Seeking and having support from others (aka “social support”) can be very beneficial for emotional well-being. Social support has consistently shown to improve well-being and help to prevent depression and other difficulties. Although social support can be difficult to find at times, seeking it out can often result in mental health benefits. Check it out!
Welcome back, this is Dr. Matt B. Welcome back to your Emotional Minutes. We’ve been talking recently about different ways that you can regulate or cope with difficult emotions that you might experience.
We’ve talked about ways that, if you can control the situation, you might affect the situation to make a more positive outcome for yourself. When this is not an option, we offered three strategies to cope. Those are cognitive self-talk, accepting the emotions, and behavioral activation.
Seeking Support from Others
One method that can sometimes help in both instances is seeking social support.
Throughout research, social support has been found to be beneficial. This can be seeking out a friend, family member, or individual who you can turn to when you need support.
You can ask for support in multiple ways. For instance, you can say that something is stressing you out and ask for ways they might deal with the situation. It might also be asking them to simply listen.
You might seek support for multiple situations. For example, you may need to move and might ask your friend to help you with that. Or you may have a stressful situation you need advice for. Those are a couple reasons you might request support from those around you, but it can be tricky.
When Social Support Isn’t an Option
Sometimes people don’t have any a social network to provide support. Similarly, people may have support, but they are not sure how to access it. It may be hard to ask family members for things or help and support through situations. If this is the case, I recommend checking out additional strategies. Maybe look into the ones that we’ve talked about in the past videos.
