Stress Management

TECH Entry 9

            This week, the strategies I used to help me out with my classes were the “Stress Diagram” and “A Day at a Time” stress management strategies in order to help me out with my homework that I have to do over break.

I used the “Stress Diagram” strategy for all my classes that assigned work over the break—which would be IST 195, REL 205, HST 231, and WRT 105—in a surprisingly successful attempt to manage my stress levels.  It worked so well because for me, I need a controlled environment when doing my work in order to be productive; and without it, I tend to just run in circles and have a hard time even getting work done.

The other strategy I used was the “A Day at a Time” strategy, and I used it in tandem with the “Stress Diagram” strategy with considerable success in that I used it to give myself a list of the stress factors that were persisting and needing to be eliminated.  It also gave me attention to which factors were more problematic because of the fact that I was having trouble getting rid of them.  This strategy worked well for me because I need a constant reminder of things that need to be taken care of in order to even get things accomplished, so having this on-going list of things that are causing stress enabled me to focus on what they were and get rid of them effectively in a faster fashion than if I had not used the strategy.

5 minutes escape and stress

This week I am going to talk about my stress diagram.  First of all, stress diagram helps us to understand how our stress spread, and how percentages they are.  As a normal person, I also have stress.  I am going to talk about my stress. Most of my stress, is my grade.  As known, I need to transfer to Whitman and ischool.  So I have to work on high grade.  I have been feeling stressed out since the beginning of this semester.  I really want to achive my goal and transfer into Whitman and ischool.  In addition,  I have some stress about my future.  As I am studying in university, I need to worry about what I am going to do in the future. I want to get internship during summer.  However, it does look like that it is easy.  Moreover, I want to apply an RA for next year.  I don’t have a lot confidence about that. It is also a good opportunity for me. I really want to get that. 

Second, I want to talk about five minutes escape. Taking a break is very important. keeping work will make people fatigue.  Once I study every 2 hours, I will take about 10 minutes or 20 mintues break.  Or I call it 5 mintues escape.  During that 5 mintues, I will have a deep breath. Or think something else, try to let my brain take a break.   Or sometimes, I will wash my face or try to breath my teeth.  I also call that 5 minutes escape. I try to keep my brain very clear. 

Blue is GPA concern

Red is career concern

Purple is  life stress. 

Green is TA competition

relax is great

Oh yeah! I am so excited because next week I can see my high school friends in Chicago. Thanksgiving break it is really wonderful time for us to relax for awhile. On this week's tech, I would use stress diagram and five-minute escape to help me escape from the stress of a lot of exams and projects.

stress diagram is a good way for me to know exactly what are the things really make me stressful. One of the things make me crazy was the due day because you have to think about it every single day. A lot of things come into your head is really annoyed so make the gragh to help me find out what are the things become important. I used different  color to help me to see clearly which one makes me so tired so I can do something to relase myself. Usually when I feel tired I would chose to watch a comedy or listern to the music which I loved. After it I would feel full of energy so I can back to work effienctly.

Nest strategy I used was five-minute escape. Due to the fact sometime I do not have so much time to watch movie so use a little break becomes so siginificant. Breaths is a very good way to relax yourself. I still remeber when I was a chid I went to the piano competition I was so nervous at the bac kstage so my mother told me to close my eyes and took a deep breath before I started to perfomance. Everytime it worked for me because you just feel you have nothing should worry about at this moment and all I should do is try my best to express the music. Also, a little exercise is very helpful expecially you feel your body isn't yours.

In summary, everyone has their stressful things so if we can find the proper way to relax ourselves I believe we will work more effiency.

Hope everyone can have a nice Thanksgiving~~

entry 8

This week the strategy I used are time waster and chunk the task. The reason I choose these two strategies are after all the exam I seem to relase myself but you know it is not good if I keep letting my self feel there are nothing I can do.

First of all, I used time waster, on the right column I listed the things which is distrction to me, then I listed the things which I should do. In this way, when I finished the chart I felt so guilty because I disorganize all my plan. Because I am a visual learner so I made this chart in two colors. I have to say this way is very suitable for me because when I posted on my wall, I started to thinking about why I am here, so in some ways it become a motivation for me to keep study.

Another strategies I used this week is chunk the task, firstly, I listed the thing I should have do this week, and then in option 1 and option 2  I write down the time that I should do the task. In this way it helps me set a time to finish the task.   

After making this chart I have certain conceprt that this week I should do what kind of big task and then I have idea that when should I did them . Also, in this way I  can give myself more flexiable time management so I can arrange other stuff in my life.

entry 8

This week I am going to introduce the techniques I use.

     First of all, I want to talk about time wastes.  I am a hardworking student. However, I also be lazy sometimes. When I was being lazy, I would waste a lot of time.  I spent a lot of time on the Internet.  I like to hang out on the facebook or other social networking. i think it is pretty addictive for me. because I can know what my friends are doing when i did not see them in real life. I spent so many time on the social networking without any proper reason for myself.  In addition, I watch a lot of TV. Recently I moved into the dorm,  and I had cable from school and my new TV.  I think American TV show is really awesome.  I am getting used to those TV shows. Generally, I spent a lot of time on both TV and Internet.

      Secondly, I used X minutes reading tech.  I am not good at reading, especially academic reading. I have difficulty in reading long and hard paragraph.  Sometimes it is very hard for me to concentrate on reading.  So I tried to use this X minutes reading.  Basically, I trunk the reading pages, and I summarized the reading materials. When I try to read more paragraph, I will look though and review the previous reading part. I think that helps my mind to understand what the content was trying to show me.

