“What tips can you give us to handle stress nowadays?” “How can we help others with their mental health concerns?”
These are common questions we get from community members about mental health care. While conducting mental health first aid or psychological first aid training would be best to raise awareness and equip community members, a lot rarely get to spare time for such training.
Below are the basic tips we’ve been sharing in such cases to make it easy for everyone to understand what they can do for themselves and for others when feeling overwhelmed. We begin by sharing what we can do for our own selves, followed by what we can do for others:
When feeling overwhelmed by our thoughts, feelings and emotions, let’s apply these
A’s for The Sake of The Almighty:
Acknowledge your thoughts, feelings, and emotions. Running away from them will only make you feel worse and may even affect your relationship with others.
Accept that these are normal reactions to your challenging experiences. Everyone feels this way sometimes. We are human.
Assess what you can do to help yourself relax, understand and process these thoughts, feelings and emotions. Will talking with loved ones or a professional help? Will sleeping or keeping yourself busy with hobbies and interests work? Will praying and doing dhikr make you feel better? What positive actions can you take?
Ask for help whenever needed. There is nothing wrong with it. It makes us appreciate even more the people Allah swt gave us.
Act to reach the desired goal. Identifying what to do is one thing; doing them is another.
Okay, now that we know what we can do for our own selves, let’s focus on how we can help our loved ones when they’re feeling overwhelmed…
When helping our loved ones process how they feel, let’s practice these
A’s for the Sake of The Almighty:
Acknowledge how the person feels. Instead of telling the person to just pray or to don’t think about how they feel, recognize and respect what they are sharing.
Appreciate the person’s honesty or courage to open up. It is never easy to share with others how we feel. So, if a loved one opens up, make sure to communicate how much you value their decision to open up to you.
Accept that it is a normal reaction to challenging experiences. Everyone feels this way sometimes. We are all human.
Allow the person to share more about their challenging experiences. Listen actively and with empathy. No judgments, no criticisms.
Assess together what can be done to help the person relax, understand and process feelings. Will talking with loved ones or a professional help? Will sleeping or keeping oneself busy with hobbies and interests work? Will praying and doing dhikr make one feel better? What positive actions can be taken?
Ask for help whenever needed. There is nothing wrong with it. It makes us appreciate even more the people Allah swt gave us.
Affirm the person’s plan of actions if they are good and encourage the person to act to reach the desired goal. Make follow-up conversations to know how the person is doing.
There we have it. It may be difficult to remember and practice them in the beginning, but never give up. The more we practice them, the more they become natural to implement, in shaa Allah.
May we all be able to apply the above always with the intention of helping ourselves and others become better individuals for the sake of our Most Loving Creator, and may He accept our efforts as sincere service for His sake. Ameen.