Just be Yourself - Ask your counsellor Q&A column

[The following column answered by me appeared in the Deccan Herald Education supplement on November 19, 2015] 

Dear Madam,

My science teacher hates me and it is apparently for no reason. Maybe I am not so good in the subject, but that is no reason for her to dislike me. It is unfair and I am not going to let her treat me like that for another year. She needs to treat me like every other pupil. How does one have a good teacher-pupil relationship?

A Student
Dear Student

It must be extremely hurtful and frustrating to feel that your teacher hates you, and to not know the reasons for it. I can also sense the anger that must be arousing in you. Could it be possible that you are mis-reading her emotions towards you? Could your interpretation of her feelings towards you be based on your thoughts that may not be really be grounded in reality? Think about it.

It may be helpful for you to have a conversation with the teacher and respectfully tell her what you feel — without challenging what she is doing. Naturally if you challenge her she will get defensive. But if you tell her that you are feeling disliked by her and that you would like to change that and so could she help you understand what is wrong, she may be amenable to having a conversation with you about your feelings. But a word of caution — enter this conversation with the objective and mind-set of trying to understand what you can do differently, rather than with an attitude of challenging her because “how dare she hate you”.

You may want to talk to a counsellor about the specifics of what this teacher is making you feel, and how you could best handle this situation. Try calling the free Parivarthan Counselling Helpline at 080-65333323 to reach out to a counsellor who could help you. All the best!

Dear Madam,

My parents seem really unhappy. One day they may be fine and the next they’re not. They often argue over me — be it studies or my behaviour. They don’t seem to agree. I don’t know what to do.

A student
Dear student,

Unfortunately when parents fight, children end up feeling that they are responsible and need to do something to improve things. You need to know that none of their fighting is your fault. It is not about anything you did, did not do, or could have done. It is about their own issues, disagreements and misunderstandings, amongst themselves.

They may be about you, because you are the link between them and are probably equally important to both of them. But they are not because of you, and you don’t need to do anything different, or be anyone different to stop them. You may be the subject of their disagreements, but you are not the cause of them, and I want you to believe that.

Just be the person you want to be, and let the adults sort out their own mess, no matter how hard that may sound.  All the best.

Dear Madam

I am in the first year of college. I act on feedback to improve, but keep getting mediocre performance reviews on my assignments, although I try hard to do my best. Should I just put up with being average at studies? How can I improve myself?

An undergraduate
Dear undergraduate student,

The most important thing, and really the only thing you can control, is the amount of effort you put in. And to perform at the level of your best potential you must put in your best effort. Beyond that you cannot control the marks. You can take feedback that you get, and you say you do, and that will help. However, don’t anchor yourself and your sense of self-worth, to your marks.

Strive to put in your best effort and that will ensure that at least you gain the knowledge that you need. Marks merely open doors for you, and sometimes not even that. Your real success in the workplace will not come from marks, but from your softer skills like the ability to learn on the job, your ability to work in a team, your ability to lead a team, your creative problem-solving skills, your ability to think out of the box, your communication and persuasive skills, among other things.

So don’t brand yourself as average just because your marks are average. There is more to you than your marks.

All the best
Dear Madam,

I am studying in a degree college. My problem is that I am depressed and keep thinking, hoping that things will be different. I am unable to concentrate on my studies. Often I have a mental block and I am unable to study. How do I come out of this situation?

Confused student
Dear confused student

I think it is important for you to get the help of a counsellor to understand and deal with your depression. If your depression has been there for a long time you may need to see a psychiatrist as well. If it is a mild onset that just set in only counselling may work.

I don’t know if you are in a place where you have access to a counsellor. However, if you don’t it may be helpful for you to reach out to a counsellor over the phone. You could call the Parivarthan Counselling Helpline at 080 65333323 which is a free helpline answered by counsellors to help young adults like you.

Most of the time, depression is the time the result of how we think about events and situations and a counsellor may be able to help you gain a different perspective on things. All the best.

Your definition of success and failure impacts your child's. Do you know your definition?

[ The following article originally appeared at http://www.whiteswanfoundation.org/understanding-mental-health/experts-speak-details/your-definition-of-success-and-failure-impacts-your-child-do-you-know-your-definition/ ]

Everyone wants to be a success. No one wants to be afailure. And understandably so. Success and failure, however, are terms meant to define events, not people. You are either successful at doing something, or achieving some milestone, or you failed at doing something or did not achieve some milestone. That does not imply that you are a complete success or a complete failure. There are other aspects of you that you may not be so successful at, or that you may not be such a failure at. The most successfulperson (if there can be such a term) may have a large bank balance, but may be a complete failure as a parent or a spouse. And a person who has been an absolute failure at business, may be an unbelievably good parent or an amazing friend.

So success and failure are terms used to describe how we did at a particular event in our life – not how we are in totality. But every so often we are unable to see the difference.

We often believe that we are a success, and our child must be a success. And the hint of failure in any small aspect of our life, or theirs, sends us into a tizzy. Or we believe that we have been a failure and therefore want to make sure that our children don’t end up as failures! If a child fails in an exam we call them failures; we project that they will remain failures for the rest of their lives. Whereas they may have just failed at an exam, and there may be several other aspects of life that they may have been successful at or successful in. We don’t allow ourselves to see or acknowledge that they may be great in sports, they may be wonderfully empathic human beings, they may be great artists and wonderful singers, they may be good orators or creative problem solvers, they may be honest and helpful, or that they may have wonderful people skills. We overlook all of this and brand them as a failure because they failed at an exam!

Similarly, if we lose our job, we brand ourselves as a failure, sometimes to the point of never being able to recover again. We interpret that failure at that particular job as a verdict on us, and our entire life, never allowing us to bounce back and think of ourselves in any other terms.

