How to calm yourself in a stressful situation: top 5 absurd tips compiled

The expert gives his recommendations

In connection with the latest tragic events, social network users began vying with each other to share tips on how to survive difficult times. To “preserve the stability of the cuckoo,” some suggest stopping reading the news (this is the only way to avoid the dangerous consequences of the so-called bystander syndrome), while others recommend moving to the countryside. “MK” decided to compile the top five most ridiculous proposals and, together with a psychologist, select truly worthwhile recommendations.

The five crazy tips open with a phrase from a resident of Ufa: “I’ll move to live in the village, I’ll go to the bathhouse and plant cabbage. I’ll build a fence around me 4 meters high.”

According to psychologist Anna Prokhorova, there is nothing wrong with living in the countryside. But behind excessively high fences, anxiety does not go away. It may even intensify. When a person strives for constant self-isolation, he continues to cultivate new phobias. Far from society, he becomes a hostage to his not always healthy imagination and media content that “stimulates anxiety.” First, a person seeks comfort, and then becomes essentially a voluntary outcast. Then psychological problems can transform into a psychiatric diagnosis.

In fourth place in our rating is the advice to “buy yourself something tasty.” You can eat anxiety with cake only if it is fleeting or false. If the anxiety was imaginary, almost everything will help you: sweets, a good movie, a glass of wine… But true anxiety cannot be overcome with a tasty treat.

In third place, we have advice to turn to the “infogypsies” who, by the way, have already released the course “Buy yourself a life for 10 thousand rubles.” This week-long course teaches you to hold your breath, look at problems through a skeptical lens, and use other “stress management techniques.” Everything that can be found in a simple book on psychology will be presented to you in shiny packaging, cut into several sessions and chewed.

“A set of these primitive instruments may not cost a thousand rubles. It’s better to spend money on a couple of sessions with a good psychologist, says Anna Prokhorova. “But these courses with provocative names are launched by charlatans who unscrupulously profit from the misfortune of others.

In second place we decided to put the advice to take a contrast shower. Of course, there is nothing wrong with it, but this recipe is absolutely universal for a wide variety of life situations. In addition, a shower can only be an auxiliary measure of self-soothing.

Well, we rightfully give first place to recommendations to draw your fear. Simply because drawing and not working on it is very wrong. Graphic psychotherapy as such exists, but it is absolutely useless if you do not contact a “live” specialist.

Well, now to effective measures. To reduce anxiety and prevent panic, Prokhorova advises getting the whole family together for at least one evening. When you hug your loved ones and take care of them, it gives you a feeling of security and confidence in the future.

In addition, the psychologist advises helping other people. Take a bowl of soup to a neighbor with cancer, join a circle of good gossips who weave a mosquito net, wash the window of a pensioner you know.

“It’s also very important to filter your information field,” says the psychologist. — If you find it difficult to watch the news, don’t turn on the TV. Better listen to calm music and go to bed early.