Time waste	Avoid tasks
Faceook social networking TV shows Hanging out with friends	I try to turn off my laptop and TV when it is not necessary for me to run them. If it is really necessary for me to turn on the laptop, I will open the facebook and listen to the music. In addition, I tried to do separate my focus on social networking and TV.

Trunk the reading parts.	Summarize the reading	Review the previous reading
Original of language Language and society Language and society of dialect 1 Language and society of dialect 2	Language is originated from where, when, and how. Different area has different dialect. Explain why and how does that happened.	Original of language Language and society Langage and society dialect 1 Language and society dialect 2

Time Wasters & More

TECH Entry 8

            This week, the strategies I used to help myself out with my classes were the “X Minute Reading” and “Time Wasters” reading and anti-procrastination strategies to help make sure that I get all the work that I have due this last week before break done.

I used the “X Minute Reading” strategy for my HST 231 class because the readings in it at the moment are very difficult to understand and are also quite lengthy.  And I found this strategy to be so helpful because it is really tailored to mold the user’s individual learning methods.  I have a hard time staying focused on lengthy and involved readings, but by using this strategy I could break it up into smaller sections and then at the end of each I summarized what I learned and reviewed that information, took a short break to clear my head, and then got back to the reading after quickly reviewing the previous material.  And the reward function of this strategy did wonders to motivate me to complete the reading so I could utilize it.

The other strategy, “Time Wasters,” I used for all my classes and it helped me to stop procrastinating today and get started on my work because it showed me that I really did not have time to waste any time at all.  It clearly listed what I was doing to procrastinate as well as the tasks I was trying to avoid having to do, which for me, was really helpful because I need to see the reminder in order for the reality to set in.  And the reality was that I was procrastinating and wasting valuable time that I really could not afford to waste.  Both strategies worked very well.

academic fear and exploring rewards

This week I am going to use academic fear and exploring rewards for my studying.

This semester, my tasks of my courses are not hard. I am keep doing my work. however, I am kind of lazy sometimes.  I have very high expectation for myself.  I finished all my homework.  My problem is that I can do better during this homework. My fear is laziness. In addition, when I am taking literal art courses, such as linguistic. My English is still a problem. I cannot read very fast.  I have to spend a lot of time reading again and again. by the way, it is a huge lecture. Professor pays very little attention to each individual student. 

So I write a tables for myself to analyze my problems. This tables are listed as following.

Academic fear	Worst outcome	Best outcome	Attention needed
1.     Laziness 2.     Reading in English 3.     Endless homework assignment 4.     High pressure exam	1.Low grade in the courses 2. fail the classes 3. disappoint myself and paretns. 4. waste my money and time.	1.     high grade 2.     easy to find a intenship or job.	1.keep myself busy and doing my work on time. 2. socialize less time. 3. pay more attention in the courses.

the other strategy is exploring rewards. I used this strategy pretty often.  Because I don’t want to study all the time, I give myself a lot of time to entertain myself. When I got high grade in my exam, I often reward myself something. Such as food, clothes.  I feel very excited when I get high grade in my exams.  at same time, I will encourage myself keep studying in the future. In other hand, I will reward myself. It is a win win strategy. I also listed my table as following.

No cost rewards	Play more time with ppl on my floor every night. Study less time. Watch tv, or play video game
Low cost rewards	Buy myself a meal of great food.  Or go to movie with friends. Buy a second hand video game
High cost reward	Buy myself clothes I like or sneaker I like. At the same time, I can buy some toys for myself.

Motivation

This week the strategies I used to help me have a positive status to study are Acedemic fear and Exploring Rewards.

 Although I do not want to admit that sometimes I really afraid heard that we will hve an exam on HOM165, I have to force myself to review it. So the strategy Acedemic fear help me to find out what is my problem and how I ca solve them. When you face the tough problem the best way is not excape from it but solve it.

So I filled the chart as the strategy told me and after that I find actually I can find way to solve them, it is not good if I always avoid to face this problem. The worst consequences even if it happened I can still have chance to make it up. Also , this strategy help me to list the method to get out of this trouble, that means if I really want to change the situation here I can change the result.

The second strategy is exploring rewards it helps me to encourage myself do not give up on the way so I can get the things  I wanted.

The good pointa of this strategy is it divides them to different level, such like if I finished the easy task I can reward myself with the thing I can do easilt,. However, as the diffculty increased that means I should pay more cost in order to reach my goal.

After the strategy I useed this week, I totally understnand how important the psycological suggestion is, if you want a thing badly you can do it!!!!

Motivation

TECH Entry 7

            This week, the strategies I used to help myself out with my classes were the “Exploring Rewards” and “Weighing Consequences” motivation strategies in order to kick myself into gear so I can get my work done for all my classes (IST 195, CLS105, REL 205, HST 231, WRT 105) for these last two weeks before break.

I used the “Exploring Rewards” strategy to give myself a physical list of rewards I intended to give myself if I could get my everyday work done ahead of time before it was even due.  And this worked well for me because given the way I am I tend to forget things pretty easily and end up just getting tunnel-vision on my work and forget to take breaks and just relax.  I did not really like the way it was set up with how it listed the categories for rewards so I changed the wording and filled it in with my rewards.

The other strategy I used, “Weighing Consequences,” was a great tool in my opinion because it lists a very plain and simple approach for work that needs to get done but does not have a lot of appeal for getting accomplished; and for me, that happens to apply to a lot of my work.  I used this strategy to smack myself in the face about how I was planning on completing the major assignment that I have due in each of my five classes the week before break; and it worked really, really well in helping me to organize my time which I am normally not very good at.