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Dealing with frustration

Homeā†’Forumsā†’Emotional Masteryā†’Dealing with frustration

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  • #179083
    Poppyxo
    Participant

    Hi,

    I think I may have brought this subject up before, but still need clarity.
    I work within an education environment & support students emotionally.
    When speaking with students, anxiety is the most prominent within them & when giving/suggesting solutions in how to deal with certain situations, sometimes I feel a range of thoughts 1 – they’re not listening to me, 2 – they don’t think what I’m saying will work & 3 – they won’t try what I suggest.

    This leads me to become very frustrated & sometimes I think things like “if you just listen to me & try these things out your suffering will ease or end all together, so why am I even wasting my time with you”. Now I know we’ve all been there & people need to take there own paths, whether that be with my guidance or not, but I struggle to stop those thoughts & also to handle the frustation.

    Any tips?

    #179085
    Poppyxo
    Participant

    I have made a previous post about this which I have just read through – but any extra comments are welcome šŸ™‚

    #179089
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Poppyxo:

    When you think regarding your students: “If you just listen to me & try these things out your suffering will ease or end all together”, it is the same “people saving mode thinking” you referred to in your Nov 17 (five days ago) reply to a member. You wrote there regarding your mother: “I wentĀ  in to ‘people saving mode’ thinking I could save her, I can help her, I can make herĀ  see her ways.”

    In that comment you indicated this people-saving-mode thinking doesn’t work. You wrote: “never worked, never does, you can’t change people, only your response or yourself. So now, when this arises, I simply keep my cool”.

    Oct 17, in regard to your boyfriend, you wrote: “I am results driven so I say ‘ok so what areĀ  weĀ  going to do about this?’ …I feel, that his situation could be made better if he took a different approach to his current one”.

    No wonder the same people saving modeĀ  of your thinking which applied to your mother, to your boyfriend, also applies to the students you work with.

    Habits of thinking-feeling-believing are very difficult to change.

    BasedĀ  on my experience with my own people savingĀ  modeĀ  of thinking is that when in that mode I misunderstood people and reality. People are not predominantly rational. People are predominantly emotional. So when you offer your rational solutions to the students, you are offering them the rational, ignoring the reality that it is not the rational that drives them.

    You can’t go inside the brain of a student and ease that fear, calm it, make itĀ  go away. If you could, andĀ  did, then you could present your rational suggestion, or the student may seeĀ  it himself or herself right away.

    Fear is aĀ  veryĀ  powerful emotion. Reason doesn’t soothe it.

    WhatĀ  do you think of my input so far?

    anita

    #179127
    Peter
    Participant

    You certainly have a challenging job and the frustration is understandable however my not be helpful.

    I suspect if you think back to your student days you would remember how unlikely it was to seek out advice let alone listen to unsolicited help from an adult. Even if you were of the personality type that did listen it is likely you didnā€™t have the skill set to implement the advice in the moment. Change takes time then happens all at once and it can take years to learn how to deal with anxiety.

    Take the above as an example. I could rationally explain to someone that is feeling frustration for advice that is not received as hoped is an unskillful practice. That this feeling of frustration is more about them then the students they are trying to help. If the person the are hoping to help senses the frustration they could feel at a subconsciously level that the problem had been highjacked (no longer about them) and stop listening. They may even feel anxiety about being the cause of that frustration.

    Depending on your personality type you might hear the above advice negatively and so pay it no heed šŸ™‚ (If you read on I hope to explain myself as I intend no offence). Even if the advice was heard learning to cultivate a skillful practice is going to take time

    As a counselor, I think you must embrace the serenity prayer – Ā change the things you can change, accept the things you canā€™t and work on gaining the wisdom to know the difference.

    You canā€™t change others but you can be the change you want to see. I know that might not sound like it applies but I think it does.

    I loved watching the Dog Whisperer.Ā  It amazed me that time and time again it was demonstrated that the dogā€™s behavior originated from the owners. That for the owners to get the change they wanted in their dogs they had to learn to become the change they hoped to see. If they were calm their dogs were more likely be calm. (kind of like the law of attraction).

    The dog whisperer talked about being calm and assertive. (the assertive word got him in trouble with dog community which equated assertiveness with aggression but they miss-understood) So I would use calm and intentional.

    At the heart of being calm and intention is the ability to listen and respond vice react in the moment. Ā I would bet that if someoneĀ cultivated the practice of being calm and intentional they would have greater influence with those they engaged with. I don’t think its advice that is going to change the situation but how you listen that will create space for change.

    Another lesson I learned by watching the show was the problems with dog mind is that it becomes fixated on what it ā€˜fearsā€™ and canā€™t look away. In such a state, often all that was required was a nudge on the leash to distract and create space to disengage from the ā€˜fearā€™ and see it for what it is. (almost always False Evidence Appearing Real)

    I suspect a student experiencing anxiety is more likely to listen to a person that listens in a calm and intentional way and that “knows” when to nudge in order to create space for the student to disengage from the issue they are fixated on and find there own way out.

    • This reply was modified 7 years ago by Peter.
    #179129
    Poppyxo
    Participant

    Hi Anita,

    I think you’re spot on.

