Host Amber Smith: Here's some expert advice from Dr. Kaushal Nanavati from Upstate Medical University. How can you help people who feel overwhelmed by stress?
Kaushal Nanavati, MD: The fundamental is own what you can do something about. The reality is we all have stress, right? And when you stress about a stress, you've got two problems. When you take care of a stress, you've got no problems, right? So if one plus one is two. One minus one is zero. The ones are the same, your stressors, but how you operate with them helps to define your outcome.
Kaushal Nanavati, MD: I had one lady who came in with so much stress. I said, write down for me. And she came back with eight pages, in a 15 minute primary care visit. And I thought, wow. So I said, do me a favor, make two columns. Write down in one column things I can do something about, the second column, things I can control. And when she came back, one page was hers to own. The other seven pages were stresses in her life, but things she couldn't do something about directly.
Kaushal Nanavati, MD: So, those are the things that go on the shelf, right? And basically every time your mind goes there, for the same time and energy, you can come back to your action item list, take one thing, make a plan, get it done, and then check it off. And every night, think about how much you got done, right? To know that you are actively living your life, versus feeling stuck with the things that you can't really control.
Host Amber Smith: You've been listening to Dr. Kaushal Nanavati, the assistant dean of wellness at Upstate Medical University.