Wellness & Body Image

Wellness & Focusing

Your ability to focus has a large impact on how well you do on exams, papers and in other competitive arenas. It also affects how relaxed you feel, how you interact with others, and how much you enjoy life. Focusing skills are learned, and there are important differences in the ways in which men and women focus their attention.

The Center offers the Focus Factor Workshop Series to help you achieve a focusing edge in classes and to make it easier for you to relax and accomplish more in less time. Learning about differences in the ways in which men and women focus will also help your communication and relationship skills. Go to Upcoming Workshops & Events for more information.

Eating & Body Image

Maintaining healthy eating habits and good nutrition can help you perform at your best. Eating behaviors can be linked with how confident you feel about your body and with self-esteem in general.

Unhealthy eating habits often start to occur during times of stress. There are many different “triggers” that can cause us to overeat or eat in unhealthy ways. These triggers include: stress, anxiety, relationship problems, conflict, boredom, loneliness, body image problems, depression and overload. It is important to recognize and understand these triggers.

In recent years, clinical researchers have developed a number of highly effective strategies for acquiring healthy eating patterns and controlling overeating. Attend the Center's Eat Fit: Feel Great Series to learn these strategies and to learn how you can improve your sense of confidence in your body and in your appearance. Go to Upcoming Workshops & Events for more information.

Strategies for Staying Well & Handling Stress

Being a college student can be exciting, rewarding, fun, engaging and meaningful. At the same time, the experience of being in college can be very stressful. Students may experience stress for a variety of reasons, including: being away from home for the first time; trying to balance the demands of classes, work, extracurricular activities and a social life; trying to meet new people and establish relationships and friendships; trying to clarify goals, career paths and identity; and dealing with the competitiveness within many majors. Even positive changes in your life (starting a new relationship) can bring about some degree of stress.

How Does Stress Affect Us?

Stress has a physiological affect on us. When you are under stress, you may experience an increase in heart rate, muscle tension, headaches, respiration rate, blood pressure, stomach aches and other somatic symptoms. People also have a tendency to gain weight when they are under stress.

Stress also can have a psychological impact, causing increased anxiety, nervousness, sadness, depression and anger, and decreased memory, motivation, sex drive and concentration.

What Determines How You Respond to Stress?

A number of factors play a role in how we respond to a stressful situation. Some factors fortify or buffer us in the face of difficult situations. Other factors make us more vulnerable.

Some of the things that can buffer you or help you cope with stressful situations are:

Physical:

• Being rested; getting enough sleep
• Good nutrition

Exercise

• Emotional:
• Good self-esteem: People who have higher self-esteem tend to see a difficult situation as a challenge, rather than feeling overwhelmed.
• Dealing with feelings through disclosure (either writing or talking about what is on your mind)

Cognitive:

• Focusing on the parts of the situation that are under your control
• Avoiding thoughts that are self-defeating, inaccurate, catastrophizing, over generalizing, or irrational
• Avoiding rumination and worry
• Learning techniques for relaxing (e.g., guided imagery, meditation)

Social:

• Social support: Having people with whom you feel close, can confide in and count on
• Maintaining contact with others, even when you feel like isolating yourself
• Exercise

Behavioral:

• Coping with stress in an “active” way (e.g., talking with a friend, going for a run, problem solving) rather than a “passive way” (e.g., staying in bed, drinking)
• Making time to do things that are fun and engaging (e.g., going to a movie, playing tennis)
• Managing your time; dividing tasks into smaller steps

The Center offers many workshops that can help you learn and develop ways to stay healthy and resilient. Go to Upcoming Workshops & Events for more information.

Stress and Gender

There are gender differences in how men and women respond to stress. Although men and women have similar physiological responses to stress, their psychological responses are often different. According to research done by UCLA Social Psychologist, Shelley Taylor, Ph.D., the hormones testosterone and estrogen react differently to oxytocin (a hormone that helps foster social and nurturing behaviors). Testosterone blunts the effects of oxytocin while estrogen heightens it. Therefore, men have a tendency to respond more often with the “fight or flight” reaction of aggression and/or emotional withdrawal; while women are more likely to use the “tend and befriend” strategy by seeking social support and talking about their stress more openly with their family and friends.

The “tend and befriend” strategy is actually more effective at relieving stress by allowing you to express and validate your feelings, whereas the “fight or flight” reaction often leaves stress and anxiety bottled up inside because most modern stressful situations do not allow fighting or running as successful resolutions.

That is not to say that both genders are locked in to these patterns. There is a wide variety of reactions to stress in both genders, and the same person will even use different coping strategies at different times. Social norms also play a key role in encouraging or discouraging certain kinds of coping within each gender.

