By: Mikayla McGuire, military family member
Hello, I am a high school health teacher, and we have a full unit on stress and mental health. I came across HPRC’s Stress Mindset resources and realized these tools were not only useful for Service Members but would also be great tools for my classes. This blog describes my experiences using HPRC’s Stress Mindset Self-Check and Create a ‘Stress helps me’ Mindset worksheets with my students. But first, let's explore what a stress mindset is, and why it’s important for all people to know about!
What is a stress mindset?
A stress mindset refers to how much an individual believes that stress either strengthens or weakens their health, well-being, performance, and growth. The goal of a stress mindset is to perceive stress as helpful. We call this the “stress-is-helpful mindset.” This is important because we all experience stress. Rather than let it impact our lives in a negative way, we want to teach people how to use stress to their advantage. Teenagers are especially at risk from the effects of stress. Adolescents deal with major stressors during an already awkward time of life. Some examples of stressors they deal with include puberty, forming an identity, transitioning to high school, keeping up with academic pressures, employment, applying for college, maintaining friendships, and managing time. The 2020 pandemic only intensified these stressors, along with adding social isolation to the mix. For some teenagers, they also deal with family members who are in the military, adding additional stress to their lives. To top it all off, according to recent reports, teens' view stress as “debilitating.” There is constant exposure to the negative effects of stress in health messages, media coverage, and even through their own personal experiences. This belief can lead teens to disengage from the stressor, which puts them at a disadvantage. Trying to avoid stress limits their ability to grow, learn, and become resilient. This can create a negative cycle of stress, isolation, and poor mental health. In order to combat these negative effects, we can teach them the skill of a stress-is-helpful mindset. This can be especially helpful to those teens who have to cope with family members serving in the military.Research shows that developing a stress-is-helpful mindset accompanies a wide variety of benefits. Adopting a stress-is-helpful mindset:
- Increases blood flow to the brain to help us think clearer
- Reduces the amount of cortisol (your body’s stress hormone) released during a stress response
- Releases hormones that help rebuild cells and boost immunity
- Improves coping behaviors
- Greater perception of physical health
- Increases well-being
- Improves cognitive functioning
- Better academic performance
How I used HPRC’s Stress Mindset Tools with my Students
I began by giving my students the Stress Mindset Self-Check survey. After the survey, I checked the results. 100% of the responses were a “stress is harmful” mindset. I distributed the Create a ‘Stress helps me’ Mindset worksheet to each student and gave them plenty of time to complete each question. This worksheet encourages students to reflect on their own experiences with stress and focus on experiences in their lives when stress was helpful. It uses a wide range of scenarios, such as stress in performance, relationships, living by values, goal setting, and significant growth. When teaching about mindsets, specifically a stress mindset, reflection is important. When individuals are able to utilize self-reflection to think about a time when stress was actually beneficial, they can better relate to the content and apply the information directly to themselves. Self-reflection can also encourage individuals to visualize how stress can be “helpful” in future stressful situations.After students completed the worksheet, they were put into groups to discuss their results. They were directed to discuss a series of questions highlighting their experiences, including:
- Was it challenging to think of scenarios where stress was helpful to you? Why or why not?
- In what types of situations do you currently feel stress benefits you the most? (School or academics, sports, performance, relationships, goals, work, etc.) Why?
- In what types of situations do you think it is the most challenging to see stress as “helpful” to you? Why?
- How can you start to shift your stress mindset to one that is “stress-is-helpful” more often?
- What has been the most surprising thing while learning about stress mindsets today?
After the stress unit, I had students retake their initial stress mindset survey. There was a shift to 71% of the students showing a “stress-is-helpful” mindset. We had a class discussion about our stress mindsets and how we feel like they have shifted since the beginning of the stress unit. Students shared that their initial mindsets came from personal information on stress. Most people (teachers, friends, parents) in their lives portrayed stress as something to get rid of. This stress mindset unit was a first for many students to view stress in a positive light. They also found it helpful to share stories with other students in the class. By hearing other students’ stories, they were able to think of even more scenarios from their own lives where stress had been helpful. To end the stress unit, we talked about how we can make sure we continue to strengthen our stress-is-helpful mindset for the future.
The purpose of implementing a stress mindset is to shift to the belief that stress can enhance learning and growth, performance and productivity, and health and vitality. I feel that HPRC’s resources were a great example of contributing to those outcomes! I feel confident that these resources can also translate to family members, especially teens, with family serving in the military.
