How To Enhance Stress Management In The Face Of Oppositions?
Although the oppositions have to do with the way in which the administration fills job positions configured by the State, there is no doubt that it is not a simple bureaucratic process.
It is a phenomenon with a clear human and psychological dimension, and of all the emotional elements involved in it, one of the most important is stress management.
And it is that The fact of preparing for oppositions usually makes it easier for candidates to become more stressed people than usual compared to the rest of the population. Luckily, from Psychology there are proposals to manage the emotions and feelings linked to this discomfort.
Why is it important to prepare psychologically for oppositions?
Stress is a form of psychological pain that, in most cases, is completely natural. and even beneficial. The biological and psychological mechanisms on which they are based are the fruit of hundreds of thousands of years of evolution, which has led our lineage to have several “tricks up our sleeve” to quickly adapt to situations of danger or crisis in which we face. Something has to be done as soon as possible.
Of course, when we expose ourselves to situations that keep us tense for longer periods than normal, it is easy for problems to arise, and this often happens when preparing for exams. The more persistent that external source of stress is, the more likely we are to participate in maintaining this without realizing it, adopting dysfunctional ways of managing our emotions. In these cases, stress becomes one of the causes of our problems, instead of being a resource to adapt to them, thus creating a vicious circle.
Thus, when we prepare to present our candidacy for competitive examinations, we are not predestined to suffer mental health problems, but we do have a greater risk of suffering unnecessarily or even of involuntarily participating in the emergence of a psychopathology: a phobia, a mood disorder, panic attacks, etc. Given these possibilities it is better know some of the keys to stress management so as not to let the study sessions applied to our daily lives for months take their toll on us.
5 tips to learn to manage stress when facing exams
The first rule to know how to manage stress is to assume that there are no magic recipes, nor infallible ways to ensure a total avoidance of discomfort due to being anxious or stressed. Emotions always have an advantage regarding our strategies and our voluntary actions.going ahead of them, although we do have room for maneuver to modulate their intensity and to increase or decrease the probabilities of experiencing them given a given context.
Therefore, the advice that you will find below is not perfect nor does it guarantee that you will not suffer stress, but it is based on principles used in psychotherapy and can help you emotionally cope with those months of hard preparation for exams. In any case, you must be clear that In cases of severe discomfort, it is essential to seek professional help in psychotherapy.
1. Establish a schedule that includes the important moments of the day
Your schedule should be as detailed as possible, limiting when the main blocks of activities of your day to day start and end from Monday to Sunday. This includes both the study sessions and the time between them, including (and this is very important) the periods of sleep and rest during the day. We will see the latter in more detail in the next section.
If you assume that your study sessions will consist of stretches of several hours in a row in which you will be preparing for the exam without detailing anything else in your schedule, you are doing it wrong. You should plan that for every 40 or 50 minutes of studying, you should rest at least 10 minutes. Thus you will ensure that you can make use of your maximum attentional capacityavoiding spending half an hour looking at your notes without being able to assimilate anything you read.
During these breaks, it is important that you do not stay in the chair you were in, that you stretch your legs and that you can look elsewhere than at the computer screen, your notes or the books you have been using. That way you will let your eyes rest. Remember that physical fatigue also produces mental fatigue, and this state of weakness predisposes you to enter a more intense state of stress to try to “compensate” for that vulnerability.
Furthermore, it is important that from time to time during the same day you intersperse these small breaks with longer ones, lasting at least half an hour.
3. Assume that going to sleep is one of the most important times of the day
Something as simple as sleeping 45 minutes less than you should will make you perform significantly less on that study day. This includes problems concentrating, problems remembering, and even physical discomfort. Furthermore, if lack of sleep becomes a persistent problem in your daily life, the physical wear and tear it will cause will also affect your brain, exposing you more to stress and even depressive symptoms.
Therefore, it is very important that you are clear about the exact moment when you should be in bed with the light off. If necessary, include in your schedule not only that moment, but also the preparation activities before going to sleep: brushing your teeth, clearing your table, etc.
4. Include moments of leisure in your opposition preparation program
You should not see moments of leisure as a waste of time, but rather They can also be an element that helps you better manage your emotions. and your life in general.
Beyond providing you with well-being in a subjective sense, having the possibility of disconnecting serves both as an incentive and source of self-motivation (for example, so that you can consider “earning” those moments when completing your study schedule) and to let Your brain also receives stimuli from areas of your life that have nothing to do with oppositions, which is beneficial when it comes to maintaining good mental health.
5. Fill out a personal diary
Finally, the routine of filling out a personal diary can help you manage stress when facing exams because it will make it easier for you to detect dysfunctional behavioral patterns that you use to vent the anxiety and tension that you will sometimes feel.
See if you get used to performing rituals to “cover” that discomfort., such as going to the refrigerator and eating without hunger, or smoking, etc. Once you have recognized these actions that you perform almost unconsciously, you will be able to note their frequency and recognize the moments in which it occurs to you to carry out these behaviors, which will make it easier to avoid them in time.
Are you looking for psychological assistance to prepare for exams?
Preparing for competitive examinations is a very complex and psychologically demanding process, which is why some psychotherapy centers have developed programs specifically designed for this type of needs.
In UPAD Psychology and Coaching We have been serving both people with diagnosable mental health problems and professional projects that require mental preparation for years; We work with professional athletes, opponents, senior company officials, and all types of people exposed to pressure due to their short, medium and long-term goals.
If you are interested in knowing more about our services, contact us: we attend in-person sessions at our center located in Madrid, and also through online sessions by video call.
