Coping Mechanisms: How do we deal with stress and our fear of the unknown?

Hi guys,

I know I haven't done a post in a while, but at this point in my life I feel like I'm still in the process of being taught a lot of things which I am not fully educated to speak about yet. So I do not have the authority to speak about a number of things! But I do feel I can share my thoughts on this...

It seems like the consensus of feeling from people surrounding me at the moment is gloominess, depression and stress. Possibly because most of us are third year students which, on an individual can be quite scary feeling an creates a sudden need for introspection. You may start to question a lot of aspects of your life as a reaction from the overwhelming feeling that you're GETTING OLD.

You may start looking as aspects such as:

.The quality of your friendships and relationships with people

.Your career prospects

.Your long-term relationship prospects

.Who you are really are as a person

.And which direction you should take your life in upon graduating?

If you struggle to find an answer to these questions, we often stay in a state of limbo where we are just confused about what exactly we are doing in life? It becomes quite tedious just focusing on one thing such as your degree or even work and that can increase the pressure to dis-cipher these aspects, on top of the pressure of your work or degree it can really lower you spirits and create what my house mate termed as a 'constant black cloud over your head' - you feel down and have zero motivation.

Where's Kelly when you need some motivation?

One thing that concerns me especially is that although we are under pressure, life will inevitably be full of pressure, so rather than moping we should in fact try to find our own coping mechanisms. Because although we cannot change a number of external factors, could we, (upon introspection), discover what makes us truly happy?

If we look at the two types of coping mechanisms, there are ones that provide long-term relief and those that provide short-term relief. Exploring the affect of these could be our first starting point.

Short term coping mechanisms can be things such as:

.Sexual comfort

.Drinking with the aim to get drunk

.Excessive partying

.Watching TV

.Retail therapy

.Takeways

Long term coping mechanisms can be things such as:

.Going to the gym

.Cooking healthy food

.Visiting a careers advisor

.ticking off things from your to do list

.making sure your home is clean and in order

.completing pieces of work

.trying the best way you know how, to fully understand yourself as an individual

.Praying, improving your relationship with God

Now Although the latter may seem less fun, (and agreed only my perspective -everyone's coping mechanisms will be personal) the difference is that these are things that will give you a longer sense of happiness as they give you a lasting sense of achievement. If you don't really know where to start, it might be useful to look at people you really admire and their qualities, and then think to yourself 'do I wish to have that quality?' If so, that should automatically lift your spirits as you then have a goal to work towards. and once you start to adopt these qualities you will automatically feel more contented as you can look at yourself and feel proud and inexcusable of the person you are.

There are many things in this world that we cannot master, but ourselves is something we all have the ability to, so why not embrace it? Plus there is nothing more attractive than a person who truly knows themselves.

I feel like Gavin DeGraw's - 'I don't wanna be' suits the mood of this entry and also a very feel good song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gFCW3PHBws

Remy weave, natural hair & The 20 year old virgins!?

Hey guys, Firstly I'd like to say that omg I took

out my weave and my hair has GROWN, I was taking it out yesterday and I thought the length was due to the fact that I still had extensions left in- but noo It was all mine. But ive already bought some Remy for my next weave and I want some romance curls for july, so I'll only be natural for a few days....

It's Remy Biiiiiitch! hahahahha ohhh shitt! (Nicki Minaj Voice)

But still I loves it! (my natural hair I mean) My mum even said to me 'omg kyomi you have hair' - Par I know she's just lucky she got blessed with gorgeous hair whilst I got the nappier end of the spectrum, but oh well (sigh) such is life......... weave definitely makes your hair grow boy, I love weave... I genuinely do. I think some boys need to be quiet with their dislike for weave as if to say when they tried to have cornrow they didn't try and add a little 22 extension cause the extension wouldnt reach their neck-

just cause it didn't work for youu-pahaha!

But genuinely if you started seeing a girl who wears weave, don't try and tell her to take it out, if it was that much of a problem you should have approached someone who didn't wear it- just saying.

******************************

But anyways onto the main topic of this blog and that is:

Being a virgin in uni :O

*random thoughts*

Hmmmm...See its a difficult thing because in regard to seeing a guy who wants sex, before it was fair to say oh well if he wants sex so bad it's clear he's only after one thing; on to the next guy who will be patient, perfect and understanding blah blah blah and so on and so forth. But now its different. Guys we're mixing with can be like 22 and how are you going to tell a 22 year old that sex isn't on the agenda (well not at least for a year and it has to be special) sex is expected in such adult relationships and unfortunately... the longer we've left it the more likely we're going to come across these not necessarily bad guys but ones that aren't content with a strictly platonic relationship.

Of course it doesn't help at all that were in uni were sex is EVERYwhere: upstairs at a house party, in the Venue toilets, in your room mates room. It's practically in the smelly Canterbury air that we breathe which unluckily works as a disadvantage to us virgins. Most people expect it of the uni lifestyle or at least from a relationship. Apart from that aspect of uni is the fact that relationships in uni travel so fast. usually you go out and him coming to yours, sleeping round, cooking with (sometimes practically living with) is all steps you take in the relationship but at uni. this happens all at once its naturally that it can be overwhelming engaging in quite quickly serious relationships and sex is on the cards even earlier than usual. Even though it might be natural progression of the relationship be aware for the guys who just want to have sexy time with as many girls as they can before they leave uni.

Also in regards to faith, part of you just feels like if you've come this far you might as well wait till marriage and let God's will be done... But finding a husband in uni seems soo far fetched it's crazy.

In so saying that most people find their wife/husband at uni. My english teacher and the head of psycology both found their husbands studying at the university of kent- shyyt thats the only reason I came here... (i'm 100% percent joking) but i think in regards the special guy/girl were looking for is best to que sera it out. Good luck & allways trust your gut!

xoxo

xXKyXx

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