Being able to cope for all of us are an essential part of life. We all live with the burdens of school, work, finances, and family, amongst a myriad of other things. Without outlets, or coping mechanisms, what would we do? Heck, for all I know, if I didn't have the outlets I did, my wife may have left me a long time ago, because I may have taken all my stuff out on her! As anyone who is married or in a relationship knows, we inevitably wind up taking our baggage from day to day out on them anyway, so imagine how we would be if we didn't have things in place to help us get through?
Anyway, the purpose of this thread is to discuss the positive coping mechanisms you employ in your life. I'll leave this up to your discretion: There are no wrong answers here. What I may perceive as a positive coping mechanism for myself may be one that would be a negative one for you, making your situation worse then it does better. So that's the goal here: Identifying what coping mechanisms assist in making your life an easier one to live.
One last thing before we start: Once you've identified a coping mechanism that really works, it becomes like an addiction to many. When barriers arise that prevent us from using our tried and true mechanism, it's important to have backupo mechanisms in life that also work, even if it's to a lesser extent. There will be situations that arise in life that prevent us from using our top coping mechanisms, so identifying secondary ones is crucial in this world.
Or, you can just talk about the ones that work for you if you don't want to go into detail. I'll start.
1. Exercise: Since my junior year in college, Ive been a runner. I started based on criticism: My mom told me that if I didn't lose weight, I wouldn't be able to fit into my tuxedo for my twin sister's wedding. Thanks, Mom! Anyway, my college girlfriend ran track, so she offered to let me start running with her. Surprisingly, I enjoyed it, and I wound up stop running with her when I began to outpace her and run longer distances. Ten years later, having added weightlifting to the mix, there's nothing in this world that works better for me. I can come home angry, sad, frustrated, or just plain stressed, but an hour in my exercise room and the stress melts away, and I feel much more equipped to move on from the day, and enjoy the rest of my evening.
Unfortunately, I had severe knee surgery back in October, and I've been unable to exercise since in any way. No running, no weightlifting, no walking even. It's frustrating having all of these things in my house, and not being able to use them. Fortunately, as I've suggested everyone has, I have backup things.
2. Sex: Seems quite shallow, right? I don't think so! Being married, my wife and I know how important this is to sustaining our relationship(amongst many other things), and it's also a great stress reliever. I can't begin to get into how many fights have been shortened and looked back on by both of us as "silly" when we've stopped fighting in favor of physical pursuits. The best part of it has been this: Since my knee surgery, my wife has realized that my stress level is higher, and despite being pregnant, she's been willing to help me out in this area of stress relief on a more frequent basis. I actually enjoy this more then I do exercise(ya think?
), but exercise if available far more readily, so that's why it tops my list.
Unfortunately, there are snags with this as well. My wife is now at 8 months in terms of being pregnant, so sex is pretty much out of the question right now between her pregnancy and my slowly healing knee.
3. Conversation: Such a funny thing, isn't it? You look at things like sex or exercise and can easily see how those things would be stress relievers, but how often do we forget about things like conversation? Over the past year, due to health difficulties for both us, I've learned more about my wife then I did in our first three years of marriage, combined. And I've enjoyed every second of us. Likes, dislikes, ways to make her laugh, future dreams, and what makes her tick were things I thought I had a great understanding of before, but I've realized I previously just hit the tip of the iceberg. And Ive enjoyed every night over the past year Ive stayed up waaaaayyyyy later then I should have, talking and laughing as we did when we first met. As much as i enjoy sex, this may be more important to the relationship, and it's certainly a great stress reliever for me.
I could on, as I have more, such as this plac, good Ol' Wrestlezone. But you get the picture, and so I turn it over to you:
What is your go-to coping skill when you're stressed? Why does it work for you?
If that is unavailable for one reason or another, do you have backup skills you turn to? What are they?
Anyway, the purpose of this thread is to discuss the positive coping mechanisms you employ in your life. I'll leave this up to your discretion: There are no wrong answers here. What I may perceive as a positive coping mechanism for myself may be one that would be a negative one for you, making your situation worse then it does better. So that's the goal here: Identifying what coping mechanisms assist in making your life an easier one to live.
One last thing before we start: Once you've identified a coping mechanism that really works, it becomes like an addiction to many. When barriers arise that prevent us from using our tried and true mechanism, it's important to have backupo mechanisms in life that also work, even if it's to a lesser extent. There will be situations that arise in life that prevent us from using our top coping mechanisms, so identifying secondary ones is crucial in this world.
Or, you can just talk about the ones that work for you if you don't want to go into detail. I'll start.
1. Exercise: Since my junior year in college, Ive been a runner. I started based on criticism: My mom told me that if I didn't lose weight, I wouldn't be able to fit into my tuxedo for my twin sister's wedding. Thanks, Mom! Anyway, my college girlfriend ran track, so she offered to let me start running with her. Surprisingly, I enjoyed it, and I wound up stop running with her when I began to outpace her and run longer distances. Ten years later, having added weightlifting to the mix, there's nothing in this world that works better for me. I can come home angry, sad, frustrated, or just plain stressed, but an hour in my exercise room and the stress melts away, and I feel much more equipped to move on from the day, and enjoy the rest of my evening.
Unfortunately, I had severe knee surgery back in October, and I've been unable to exercise since in any way. No running, no weightlifting, no walking even. It's frustrating having all of these things in my house, and not being able to use them. Fortunately, as I've suggested everyone has, I have backup things.
2. Sex: Seems quite shallow, right? I don't think so! Being married, my wife and I know how important this is to sustaining our relationship(amongst many other things), and it's also a great stress reliever. I can't begin to get into how many fights have been shortened and looked back on by both of us as "silly" when we've stopped fighting in favor of physical pursuits. The best part of it has been this: Since my knee surgery, my wife has realized that my stress level is higher, and despite being pregnant, she's been willing to help me out in this area of stress relief on a more frequent basis. I actually enjoy this more then I do exercise(ya think?
), but exercise if available far more readily, so that's why it tops my list.Unfortunately, there are snags with this as well. My wife is now at 8 months in terms of being pregnant, so sex is pretty much out of the question right now between her pregnancy and my slowly healing knee.
3. Conversation: Such a funny thing, isn't it? You look at things like sex or exercise and can easily see how those things would be stress relievers, but how often do we forget about things like conversation? Over the past year, due to health difficulties for both us, I've learned more about my wife then I did in our first three years of marriage, combined. And I've enjoyed every second of us. Likes, dislikes, ways to make her laugh, future dreams, and what makes her tick were things I thought I had a great understanding of before, but I've realized I previously just hit the tip of the iceberg. And Ive enjoyed every night over the past year Ive stayed up waaaaayyyyy later then I should have, talking and laughing as we did when we first met. As much as i enjoy sex, this may be more important to the relationship, and it's certainly a great stress reliever for me.
I could on, as I have more, such as this plac, good Ol' Wrestlezone. But you get the picture, and so I turn it over to you:
What is your go-to coping skill when you're stressed? Why does it work for you?
If that is unavailable for one reason or another, do you have backup skills you turn to? What are they?
