Whether you’ve been dumped by your date or you’ve had a rough day at the office, having healthy coping skills can be key to getting through tough times. Coping skills help you tolerate, minimize, and deal with inevitable ups and downs we all experience in life.
Coping skills may be defined as the tactics that people use to deal with stressful situations. Managing your stress well can help you feel better physically and psychologically and impact your ability to perform your best. However, not all coping skills are created equal.
Sometimes, it’s tempting to engage in strategies that will give quick relief but might create bigger problems down the road. It’s important to establish healthy coping skills that will help you reduce or rid yourself of the stressful situations you face.
Examples of healthy coping skills include:
Establishing and maintaining boundaries
Practicing relaxation strategies such as deep breathing, meditation, and mindfulness
Getting regular physical activity
Making to-do lists and setting goals
Problem-Based vs. Emotion-Based
The five main types of coping skills are: problem-focused coping, emotion-focused coping, religious coping, meaning-making, and social support.
Two of the main types of coping skills are problem-based coping and emotion-based coping. Understanding how they differ can help you determine the best coping strategy for you.
Problem-based coping is helpful when you need to change your situation, perhaps by removing a stressful thing from your life. For example, if you’re in an unhealthy relationship, your anxiety and sadness might be best resolved by ending the relationship (as opposed to soothing your emotions).
Emotion-based coping is helpful when you need to take care of your feelings when you either don’t want to change your situation or when circumstances are out of your control. For example, if you are grieving the loss of a loved one, it’d be important to take care of your feelings in a healthy way (since you can’t change the circumstance).
There isn’t always one best way to proceed. Instead, it’s up to you to decide which type of coping skill is likely to work best for you in your particular circumstance. The following are examples of stressful situations and how each approach could be used.
Reading Your Performance Review
You open your email to find your annual performance review. The review states that you are below average in several areas and you’re surprised by this because you thought you were performing well. You feel anxious and frustrated.
Problem-focused coping: You go to the boss and talk about what you can do to improve your performance. You develop a clear plan that will help you do better and you start to feel more confident about your ability to succeed.
Emotion-focused coping: You spend your lunch break reading a book to distract yourself from catastrophic predictions that you’re going to be fired. After work, you exercise and clean the house as a way to help you feel better so you can think about the situation more clearly.
Getting a Teenager to Clean
You have told your teenager he needs to clean his bedroom. But it’s been a week and clothes and trash seem to be piling up. Before heading out the door in the morning, you told him he has to clean his room after school "or else." You arrive home from work to find him playing videos in his messy room.
Problem-focused coping: You sit your teenager down and tell him that he’s going to be grounded until his room is clean. You take away his electronics and put him on restriction. In the meantime, you shut the door to his room so you don’t have to look at the mess.
Emotion-focused coping: You decide to run some bathwater because a hot bath always helps you feel better. You know a bath will help you calm down so you don’t yell at him or overreact.
Giving a Presentation
You’ve been invited to give a presentation in front of a large group. You were so flattered and surprised by the invitation that you agreed to do it. But as the event approaches, your anxiety skyrockets because you dislike public speaking.
Problem-focused coping: You decide to hire a public speaking coach to help you learn how to write a good speech and how to deliver it confidently. You practice giving your speech in front of a few friends and family members so you will feel better prepared to step on stage.
Emotion-focused coping: You tell yourself that you can do this. You practice relaxation exercises whenever you start to panic. And you remind yourself that even if you’re nervous, no one else is even likely to notice.
Recap
Problem-based coping skills focus on changing the situation, while emotional-based coping skills are centered on changing how you feel. Knowing which approach is right for a specific situation can help you deal with stress more effectively.
Healthy Emotion-Focused Coping Skills
Whether you’re feeling nervous, sad or angry, emotion-focused coping skills can help you deal with your feelings in a healthy way. Healthy coping strategies may soothe you, temporarily distract you, or help you tolerate distress.
Sometimes, it’s helpful to face your emotions head-on. For example, feeling sad after the death of a loved one can help you honor the loss. While it would be important to use coping skills to help relieve some of your distress, coping strategies shouldn’t be about constantly distracting you from reality.
Other times, coping skills may help you change your mood. If you’ve had a bad day at work, playing with your kids or watching a funny movie might cheer you up. Or, if you’re angry about something someone said, a healthy coping strategy might help you calm down before you say something you might later regret.
