Take a moment to breathe

New Year’s greetings to everyone, far and wide!  May it be a year of peace, health and prosperity for all.

Since the beginning of a new year is usually filed with resolutions– which are really thinly disguised attempts to change habits — I’m going to begin the year with a series of posts on habits.

Habits determine the quality of our lives. And they are fundamental if you want to reduce your stress around taking tests.

Life is made up of habits. Think about it. As you are reading this you are breathing (whether you are aware of your breath or not).  As your eyes take in these words do you know whether you are inhaling or exhaling?  Likely not because breathing is such an automatic habit — so much in the fabric of every moment of life -that most of us lose our awareness, or consciousness of it. Yet, it is the single most important tool we have for calming down and staying in the present. Wouldn’t it be helpful if we could use it to our benefit beyond simply staying alive.

Although everyone is breathing, very few of us have any sustained awareness of our breath.  Why is such an awareness important?  Because along the way each of us has adapted and even changed the fundamental habit of breathing so that it corresponds to our own emotional/mental state. Take a person who, every time she hears the word “TEST,” freezes up. In that moment she is stopping her breath. What’s causing her anxiety?  Surely not the four printed letters T-E-S-T. They are merely pixels on a screen, they are not “making” her anxiety. This person’s anxiety comes from her long-time habit of stopping her breath every time she reads or hears the word “TEST.” Her memories, associations and fears about tests have a stranglehold on the one tool that could really help her: her breath.

Try an experiment:  as you read this sentence, exhale deeply.  Keep going until all the air is out. Good.  Now what happens?  The inhale comes in automatically.  That’s the fundamental habit we come in with it at birth (it’s what kicks off life) and it’s what leaves us at death.  I remember sitting with my dear Aunt Rachel when she lay dying at the age of 105.  Over the course of two weeks I watched and listened to her breath, becoming every more shallow, ever shorter, until finally…. it stopped.

Keep your breath going, and keep your attention on your breath. As you click away from this blog xhale, and then inhale on the next thing you do, whether at your computer or away. Sustain your awareness of your breath in any activity you are doing today and forward:  whether it’s cooking, studying, taking a shower, or working out.  When you realize you’ve lost awareness—we all do, most of the time—bring your attention back to your breath. Exhale. Inhale.  Simple.

That’s your first task: just become more aware of your breath.. In a few days we’ll get into the next step of using this basic and most profound tool to our benefit.

OK. Get ready to click away from this blog.  Ready? Exhale.  See you in a few days

Are you all tied up?

As I write this I am in south India at an Ayurvedic retreat.  Ayurveda is the oldest system of healing arts known to man. It dates back thousands of years to the writing of the Vedas, or ancient texts.

One of the pillars of this remarkably comprehensive and far-reaching system is to establish and maintain balance of body, mind and spirit. Since this corresponds so directly with the work I do as a stress psychologist I want to take a moment, at year’s end, review this foundational aspect of good health.  Let’s start out with 

thinking of yourself as a team of three players.  They are called your body, your mind and your spirit. Your body is easy to recognize: it’s your blood and guts, flesh and bones.  Mind is a big word and harder to define. Let’s limit our understanding of “mind” right now to the part of you that comments on yourself (“I’m OK, I’m terrible, I can do this, I’ll never get anything right”). Spirit is the most elusive of the three, yet it is, on our “team of 3”, a player of equal importance. Let’s view spirit as the force that defines your goals and drives you to achieve them.

The model for balance

For an easy visual, consider your team of three like a 3-legged stool: one leg each for body, mind and spirit. When all three legs are equally strong the stool is a sturdy, dependable platform (elephants stand on it at the circus!). But when one of the legs is weak or shorter there is instability and inequilibrium. Not only does the platform give way, but a “shortness” in one leg will effect the other two.  If you are feverish (body), chances are you won’t be able to think straight (mind), and you won’t have much oomph to do anything (spirit).  To function as a winning team you need all three players to be in top form:  strong, robust and cooperating.

