Eight elements of workplace mental health

Self-worth anchoring, boundary establishment, emotional tolerance space, professional meaning perception, dynamic adjustment of stress, interpersonal relaxation, anti-PUA cognitive system, and burnout early warning mechanism.

I previously talked to an EAP consultant from an Internet company, and she told me that among the consultations she received every week, more than 60% of the problems were related to self-worth anchoring. For example, Xiao Zhou, an operations employee who came to her last month, was criticized by his boss for saying "there is a problem with the logic of the plan". He then hid in the toilet and cried for half an hour. He even had the thought of "Am I not suitable for work at all?" Regarding how to build a stable self-worth anchor, different schools of thought actually have different opinions: The school of positive psychology recommends that everyone record their small achievements every day, even if it is "Today's plan was passed in one go" or "I helped a colleague solve a small problem today", and slowly extract the sense of value from the boss's evaluation. ； However, consultants with an existential orientation will feel that the more important thing is to understand clearly first - the score the company gives you is only an evaluation of your output in this position, and has nothing to do with whether you are good or valuable as a person. Both statements are valid, use whichever one works best for you.

As easily overlooked as self-worth anchoring, is the establishment of a sense of boundary that many people only understand after stepping on numerous pitfalls. I used to know a young administrative girl who was very enthusiastic. She would never refuse when her colleagues asked her to help bring meals or pick up express delivery. Even when her boss asked her to help pick up the children or buy food for her pets, she responded. However, at the end of last year, when she was evaluated for excellence, everyone thought she was "free anyway, so she should do more" and was not even nominated. She was so embarrassed that she went to the hospital to find out about grade three breast nodules. She took the report sheet and dared to tell the boss, "I can't help with personal matters in the future." Different people have different opinions on how to establish boundaries: The workplace relationship school believes that you don’t need to say “no” in black and white, and use soft boundaries such as “I have three higher-priority tasks on hand, which I can only help you with tomorrow afternoon”, so that you can maintain your own pace without offending others. ； But a friend who has been in HR for ten years will tell you directly that if it is not part of the job responsibilities, you can definitely refuse it through a formal work order. Even if it offends someone, it is more cost-effective than holding back and getting sick.

Many people cannot establish a sense of boundaries. Essentially, they are afraid that if they reject others, they will feel guilty and uneasy, and they will also feel that they are "unable to get into trouble" and have low emotional intelligence. This actually means that they do not leave enough room for emotional error. To be honest, I am particularly annoyed by the old saying on the Internet that "tears are not believed in the workplace", as if shedding tears in the workplace is a heinous crime. I once had a male colleague who was working on the backend. When a minor bug went online, the whole team worked overtime for two days. He hid in the fire escape and cried for half an hour. Then he turned around and fixed the bug. Nothing happened. On the contrary, those who suppress their emotions and turn around to vent their anger on their subordinates or family members are more likely to have problems. According to EAP statistics, 83% of people in the workplace will engage in self-punishment behavior due to work mistakes. The consensus in the clinical psychology community is that emotional tolerance does not mean allowing yourself to lose your temper, but leaving a three-day digestion period for negative emotions, without forcing yourself to "resurrect" on the same day. Now many Internet companies have begun to set up half-day to one-day "emotional leave". There is no need to fill in a reason, and you can take it as long as you want.

At this point, some people may sneer: "I just go to work to make money, so what sense of professional meaning is there?" Pretentious. ”I thought so before, until last year I met an HRD who had been working as a corporate recruiter for 12 years, with an annual salary of 700,000. He suddenly resigned from a charity organization affiliated to the Disabled Persons' Federation to work as an HR, and his monthly salary was only one-third of his previous salary. She told me that she used to help the company lay off people every day, and sometimes she didn't dare to look up when the newly graduated children were carrying things away. She always felt that what she was doing was "evil". Now she helps people with disabilities find suitable positions. Last week, a hearing-impaired young man got his first salary as a designer and specially gave her a postcard he drew. She said in the circle of friends that day that this was the first time in all her years of working in HR that she felt that her job was really useful. Of course, this does not mean that everyone must do charity for it to be meaningful. Professional counselors with a utilitarian orientation are right: if you can't even pay the rent, there is no shame in making enough money first and then talking about the meaning. Even in an ordinary position, if you feel that the code you wrote saves users time, or that the milk tea customers you serve are happy, it is all meaningful, and you don't have to put on any grandiose hats.