To accept our children in totality (and accept we must) with all their strengths and weaknesses, we need to understand success and failure as terms used to define events and not people. Which means that we need to look at ourselves also as people who have been successful in some aspects of our lives, and failures at others. We need to acknowledge and accept things that we failed at and we need to be comfortable talking about our failures. Can we accept our past failures, and take stock of what we learned from the experience? Are we comfortable with having failed in certain aspects and able to talk to our children about our failures? Can we make our failures, and how we dealt with them, an integral part of dinner-time conversations? Only then can we help our children accept failure as just another event in their lives – a learning opportunity that came their way – rather than something that fatally defines them in totality.

Some failure is inevitable – in our life, and in the life of our children. Equipping our children with life skills that will help use the failure to gain a deeper understanding of themselves, and gain new learnings from the situation, will be an invaluable gift that we can give them – far more valuable than the biggest bank balance that we may be slaving for. It will teach them the importance of resilience – of bouncing back in the face of adversity, and not letting adversity define them. And the sooner they learn this life lesson, the better off they will be.

But, children learn from what they see and experience, not from what we say or scream about. So that means they will learn life lessons around success and failure from how we, as parents, experience and deal with success and failure ourselves. They need to see us model behavior that takes failure in its stride. They need to see us learn from our failures. They need to see us fall down and then bounce back again – sometimes to newer heights, and sometimes to fall down again. They also need to see us succeed at some things, and take success in its stride. They need to see us experience joy in our successes.

In short, they need to see us experience failure and success, but most of all they need to see success and failure as temporary events in our life, not permanent life-defining states of being. In the words of John Wooden, “Success is never final, failure is never fatal. It's courage that counts.”

Courage in the face of adversity, and humility in the face of prosperity, is what we need to model as parents. Only then will our children experience it from us, and only then will they learn to live it. And then, and only then, will we have helped them grow into resilient adults, ready to face all the challenges and joys, successes and failures, that life will throw in their path.

Never underestimate the power of our influence – negative and positive – on the lives of our children. Let’s strive to maximize the positive and minimize the negative.

Gain Control of Situations - Ask your cousellor Q&A Column

[The following column answered by me appeared in the Deccan Herald Education supplement of October 29, 2015]

Dear Madam,

I don’t know who to turn to help. My parents moved to a new town during this academic year and have started new jobs. I think they have enough problems without me adding to them. I started at my new school this academic year. I have made no friends. Two boys keep calling me names and the others laugh every time they do it. They always shout at me when the teacher isn’t around. It happens in the classroom, playground and when I am walking to and from school. Please help me. I can’t take it anymore.

A distressed boy

Dear distressed boy

Please don’t think that you need to protect your parents from your worries because they have too much to handle. I am sure wanting you to settle down well will be their primary objective and if you don’t tell them about what is bothering you they will never know. They are adults and know how to take care of their needs. You do not have to think that what you tell them is an added burden on them.

Having said that, you need to believe in yourself and your worth. The other children in school will pick on someone they think will not stand up to them. You need to prove them wrong. You are worthy and capable no matter what anyone may say, and they need to know that. Just because they call you names and laugh at you does not mean that they have a right to do that, or that you deserve that. You should speak up and let the teacher know. And also let them know that you can stand up for yourself. If someone thinks you are not good enough, it does not mean that you become that. You have to believe that you are good enough and capable and worthy and that no one has the right to undermine your confidence. You may reach out to the free Parivarthan Counselling Helpline at 080-65333323 if you want to talk to someone about it. Please also read my article on this topic at http://personalorbitchange.blogspot.com/2010/09/see-lion-in-mirror.html .

Good luck

Dear Madam, 

I am 15 years old and in the ninth standard. My classmates make me sick. They treat me badly and that scares me. Every morning when I go to my classroom they wait for me by the only entrance. I can’t go to my teachers or my parents because they don’t believe me. How do I come out of this situation?

JM

Dear JM

What scares you? What is your worst fear? What are worried about that your classmates can do to you? You must try to articulate and define what you are scared about and when you do that most of the time you will realize that the fear may be an irrational fear. Once you realize that, it may not be that scary anymore. The reason your classmates have this power over you is because you of the fear which makes you feel vulnerable and out of control. Please remember that you are in control over what happens to you. If you think differently about things and situations, you can regain control and not feel so helpless. Please see a counsellor to help you with this, if you have one in your school. You could also call the helpline that I have talked about above. I would also ask you to read this article on my blog which will help you understand the situation you are in a little differently and believe in the power within you. http://personalorbitchange.blogspot.com/2010/09/how-balanced-are-your-see-saws.html

Good luck

Dear Madam,

A classmate I have known for many years blackmails me into spending more time on her than I want to. She gets upset if I don’t reply to her long e-mails. I don’t know how to extricate myself from this ‘friendship’ because I am fed up with her negative self-pity,

LR

Dear LR

You are feeling helpless because you have given up your control. You must regain your control in this situation which will not make you feel helpless in this situation. A person may expect whatever they do, but it is in your control how much you fulfil those expectations. You do not have to fulfil everyone’s expectations all of the time. This may get some people upset with you sometimes and that is okay. Everyone does not have to like you and be happy with you all the time. The same way you do not like some people all the time, and all people some of the time, it is okay for others not to like you as well. So if your friend is not okay with you spending the amount of time you feel appropriate she may be upset but if she values you she will understand. If she does not understand then that relationship may not be all that you think it is. In a friendship or any other relationship it is important for both people to be able to define and establish their boundaries as they find comfortable. So go ahead and take back the control and define your boundaries.

Good luck!