Of the three legs, the one we tend to undervalue and pay least attention to is our spirit.  There are two basic reasons for this: we can’t see it, and we negatively associate it with “religion.”  Both reasons are based on faulty premises. Briefly, what I mean is this: over several hundred years, western science has done a good job of convincing us that what we can’t see is not real; and a common belief is that religion is nothing more than a set of rules to which one becomes a mindless slave.

While this is neither the time nor place for a complicated discourse (“It’s New Year’s Eve, Dr. B!), I’d recommend we consider making a new year’s resolution to pay more attention to our spirit. That means taking time to reflect, to quiet down, to meditate and to consider where we are really going with our lives and where we want to go.  It’s easy to get all tied up, but that always leads to imbalance, discomfort and ultimately disease.  Without spirit we would be robots. So if you’re feeling robotic about your life it’s a sure sign that your spirit needs to be rejuvenated.

The word “spirit,” after all, comes from the Latin inspirare, which also means to breathe. When we breathe, the circle is complete: our body relaxes, our mind calms down, and our spirit can fulfill its direction, which ultimately is to be a healthy, balanced, giving member of society.

Comparing the effects of chewing gum before or during various testing situations, researchers found that performance on a battery of cognitive tasks improved for those who chewed gum for five minutes before a test, compared with those who didn’t

A report on the study said that scientists “believe the benefits of chewing gum were resulted from an effect called ‘mastication-induced arousal’ of the brain which acts similarly to a mild physical activity or exercise.”

OK, so much for 50 cent scientific terms (“mastication-induced arousal”).

I’m going to give a different point of view. If you’ve ever watched test takers at the beginning or during a test one thing you notice with great frequency is how many of them are holding their jaws very tight.

So the positive effect of chewing gum is to keep the jaw loose.

Interesting to note that the effects of this lasted for only 15 to 20 minutes after the start of the test, and that those who chewed gum during the test did more poorly.

Not surprising: students don’t need to know how to chew gum; they need to learn how to relax their muscles.   While “mastication-induced arousal” may stimulate the brain, good old simple, regular breathing and relaxing muscular tension will go a long way to a helping any student be a calmer and better test-taker.

You need some energy to perform well

Today’s question is:  How do I get rid of my anxiety before an exam?

Answer: You don’t get “rid” of anxiety. A little bit of anxiety has been shown (in over a hundred years of research) to be a good thing. Remember the “Yerkes-Dodson curve” (see illustration).  Yerkes and Dodson were two psychologists who showed, at the beginning of the 20th century, that there’s a direct relationship between stress and performance. Too much or too little stress and performance suffers. You need just the right amount of stress to perform well. The trouble is students think that their “anxiety” before an exam is a bad thing. Yes, it is, when it incapacitates you. In other words, when it’s too high.But if you think about it as “energy” you need some to give you the boost to get you launched. Think about those big spacecraft — the rockets are fired and the energy propels the rocket into space. The big hulking parts of the spacecraft fall away eventually and the small capsule does its thing once it is out of the earth’s gravitational pull. You are just like that before an exam. Your jets are fired, you are ready to launch. Don’t confuse anxiety with energy.  If you are truly anxious and you are not remembering things, you are doubting yourself, you are distracted and you are physically tense, then you’re going to slide quickly to the right side of the graph. You are unable to perform the way you ought to be.  Too much stress = poor performance. Use the tools in the book. Get yourself back on track. Learn to become calm, confident and focused.

Tell us your stories and send in your questions.

Afraid? Again?

I’ve recently started coaching three very different people who have exactly the same issue with tests: they’re all afraid of failing.  To be accurate, they’re all afraid of failing again.

Each of them (a high school, college and graduate student) had a bad experience in the past with a test—one didn’t finish in time, one didn’t get the score she wanted and one actually failed.  I’m using the word “bad experience” instead of “failure.”  While every one of us has had a bad experience with a test none of us is a failure because of it.

Following what I wrote in my last post: when you have a bad experience you have two choices with how you are going to hold that experience.  Choice #1: You say to yourself, “Oh, no,  it happened before and it’s going to happen again. For sure. No way I’m going to succeed.”; Choice #2: You say to yourself, “Yes, I did have a bad experience, but  I learned from that experience and what I learned is actually going to help me do better this time.”

