Welcome back to another year at WISS! After such a stressful COVID-induced summer, and being a student in one of the few schools open in the world, how can you take care of your mental health in this trying time?
There are definitely different ways to generally relax—talking to your friends, drinking and eating properly, asking for help, taking a break. However, we as members of the WISS community wanted to create specific remedies for common causes of mental strain that we students face.
1. Relieve Stress
First of all, you should focus on the origin of your stress. What exactly is causing this? Is it a particular piece of homework? Is it your grades? Is it your friends? Locating the main cause of your stress can help you understand and find the specific solution to your problems.
After you have locked down on the prime source of your stress, write down a list of specific aspects of your stress source. For example, if it’s your homework, what is it about this that stresses you? Is the content hard to understand? Is there just too much to do?
If your stress sources are similar to the example above, simply go talk to the teacher, and come to a compromise, all the teachers at WISS are pretty understanding and forgiving, so all you’ve got to do is talk to them!
Talk to your advisory teacher first. Your Advisory teacher is the first person you should approach if you are facing difficulties at school. If that doesn’t quite work, talk to you Grade level leader. If you do not feel comfortable talking to your teachers, our community has on-campus counselors— Ms. Jae and Mr. Matheson. Ms. Jae is the counselor for grades 9 and 10, and is in charge of learning support from grades 6 to 12. Mr. Matheson is the 7th and 8th grade counselor, as well as the college counselor for Grade 11. He is also the guidance lead for the advisories- basically plans all the agenda for the advisory periods. Ms. Mei is the school psychologist. She offers help to all student from pre-k to Grade 12. All you’ve got to do is email any one of them and set up an appointment.
2. Tips for Anxiety
When are you most anxious? When you’re called to stand up and present in front of the class? Or perhaps when you experience something that triggers a series of traumatic memories?
You’re not the only one! During Coronavirus quarantine, I was incredibly behind in all my school work, I would constantly receive a series of emails from teachers asking me to upload my work. Every time I would hear the sound of new mail in my inbox, my heart would just drop and for a split second, I would freak out. I’m sure many people feel the same way, maybe with the same situation, or with something else. Nevertheless, here are some tips to relieve anxiety!
Get a good nights sleep! I cannot stress the importance of this tip. A good nights sleep keeps you focused and prevents things from slipping your mind. Science has proven that chemicals in your brain connected to sleep reduce the amount the stress hormones produced, thus reducing attacks of anxiety.
Build different memories of things that trigger an emotional response. For example, the sound of a new email used to make me extremely anxious, but then I started to use it to talk/chat with my friends. Soon, I looked forward to new emails, and whenever I heard that *ding* sound, I was excited.
Another tip for anxiety is to prevent it from the start. If you know you’re probably going to procrastinate or have poor time management skills, just finishing it in the beginning will 100% prevent all your anxiety and stress from affecting you in the future. Just don’t think about it too much and force yourself to do it. It’s always better to have something done, no matter how crappy it is, rather than an unfinished piece of work. Trust me, it will feel much better if you finish something first because you can always go back and change it, as opposed to not finishing it.
3. Tips for Battling Quarantine Depression (Corona Blue)
Corona blue is a term used to describe depression caused during quarantine. Although, we as members of the WISS community have been extremely fortunate to be able to go to school, and walk about freely. Countless people around the globe are still in quarantine, and the rest of the world is in turmoil. Remember the previous summer holiday? Do you remember how local supermarkets were ordered by the government to close for a couple of days? The empty aisles in convenience stores? To be very honest, living the life we have now, I kind of forgot all these struggles we endured during covid-summer. HOWEVER, if you still feel the effects of corona blue, then this tip is perfect for you!
An effective way to battle depression is to go out and exercise. It doesn’t have to be too intense, just a small bike ride around your compound or to the nearest supermarket, or someplace close by such as Lidoway, or Feastworld will do the trick. Fresh air helps, truly.
If you’d still prefer not to physically exert yourselves, go read books. The WISS library has a vast collection of books, in all sorts of languages, from science fiction to biographies.
Do things that really makes you happy. Nothing illegal though…. Remind yourself what happiness is. If you don’t know what makes you happy, well then, explore! Try all the things in the world, I mean, eventually you’ll find something that interests you.
Stay safe, stay happy. Keep a healthy mind. Y’all got this!
Comments