageable steps towards your goal. If you’ve always wanted to be a marathon runner, start by jogging every morning.
• Keep positive. Failure is merely a learning experience to help you become your best the next time.
• Be open. If things turn out differently from what you expect, adapt to the change and readjust your goal–just as Silken Laumann did.
• Have faith in yourself. You can do it!

Reprinted from You’ve Got the Power: Emotional and Mental Health at Alive.com

Links: Fatigue and lifestyle entrepreneurship

Fagitue – get your energy back at WomanToWoman.com

Become a Lifestyle Entrepreneur at CultivateGreatness.com

Links: Positivity, optimism

The 5 Myths of a Positive Mental Attitude at ThinkSimpleNow.com

6 Ways to be Positive in any situation at ThinkSimpleNow.com

9 Ways to Live a More Positive Life at RirianProject.com

Wake Up Feeling Great with These 22 Tips for High Self-Esteem at RirianProject.com

Positive Mental Attitude by Rob Davies (Rob Davies Comic Career Articles, rec.arts.comics.info)

Thinking Positive at 100ventures.com

Some thoughts and links about failure

Dealing with Failure by Chandresh Bharwaj

Dealing with Failure by Dion Melchior

Conscious competence (learning model matrix) from businessballs.com

Dunning-Kruger effect at Wikipedia, and associated article at DamnInteresting.com

• Keep it in perspective: balance the frequency of your failures against the frequency of your successes
• Could they have been worse – could you have failed more dramatically if you hadn’t used your existing skills and experience to intervene (even if you were not able to completely avoid difficulties)?
• What actions or behaviours or assessments might have changed the outcome?
• What systems (skills, knowledge, processes) can be put in place to avoid repetition?
• Can this knowledge be shared to benefit others?
• We only find our limitations by stepping over them and stretching ourselvers; the cost of adopting any approach that diligently avoids failure is never to challenge ourselves, and ultimately to prevent any chance that we might fulfil our full potential
• How many toddlers are so destroyed by their failure to walk first time that they give up for life? Can we learn from their lack of self-consciousness?
• “Try to be a failure” – look back over the things you have done and see if you really can classify yourself as a failure. If there’s any successes in there, you’re just not enough of a failure to qualify (this is what your perfectionist negative filter is doing, just the other way around).
• What is there to be redeemed from failure? If it is unrealistic or limiting/counter-productive to try and avoid it completely, is there something in the experience in which we can find some redemption? (such as being good at identifiying the lessons to be learned from failure, without being hindered or paralysed by the challenge it poses to our pride and appearence)
• Acknowledging a personal limitation that might have lead to failure can be uncomfortable. It can also be a useful opportunity to really get inside the experience of that acknowledgement, and identify what it is that is holding you back in recognising your own limitations. For example, are you reminded of an instance in the past where your limitations have had intense or negative consequences, that has left an impact. What is the risk if you fail or are responsible for failure? What is the risk if you never risk failure?
• If you are very unable to acknowledge your own limitations, it is impossible to become consciously aware of your lack of skills, the impact of that on the situation, and the limits it places on your future opportunities. You are stuck at “unconscious incompetence” forever, because you are unable to (or refuse) to become conscious at it. Failures can be painful experiences; those around us who may also have their own issues around failure in their life can be critical and destructive. Don’t let them rob you of the opportunity to learn and develop yourself to your full potential.

Work worries: Monday 7th April 2008

• Reporting day
  • accountable/responsible for problems I have already tried to avoid
  • when people say “best isn’t good enough” I don’t have an answer
    • defeated – think nothing I say will make any difference
  • not raising problems, or not challenging when problems are dismissed
  • trying to fix them all myself
  • accepting being fobbed off
  • not getting “client” buy-in to difficult messages
  • doubting own abilities
    • means excess time for me
    • not escalating because I’m worried it’ll reflect on me

There seems to be lots of doubt going on here. Could use more balance; helpful to look at what I could have done differently but also needs to be balanced with what others could also have done differently. Might be useful to read “The Now Habit” again.