So why do so many people – certainly the ones I see in my practice—so readily adopt choice #1?  I think it’s a combination of  things. The “bad” past experience was painful. No one wants to score low, not be able to finish or actually not passing the test, but sometimes these things do happen and the bottom line—and please read this carefully – is that we are meant to learn from all our experiences.  ‘Learn’ means: what did that experience teach me that will help me the next time around?  As soon as we start to uncover the answer to that question, the more quickly and determinedly we can move ahead.

So here’s my challenge to you: think of of a time when you did not do well on a test. What did you learn from that that you can apply to the next time you take that test, or any other test?

I’m going to provide you with some common responses to that question, but first I’d like you to do the work and answer that question for yourself.

In part 3 of this series of posts I’ll not only answer the question, but show you how we can get through previously traumatic experiences in a new, better, and much more fulfilling way.

Do you really have to be so frightened every time?

When I was a young child — 9 years old to be exact– my parents sent me on a plane, alone, to visit my beloved aunt in Florida. It was exciting to travel by myself and I was treated royally by the flight crew.

Somewhere along the way the plane got into a big storm and started bouncing around terribly. This was in the days of prop planes, much smaller than the ones today and much more vulnerable to bad weather. The turbulence got worse and worse and the plane was now getting thrown around in the sky, People started screaming. I was so scared. My aunt said that when I got off the plane in Miami and ran into her arms she saw that I had bitten clear through my bottom lip.

This event had a terrible effect on me for years every time I went into an airplane . For days before the flight the scare built and built and by the day of the flight I was invariably nearly petrified. All through every flight I clutched onto the arm rests and if there was even a slight jarring of the plane in the air I completely froze.

Once, when I was returning to college from a holiday break, my father drove me to the airport. I never told anyone how scared I was of flying, but, for some reason on this drive to the airport I couldn’t hold it in anymore and I confided in my dad. He was a psychologist. He said, “You know, every time you have to fly you get so scared, but then the plane ride is fine. In your mind you have come to believe that in order for it to turn out fine you have to be so scared before the ride and during it.”

I thought about what he said and I calmed down. Yes, I had a terrible experience as a child. And he was right, somehow I had it wired up that in order to get through the ordeal of flying I had to be so scared– just as I was as a 9 year old. But do I really need to keep that going every time I travel by plane?  Is it really necessary to tie myself into knots in order to get through every flight fine and okay? Do I have to make every flight such an ordeal.  Clearly, no.

So what does this have to do with tests, testing, and test anxiety?

Think about it.  And stay tuned for part 2!

Delia Lloyd. Blogger and Journalist

I was introduced to an interesting blog today and the post was apt for this site  “Do You Every Really Leave High School?” and it’s from the blog RealDelia: Finding Yourself in Adulthood,” written by  an American-born journalist in London, Delia Lloyd.  The post focuses on the anxiety dreams many of us continue to have about tests.   In my 35 years as I performance psychologist I’ve heard so many dreams about test anxiety that I’ve lost count. When I was a young child–just around the time I started school — I started having a full-blown nightmare about taking tests. The dream all took place on an enormous sheet of lined paper, the older kind with the red margin running up and down the left side. The teacher– something of a Alice in Wonderland Red Queen type — was standing at the top line, looking very imperious and scary. I had to go up to the top line on the page  and answer a question. My Jungian analyst friends would probably have a field day with this day, but suffice it to say, I found tests scary. Most people find tests scary, and that’s why they dream about them well into adult life.
Delia Lloyd offers this:  ”Whether it’s taking an important test or competing in a do-or-die football match or finally screwing up the courage to ask the girl you’ve had a crush on to Senior Prom, none of us ever fully escapes the clutches of high school.” Why is this so?  Because when we’re in school (I would say even before high school), we’re open, vulnerable, and particularly susceptible to the negative effects of being  judged or rejected. Our self-esteem is wound up in our actions and in how others respond to us. This is all badly reinforced by the high degree of competition and comparison that our schools promote and foster. I think that test anxiety dreams — and now I’ll put on my psychologist hat– point to underlying feelings of unworthiness that are particularly rife in our high school years when we realize we “are”– that existential moment in which we sense we actually exist and that we are this person. Worthiness is something everyone struggles with. I would say it’s one of the root of most psycho-emotional problems. As we grow we realize that worthiness doesn’t come from a test score, or from someone else’s opinion from us, but from a deeply personal, heart-felt sense that who we are, as we are, is OK. And that we have something to offer the world.  So yes, when we have to take a test in later life, or we face a particularly challenging, test-like, situation, our unconscious sends up all those feelings and memories and anxieties that were so much a part of our lives at a very tender time in our growth. Consciousness is like a fishnet– you pull up one part of it and the rest comes with it. If you are feeling anxious about a present-day test, stop, take a good deep breath and feel your feet on the floor. Have the experience of where you are now. There used to be a cigarette commercial (Virignia Slims) with the tag line: “You’ve come a long way baby.” It’s true, you have.  Thank you Delia Lloyd!

