You may need professional health when dealing with stressful situations and you may need help of a psychologist. Check out the list below.
It’s not easy to see just when our problems get too big to handle. For a time, it’s easy to hide them and tell ourselves that we can continue on by burying them.
But sooner or later those hidden difficulties get out. Sometimes they show up as real physical ailments like headaches or back pains. Other times they invade our minds, depressing us, causing stress, even ruining our lives.
There’s no need for that to happen. If you can become aware of some of the situations that can bring on stress, you’ll be able to recognize the need to discuss your feelings with a qualified psychologist before they get the best of you.
With techniques that can help you learn to relax and monitor your own stress signals, you’ll be able to regain positive control of your body, your mind, and your life.
Here’s a short list of some major situations that can mean problems are getting too big to handle alone:
1. You see your future as flat, emotionless and tiring. You feel that over time your life has become meaningless and unrewarding, and few things seem like fun anymore.
2. An important life change occurs. Life changes include marriage, death of a loved person, change or contemplated change of careers or jobs, divorce, the prospect of caring for aging parents, retirement, or death of a partner. Adjustments to these changes often present greater emotional difficulties than we’d like to admit.
3. Certain normal stages of life frequently bring with them stress and tension that are difficult to cope with: adolescence, parenthood, the midlife period, the onset of old age–even the contemplation of one’s own death at any age.
4. You find yourself drawing away from friends and relatives. It becomes difficult to share your thoughts and feelings with others. These feelings of isolation are often accompanied by the perception that the world is treating you unfairly. Speaking to a psychologist at this point is extremely helpful.
5. You find yourself stuck in a pattern of behavior that once was satisfying but, over the years, has become empty. The conqueror, the person who relies on anger or temper to get what he wants, and the tireless worker all fall into this group.
6. Stress begins to take control of you, and you feel helpless and unable to make decisions. Addictive behaviors often result: alcoholism, over-eating, smoking. Stress and its manifestations can be controlled with the help of a psychologist through holistic methods. You can learn to become aware of your body’s signals through simple procedures that can help you let go of stress.
7. You constantly feel inadequate in spite of success. It is hard for you to accept compliments because you are nagged by feelings of low self-esteem. You have lost confidence in yourself. You feel unloved and unlovable.
8. Feelings of fear and resentment may persist for a long time after severe illness or physical assault. Counseling is often necessary to keep these feelings from taking control of your life.
9. You find yourself constantly becoming afraid of things you never feared before. Those vague fears can begin to restrict your behavior and grow into phobias. Routine functions may become harder for you to perform, and needs to be discussed with a counselor.
10. You are plagued with frequent physical ailments, often of a vague nature, such as acid stomach, asthma, eating disorders, sexual dysfunction, backaches or headaches. Stress can be the cause of these recurring problems, and learning to control stress can help to diminish these symptoms.
11. Your life is going well, but still you feel the need for more– more excitement, more opportunity, fuller realization of your potential. You need to clarify your feelings, and the help of a coach can provide the support you need to continue your personal growth.
This list is certainly not complete, but it can help you to recognize some of the situations in which consultation with a coach may be needed and can be successful. Most of us experience some of these feelings from time to time, and that’s to be expected. But when they persist and become the main pattern of our behavior, they are just too big to handle alone.