Regardless of whether you can find professional meaning or not, no one can escape the pressure in the workplace. Many people have misunderstandings about "stress resistance" and think that being able to carry on continuously means being able to endure stress. In fact, this is not the case at all. I once had a friend who was in sales. He topped the quarterly sales volume for three consecutive months. He drank with customers until midnight every day. Finally, he won the sales volume and was hospitalized for stomach bleeding. The first thing he did after he was discharged was to apply for a transfer to a back-end operations position. He lost one-third of his money, but he no longer had to drink. There is actually no standard answer to the dynamic regulation of stress. Behavioral psychology schools will recommend that you develop fixed relaxation habits, such as taking 10 minutes to meditate every day and running for half an hour after get off work. ； But I have asked many people in the workplace around me, and their methods are all kinds of weird. Some people watch 10-minute cat fight videos, some go to the supermarket after get off work to squeeze instant noodles and put them back on the shelf (don’t crush them of course), and some people like to take the bus and go around the city. As long as they can loosen the tight string, any method will work, and you don’t have to follow the so-called "scientific method".

Under great pressure, many people also become tense in their workplace relationships. They are always afraid of saying the wrong thing and offending others, which may lead to "social infighting". This is actually a lack of interpersonal relaxation. There used to be a little girl who was doing UI design. She was so nervous that her palms became sweaty every time she held a requirements review meeting. She didn’t dare to refute anything the product said, for fear of offending the product and giving her little shoes. As a result, she had to stay up late every day to change the requirements. Later, she couldn’t bear it anymore. The next time the product made a completely unreasonable requirement, she just dumped the data: “I have tried this modification before, and the user click-through rate will drop by 20%. It’s fine if you insist on changing it. If something goes wrong, you just have to take responsibility.” ”As a result, the product didn’t say much, and it was much more reliable to raise demands in the future. There are also many sayings about interpersonal relationships in the workplace. Old-school professionals will tell you to "plant more flowers and less thorns." It is always right to be polite in everything. ； Social psychology research also proves that the essence of interpersonal relationships in the workplace is actually value exchange. As long as your output is reliable, even if you speak more straightforwardly, everyone will be more willing to cooperate with you. Both are correct. It just depends on your own personality and the atmosphere of the company you work in. There is no need to force yourself to become a social butterfly.

Of course, not everyone in the workplace is reasonable. If you encounter people who deliberately brainwash you and suppress you, you must have your own anti-PUA cognitive system. A reader left me a message before, saying that his boss told him every day, "You can't find a job with your ability, so I'm willing to give you a chance." He really believed it. He worked for 3 years with a monthly salary of 4,500 and never received a salary increase. Last year, I accidentally chatted with a friend in the same industry and found out that an operator with the same experience as him could get a minimum of 8,000, and his salary would be doubled after he changed jobs. However, many people now have misunderstandings about anti-PUA. They think that the boss's statement "You are not doing well with this plan" is PUA. In fact, it is not. Professional labor lawyers and EAP consultants all have a consensus: only behavior that deliberately distorts facts, demeans your personality, and aims to make you pay for free or accept unreasonable treatment is called PUA. If your boss just makes reasonable criticisms about your work output, that's called work requirements. Don't get angry as soon as it comes up, which will be detrimental to your own development.

Even if you have done all the above well, there will inevitably be times when you feel tired. Many people only realize that they are burnt out until they can no longer hold on. In fact, as long as there is a burnout early warning mechanism, you can make adjustments in advance. A senior HR I know said that their company now conducts free burnout self-assessments for employees every six months. The questions in them are very simple, such as "Are you irritable when you think about going to work recently?" "Are you feeling unmotivated at the job you were good at before?" "Have you been less and less patient with your colleagues recently?" If more than 3 of the options apply, it means you have early signs of burnout. You should either apply for a job transfer or take a vacation. Don't force yourself to do it. Once you get to severe burnout, it may take months or even years to adjust. Of course, there is no need to be overly nervous. The consensus in the psychology community is that job burnout is a very normal phenomenon in the workplace. Just like you will get tired after running for a long time, just take a break. You don’t have to feel that you are not suitable for the job when you feel tired and have to resign. On the contrary, you will easily fall into greater anxiety.

In fact, having said so much, these eight contents are not exam papers that must be scored full marks. Just like your annual physical examination, there will always be one or two indicators that fluctuate up and down. It is very normal. Mental health in the workplace is never about turning you into an "invincible little strongman", but about making your life less miserable while making money. After all, you go to work to live a good life, not the other way around, right?