    In reality if it were that easy there wouldn’t be such a thing as counsellors & therapists etc. So, I understand why I feel this way, bit how can I change it? Haha. Because in my previous post I was still ‘stuck’. I recognise this pattern if frustration but can never seem to let it go.. I’ve also come across two interesting jobs, but because they’re prodominantly based around children & bahviour, I wonder how my feelings will stand up day in day out.

    #179195
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Poppyxo:

    You wrote: “how can I changeĀ  it?” andĀ  answeredĀ  previously, Nov 17: “IĀ  simply keep my cool” in relation to your mother (I wonder if you are always successful keeping your cool with her?)

    Extend this awareness to everyone, theĀ  awareness thatĀ  you cannot change anyone. Not because any particular person is unnaturallyĀ  stubborn, but because people areĀ  motivated by emotions, mostly by fear, and you can not calm that fearĀ  of theirs on a regular basis. You cannot beĀ  there with them day in and day out, every moment, and put out that fire, that fear.

    When you are aware, in any situation, when interactingĀ  with anyĀ  person, that there reallyĀ  isĀ  nothingĀ  that you can do, it isĀ  very minimal, then you relax.

    anita

    #179223
    Peter
    Participant

    good thing I don’t get frustrated when ignored šŸ™‚

     

    • This reply was modified 7 years ago by Peter.
    #179233
    Poppyxo
    Participant

    Sorry Peter,

    I’ve just looked over this thread & didn’t see your original post, I’ve only seen it now? Weird!

    I’ll need to re read it again because I got a bit confused with what you’re saying, once in in a quiet place later I will re read, but agree with most of what I picked up from it. I do listen calmly & I don’t allow this frustration to change my behaviours in the moment (or at least I don’t think I do) it’s more after that I look over the discussions I’ve had, especially if I see them again & they present exactly the same problem.

     

    Anita – yes you’re right, I can do this with my mum so I should be able to do this with those students.

    #179243
    Anonymous
    Guest

    Dear Poppyxo:

    ItĀ  is a good idea, when something works with one person and in one context, to practice it with other people, in other contexts, if it makes sense. And here, it does. This way you extend what works and limits what doesn’t work to more and more areas in your life.

    anita

    #179245
    Peter
    Participant

    SorryĀ  words can get away from me.

    To Summarize: Away to deal with feelings of frustration is to make the conscious, recognize the feelings for what they are and let them flow/go. Ā Notice, experience, breathe and move forwardā€¦ maybe with a silent prayer or positive thought towards the person you were hoping to help.

    The above lead me to thinking about how we direct or donā€™t direct our conciseness. I suspect most people donā€™t think of conciseness as something they direct though that is one of the purposes of the practice of meditation. I would argue that such a practice isnā€™t something to do in an hour but in every moment.

    Anyway. I visualize my conciseness as being dog like. Attracted to any experience that stands out especially fear. Sometimes its ok to let my awareness run free but sometimes I need to put a “leash” on it and ask it to heal (return to the still point). Especially when it becomes fixated on fear, a memory or an emotion like frustration which tends to intensifies the situation. Ā I find doing so in a calm intentional manner is most effective.

    My thinking was that if you took up such a practice (however you wish to visualize it) you would be in a better position to influence those you wish to help. I suspect that your frustration with feeling frustrated as well as most of the studentā€™s anxiety is a result of consciousness becoming fixated on the issue or emotion and so not being able to, ā€˜breatheā€™ and let the experience flow through.

    This brings me to my favorite quote:

    ā€œAt the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless; Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,Ā But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,Ā Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,Ā Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,Ā There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.”- Ā TS Eliot

    #179411
    jon kirkham
    Participant

    Just a little addition, maybe a bit limited, but; how about a little addition to your perception – in that maybe 1 day it will cotton onto their true self. I know from personal experience what it’s like to not listen to people. Or to also listen but not connect. But how sometimes, eventually, i have finally had the light bulb which has been fired up over a statement that was put forward by somebody, or somebody elses wisdom. Just that some people are slower than others. We don’t know what is going to happen later down the line. So letting frustration pour over a future which you possibly won’t find out about doesn’t help you in the present. Maybe it will work in their favor, maybe it won’t. Nobody knows. However having faith and hoping that with you putting in your best efforts will have a positive effect 1 way or another can alleviate ourselves in a way. Some people can be helped by others, some can’t. Some learn through trial and error. Some people learn from others, while some don’t. It’s not simple at the end of the day. Each and every individual mind is different in multiple ways for multiple reasons. But it doesn’t mean that you should stop or give up in what it is that you’re doing.

     

    But emotions are a bit tricky and can get in the way at times. We never sop learning…

    #180297
    frantzces
    Participant

    I believe when we are in the helping profession it’s important to be mindful of whether what we are doing is our own agenda. Of course, we know more often than not what’s good for our clients but we need to be mindful of our agenda. I’m not sure how old your students are because this depends on their age. When frustrations such as this arise (especially if they arise frequently), it’s looking at your own self-care plan to manage these frustrations. Because it’s important to meet each client where they are.

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