The Student Affairs Blog

Stress? Keeping Your Head Above Water

It's near the middle of the fall semester for many campuses and there's a chance you are feeling that pinch of stress. That feeling that we have bitten off more than we can chew and overcommitted ourselves. Again. The feeling of a schedule becoming out of control that may require snorkle gear if we reply to one more email request.

Stress raises our adrenaline, resulting in increased heart rate, respiration, and blood pressure. These increases make bodily organs work harder. A little stress is good and keeps us on our toes. But over the long term, too much stress can lead to illnesses such as heart disease, high blood pressure, and stroke.

The MBTI Blog discusses our stress as an In The Grip experience, or being forced to react contrary to personality preferences. Usually my recognition of being in a Grip experience arises when I am counseling a student with school anxiety and realize I need to take my own advice.

In my first-year seminar, we discuss the symptoms and effects of stress and ways college students can alleviate stress through planning and organization. For a bit of fun, we encourage students to add more stress to their lives with a few of the suggestions below:

♦ No matter where you are going, always leave for the appointment at the time you should be arriving. On the way there, drive, walk or ride your bike no further than two feet from the car or person in front of you.

♦ Don’t pay attention to your body. If you feel yourself becoming over-stressed and tired, ignore it and keep pushing yourself.

♦ Make a special effort to take note of the irritations in your life and blow them out of proportion. Be resentful and hypercritical, especially toward yourself.

♦ Refuse to take action on nagging problems. Procrastinate, worry, and whenever possibly lose sleep over them. Blame other people for all of your problems.

♦ If you’ve been sleeping less than 4 hours a night, consider eliminating this activity altogether.

Stress Management Tips offers great information, games and exercises to introduce to your students. Me? I'm practicing a little deep breathing until finals week.

What causes you stress? Do you have a favorite stress reliever?

Creating A Contemporary Mission Statement

Every organization on campus needs a Mission Statement.  As a matter of fact, every department and office on campus should have a Mission Statement.  While it sounds like a pretty simple matter to create a mission, it's more difficult and requires more thought than you might initially consider.

The modern mission statement is far different than it's predecessor.  How can that be?  Isn't a mission statement just the purpose for an organization?  Shouldn't it be simple to capture your purpose in a few words?

Here's the difference in the modern Mission Statement:  it explains why. 

Old school mission statements defined what an organization did.  Contemporary mission statements define why an organization does what it does.

See, it's really the why we do things that matters.

Let me give you an example.  I worked with a history and natural science museum to create a new mission statement.  Their old mission was typical.  It explained what the museum did:  maintained a collection of native plants, animals, and historic buildings and presented programs to the public.

I started out the rewrite by asking everyone why the museum was important.  I talked with staff, volunteers, board members, visitors, any one who had an opinion.  Why was all the stuff the museum did important?

I discovered that the museum had a higher mission than just collecting artifacts.  All of the collections were simple tools serving a bigger goal.   

In the end, this became the new Mission Statement:  "The Museum promotes knowledge and understanding of the area's cultural history and natural environment, inspiring people to enrich their lives and build a better community."

The real mission of the organization was to inspire people to enrich their lives, and to thereby create a better community.  That was why volunteers gave their time.  That was why staff members worked long hours without complaint.  That was why donors provided funding.  Collecting artifacts and presenting exhibits just assisted in reaching that end goal.

Think about applying that lesson to your organization and office.  Take a look at your mission statement.  Does it define what you do?  Redevelop it so that it explains why you do what you do.  What is your ultimate purpose?

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