Enrich your life skills & career

Dr. Jitendra Nagpal

Life skills are abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable our youngsters to deal effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life. These are a set of human skills acquired via teaching or direct experience that are used to handle problems and questions commonly encountered in daily human life.  Dr. Jitendra Nagpal is a Life Skills Coach. He is a developmental trainer in youth wellbeing and soft skills for the schools, colleges and corporate sector. In this regular column, he will answer the questions of our readers

Question : I am 23 years old. I have this difficult pattern of expectation from very close relationships and land up sorrowful with breakups. The recent one has been traumatic but I want to cope up well. I have a desire to move on in my life and focus on my work but I am constantly failing in my efforts to do the same. Please help?

Answer : Relationships and career making often coincide to test your mettle and life skills. But that’s an important learning for life, in itself. Firstly, it is important for you to accept the present reality and try to bring about a change in your thinking process. You need to understand that life is very unpredictable and often such things happen or such situations suddenly crop up which are beyond our control. But at the same time we must have the courage and will power to face such situations and deal with them effectively. This courage comes by changing one’s attitude and perceptions.

Always remember that the past is an information bank from which you can learn but it is not a web in which you are caught. You cannot run from your past, nor can you change it. It will always stay with you but it is required that you store your past in your memory as a learning experience. Try to introspect and ask yourself, where did you go wrong in that particular relationship or what was lacking which led to a breakup, rather than feeling sad and low about it. You should treat that episode as an experience from which you got to learn a lot. Therefore, make an attempt to sow seeds of positive memories and let time heal the sad memories that has affected you.  Being not just good but a great friend to you is the first ingredient of a healthy life.

Also, be optimistic about your future and this optimism will give you the strength to grow and flourish in the best possible way. Always remember that whatever happens in life happens for good and there is something or someone much better in store for you. You just need to be happy and welcome the bright future, which is approaching you. Good luck & best wishes.

Ques : I am 24 years and overweight as compared to all my other friends. I really want to lose weight but don’t know how. I don’t feel like eating anything because of which I land up always fighting with my parents. How do I explain to them that I can’t eat much? In between all of this, my work life is getting affected as I just can’t concentrate. Is something wrong? What I do?

 Ans : One has to understand that food intake serves significant and diverse purpose in the body. It is the basic source of energy and required to preserve all bodily functions, even cognitive tasks. Nutrition through the food and its expenditure through metabolism are essential for a healthy and stable functioning of the body and its vital systems. Your concentration is poor because of lack of basic nutrition. Please appreciate that you may lose weight by not eating but it is not healthy. Not eating properly only makes the body convert any food into fat for storage. The only real weight you lose is muscle weight. Losing weight this way means that when you do start eating, your body will gain weight with a vengeance. Consequently, one has a disposition to develop metabolic and eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia. This is probably one of the reasons why you have a fight with your parents as they are trying to save you from critical lifelong problems.

One also learns to be comfortable with one’s body and if there is a requirement for any change then look for healthy measures like running, working out, dancing etc. Working out would not only help you lose weight in a healthy manner but also help in your blood circulation, which would enhance concentration. So think and act. It’s about your wellbeing.

(e-mail: jnagpal10@gmail.com)