Richard Wyne and Nora

At the Apple store in Seattle I got into an interesting conversation with Richard Wyne, from Whistler, B.C., Canada. Richard is the head of a company called Polar Solutions, which is in the business of disaster management and emergency preparedness.  They save people’s lives. Talk about stress and performance!. Locating and saving a person trapped in a building, or under an avalanche of snow requires the epitome of being calm, confident and focused.  I met Richard with his trusted partner, Nora, a Senior Avalanche Rescue Dog (German Shepard, Border Collie X). I would love to see them in action.  If your job requires you to keep stress at an optimal level let us know what it is.  I’d love to see Richard and Nora in action (check out their website), and the necessity for them to remain calm,confident and focused. Richard was interested in The Workbook for Test Success, and I look forward to sharing ideas an experiences with him, and with you. Tell us about your stress-related work.

Let go of suffering: you have options!

Something came across my desk today which I want to applaud and call your attention to. It’s a posting by the McNamara Academic Center at the University of Minnesota with helpful tips for test anxiety.

This kind of help is so useful for two important reasons: (1) it’s sound advice, and (2) it shows that there is help and you don’t need to feel alone if you are suffering from test anxiety.

I encourage you to take advantage of the resources that are out there already. Definitely click on the link above and download the pages from UM.  Look into your school’s learning center and see what resources they are offering. If your school isn’t offering any, get them on the stick!  At the very least get them to buy my book (click on the link on this website). Though to some it might look self-promoting i truly believe i have something helpful to offer.

You do not have to suffer. Get the help you need.  Just ask.   And thank you to the folks at the McNamara Academic Center. Keep up the good work!

The right answer? Strengthen yourself.

The Silicon Valley Mercury News today published an article today about the SAT and ACT. Author Purvy Mody starts off by saying “The words SAT and ACT can conjure anxiety for even the most academically confident student. Standardized testing has become so talked about and so prepared for that I have heard of fifth-graders enrolling in SAT prep classes — something I am highly against.”

5th graders prepping for the SAT?  AYK?  (are you kidding?)

Mody ends the article with this: “Take a class if you need the structure, or get the official books and practice on your own. Whatever method you use, the most important thing is that you do the work. The test will not take itself.” True enough, but columnist Mody is probably thinking “the work” means opening an SAT or ACT book and doing that work. In my coaching experience, learning the content is necessary but not the totality of test prep. The work is not just learning the content– the kinds of items, the subjects, and doing practice questions over and over again. It must include, and be thoroughly integrated with, the work you do on yourself.  Meaning, specifically, learning how to stay calm, confident and focused through the study and practice phases and then when you take the test itself.

You want a good, sturdy platform for your SAT or ACT performance. The platform for test success is the 3-legged stool: body, mind and spirit– being calm, confident and focused. Do that work and you’re well on the road to success.

Would you like to improve your test performance on the SAT or ACT?  If yes, let us know. We’re about to launch a training program that will give you the tools you really need to succeed. Send an email to us at testsuccess@sparkavenue.com.

Let prepping for SAT or ACT be an opportunity to cultivate and strengthen your calm, confidence and focus.