Relaxation Techniques

Abdominal Breathing

The way you breathe reflects the level of tension you carry in your body. During stress, your breathing becomes more shallow and rapid, and you breathe from the chest. Another form of breathing, which is connected to a more relaxed state, comes from the abdomen and uses the diaphragm rather than the chest muscles to draw air deeper into the lungs. Being mindful and focusing on your breathing can be an effective way to reduce stress. Simply closing your eyes, counting as you breather, and focusing on your breathing can be a simply way to relax and find balance before or during a stressful time. Some of benefits of abdominal breathing include:

• Increased oxygen supply to the brain and muscles.
• Stimulation of parasympathetic nervous system, which promotes a state of calmness and quiescence.
• Reduced anxiety and worry.
• Improved concentration because it helps to quiet the mind.

Meditation

Meditation is a process that allows you to let go of thoughts of the past or the future, and just focus on the present moment. In United States , meditation was popularized in the 1970s with the published of book The Relaxation Response by Herbert Benson. Some of benefits from practicing meditation are:

• Sharpened alertness
• Increased energy level and productivity
• Reduced chronic anxiety
• Increased objectivity
• Decreased dependence on alcohol or recreational drugs
• Increased accessibility of emotions
• Heightened self esteem and sense of identity

Guidelines for practicing meditation (cited from the Anxiety & Phobia Workbook, 2000, R. Bourne)

1.Find a quiet environment. Try to reduce external noise. Play a tape of soft instrumental sounds or sounds from nature (for example the sound of ocean waves).

2.Reduce muscle tension by breathing deeply from your stomach.

3.Sit properly:

Eastern style

Cross-legged on the floor or a cushion supporting your buttocks. Rest your hands on your thighs and lean slightly forward so that some of your weight is supported by your thighs and buttocks.

Western style

Sit in a comfortable position, perhaps on a straight backed chair, with your feet on the floor and legs uncrossed, hands on your thighs.

1.For beginners, start out with 5-10 minutes. As you progress, increase time up to 20-30 minutes.

2.Make it a regular practice to meditate every day, even if you only meditate for 5 minutes.

3.Avoid meditating with a full stomach or when you are tired.

4.Select a specific focus for your attention. For example, focus only on your breathing, or focus on a candle flame.

5.Be non-judgmental; just accept all the sensations and feelings or thoughts that come across in your mind.

6.Every time your attention wanders from your focus, gently bring it back again. Distractions are normal. Don't dwell on the outcome of your meditation. Some meditations will feel good, some mediocre, and sometimes it's difficult to meditate. The more you let go and refrain from trying to do anything other than guiding your attention to your object of focus, the deeper your experience of the meditation will be.

Visualization

The French pharmacist Emil Coue asserted that the power of imagination exceeds that of your unconscious mind. If you have a specific goal, visualizing the attainment of that goal increases your confidence and ability to make it come true. Athletes, trial lawyers, students, and salespersons use this technique to their advantage. During a stressful time or when you feel stuck and anxious, try to visualize yourself in a favorite place where you usually find yourself relaxed and calm. Some common places most people like are the beach, mountains, and forest.

Guidelines for effective visualization

1.Get into a comfortable position
2.Make sure your environment is quiet and free from distraction
3.Give yourself some time to relax; close your eyes, and breathe deeply from your stomach
4.If you like, you can make affirmations such as “I am at peace”, “I am relaxed”, “I am letting go of my tension”.
5.Picture yourself in your favorite relaxing place in vivid detail. For example, if you visualize yourself on the beach, picture the color and the smell of the ocean, the white sand, the clear blue sky, coconuts trees, the sound of waves, etc.

Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR)

Developed by Dr. Edmund Jacobson, progressive muscle relaxation is a systematic technique for achieving a deep state of relaxation. He discovered that a muscle could be relaxed by first tensing it for a few seconds and then releasing it. Tensing and releasing different muscle groups produce muscle relaxation because it gives you a chance to be aware of the sensations of your body, and to learn how to relax your body when you experience stress.

Guidelines for PMR:

1.Sit or lay down in comfortable position
2.Tense each muscle group for 7-10 seconds and do so vigorously without straining.
3.Concentrate on what is happening and how it feels
4.Release and relax your muscle, do so abruptly for 15-20 seconds before tensing the next muscle group
5.Pay attention to the difference between relaxation and tension

Yoga

Yoga is an ancient Indian practice that combines relaxation, breathing technique, and exercise to combat stress, to improve blood circulation, and to increase the movement of joints. Today, yoga is considered a science of health. In yoga, mind and body are linked and integrated to create a state of internal peacefulness. It brings an individual from a state of separation to a sense of self unity. Yoga techniques concentrate on posture alignment, and stretching produce emotional, mental, and physical calm.

Some benefits are:

• Decrease blood pressure
• Sleeping improvement
• Immunity increases
• Increase energy level
• Increase cardiovascular efficiency
• Decreases pain
• Normalizes weight
• Increase endurance, strength, and flexibility

Self Help Books

The Center for Women and Men has a library of useful books that you can check out for a two week period. There is a wide range of topics from stress to body image to sexual assault. Self help books and bibliotherapy can be a very effective way to learn new coping skills to combat stress!