STRESS MANAGEMENT AND OVERALL WELLNESS
Meaningful connections with others can play a key role in stress management and overall wellness. A sense of isolation can lead to chronic stress, which in turn can increase one’s susceptibility to temporary illnesses like colds and to chronic illnesses like heart disease. Although the mechanism isn’t clear, social isolation can be as significant to mortality rates as factors like smoking, high blood pressure, and obesity.
There is no single best pattern of social support that works for everyone. However, research suggests that having a variety of types of relationships may be important for wellness. Here are some tips for strengthening your social ties:
• Foster friendships. Keep in regular contact with your friends. Offer respect, trust, and acceptance, and provide help and support in times of need. Express appreciation for your friends.
• Keep your family ties strong. Stay in touch with the family members you feel close to. If your family doesn’t function well as a support system for its members, create a second “family” of people with whom you have built meaningful ties.
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• Get involved with a group. Do volunteer work, take a class, attend a lecture series, or join a religious group. These types of activities can give you a sense of security, a place to talk about your feelings or concerns, and a way to build new friendships.
Choose activities that are meaningful to you and that include direct involvement with other people.
• Build your communication skills. The more you share your feelings with others, the closer the bonds between you will become. When others are speaking, be a considerate and attentive listener.
Empathy, warmth, respect, and genuineness are qualities of skillful listeners. Attentive listening encourages friends or partners to share more and, in turn, to be attentive listeners. To connect with other people and develop real emotional intimacy, listening is essential.
• Feedback, a constructive response to another’s selfdisclosure, is the third key to good communication. Giving positive feedback means acknowledging that the friend’s or partner’s feelings are valid no matter how upsetting or troubling and offering selfdisclosure in response. Self-disclosure and feedback can open the door to change, whereas other responses block communication and change.
For tips on improving your skills, see the box “Guidelines for Effective Communication.”
Some people have trouble either telling others what they need or saying no to the needs of others. They may suppress their feelings of anger, frustration, and resentment, and they may end up feeling taken advantage of or suffering in unhealthy relationships. At the other extreme are people who express anger openly and directly by being verbally or physically aggressive or indirectly by making critical, hurtful comments to others. Their abusive behavior pushes other people away, so they also have problems with relationships.
If you typically suppress your feelings, you might want to take an assertiveness training course that can help you identify and change your patterns of communication. If you have trouble controlling your anger, you can benefit from learning anger management strategies; see the box “Dealing with Anger.”
Conflict Resolution
Conflict is natural in any relationship, and it can become a key source of stress for friends, coworkers, family members, and intimate partners. No matter how close two people become, they still remain separate individuals with their own needs, desires, past experiences, and ways of seeing the world. Conflict itself isn’t dangerous to a relationship; it may simply indicate that the relationship is growing. But if it isn’t handled in a constructive way, conflict can damage and ultimately destroy a relationship.
Conflict is often accompanied by anger a universal emotion, but one that can be difficult to handle. When angry, both parties should back off until they calm down and then come back to the issue later and try to resolve it rationally.
Getting Started
When you want to have a serious discussion with your partner, choose an appropriate time and place. Find a private place and a time when you will not be interrupted.
• Face your partner and maintain eye contact. Use nonverbal feedback to show that you are interested and involved in the communication process.