Other examples of healthy ways to cope with emotions include:
Care for yourself: Put on lotion that smells good, spend time in nature, take a bath, drink tea, or take care of your body in a way that makes you feel good such as painting your nails, doing your hair, putting on a face mask.
Engage in a hobby: Do something you enjoy such as drawing or cooking.
Exercise: Do yoga, go for a walk, take a hike, or engage in a recreational sport.
Focus on a task: Clean the house (or a closet, drawer, or area), cook a meal, garden, or read a book.
Practice mindfulness: List the things you feel grateful for, picture a "happy place" or look at pictures to remind you of the people, places, and things that bring you joy.
Use relaxation strategies: Play with a pet, practice breathing exercises, squeeze a stress ball, use a relaxation app, enjoy some aromatherapy or write in a journal.
Healthy Problem-Focused Coping Skills
There are many ways you might decide to tackle a problem head-on and eliminate the source of your stress. In some cases, that may mean changing your behavior or creating a plan that helps you know what action you’re going to take.
In other situations, problem-focused coping may involve more drastic measures, like changing jobs or ending a relationship.
Here are some examples of positive problem-focused coping skills:
Ask for support from a friend or a professional.
Create a to-do list.
Engage in problem-solving.
Establish and define healthy boundaries.
Walk away and leave a situation that is causing you stress.
Work on managing your time better.
Recap
Whether emotion-focused or problem-focused, healthy coping skills should help calm stress without avoiding the issue. The right coping skill often depends on the situation and your specific needs in the moment.
Coping Skills to Avoid
Just because a strategy helps you endure emotional pain, it doesn’t mean it’s healthy. Some coping skills could create bigger problems in your life.
Here are some examples of unhealthy coping skills:
Drinking alcohol or using drugs: Substances may temporarily numb your pain, but they won’t resolve your issues. Substances are likely to introduce new problems into your life. Alcohol, for example, is a depressant that can make you feel worse. Using substances to cope also puts you at risk for developing a substance use disorder and it may create health, legal, financial problems, and social problems.
Overeating: Food is a common coping strategy. However, trying to fix your feelings with food can lead to health issues. Sometimes people go to the other extreme and restrict their eating because it makes them feel more in control.
Sleeping too much: Whether you take a nap when you’re stressed out or you sleep late to avoid facing the day, sleeping offers a temporary escape from your problems. However, when you wake up, the problem will still be there.
Venting to others: Sharing so that you can gain support, develop a solution, or see a problem in a different way can be healthy. However, repeatedly venting about how bad your situation is makes it more likely you will remain stuck in a place of pain.
Overspending: While many people say they enjoy retail therapy, shopping can become unhealthy. Spending more than you can afford will ultimately increase stress and worry.
Avoiding: Even “healthy” coping strategies can become unhealthy if you’re using them to avoid the problem. For example, if you are stressed about your financial situation, you might be tempted to spend time with friends or watch TV because that’s less anxiety-provoking than creating a budget. But, if you never resolve your financial issues, your coping strategies are only masking the problem. Balance is key.
Recap
Unhealthy coping techniques—such as drinking or avoiding the problem—may offer temporary relief, but they tend to make things worse in the long run. These tactics can also lead to other problems that create more stress and make coping more difficult.
Ultimately, Find What Works for You
The coping strategies that work for someone else might not work for you. Going for a walk might help your partner calm down. But you might find going for a walk when you’re angry causes you to think more about why you’re mad—and it fuels your angry feelings. So you might decide watching a funny video for a few minutes helps you relax.
You might find that certain coping strategies work best for specific issues or emotions. For example, engaging in a hobby may be an effective way to unwind after a long day at work. But, going for a walk in nature might be the best approach when you’re feeling sad.
When it comes to coping skills, there’s always room for improvement. So, assess what tools and resources you can use and consider how you might continue to sharpen your skills in the future.
Recap
It's important to develop your own toolkit of coping skills that you’ll find useful. You may need to experiment with a variety of coping strategies to help you discover which ones work best for you.
Learn more about how therapy at Downers Grove Counseling and Wellness can help you become friendlier and more comfortable with utilizing the coping mechanisms available to you.
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