Beginning October 19, a Virtual Workshop Series called “Managing Life in Times of Change” will be presented by the Saint Xavier University Counseling Center.
Three virtual sessions are being held during the both months of mid-October and November. Each of these workshops is 45 minutes long, and all campus community members are welcome to attend.
The first event is on Tuesday, October 19, from 3 p.m. to 3:45 p.m., where the Counseling Center will host “Dealing with the Overwhelming — Skills for Time Management and Self-Care.”
The next two events will occur in November. “Coping with the Anxiety of Uncertainty — Basic Distress Tolerance Skills” is on Wednesday, November 3, from 1 p.m. to 1:45 p.m., followed by “Accepting Change — Learning to Work Through Uncertainty and Change” on Thursday, November 18. This session will close the Virtual Workshop Series, starting at 11 a.m. to 11:45 a.m.
In an interview conducted on October 21, Matthew Marjan, LPC, a counselor at the SXU Counseling Center, said, “Our main purpose is recognizing that times are weird right now. There’s sort of, like, a facade of normal.”
Marjan continued: “We had more than a whole year where things were very different, and people got out of old habits and old patterns,” adding, “and now they’re coming back, and they’re, like, uncertain as to how to go back to the way things were while simultaneously realizing that things aren’t quite the same.”
As college is ‘already a stressful time,’ he found that “throwing in all the things that people are dealing with, with the [Coronavirus] pandemic, with the uncertainty of it all, we don’t know if things are going to get worse again,” adding, “We don’t know if and when things will get better.”
In addition, Marjan recognized that “change is difficult to cope with sometimes,” referring to ‘things’ as the possible new [COVID-19] variants he concerns himself with, among other ‘major’ factors considered.
“It’s about giving people a more sense of grounding, giving people some skills they can use,” noted Marjan. These ‘skills,’ he explained, range from time management and self-care to heavier topics such as stress tolerance.
In search of a sense of normalcy, however, Marjan believed that most students feel their skills have ‘deteriorated,’ continuing to question themselves by asking, “What do I do?” “How do I deal with this,” and “How do I keep up with the pace?”
On another note, although individuals are returning to campus again, they now have “to interact with people,” which causes some to feel overwhelmed. Marjan has monitored the dynamics and nature of COVID since the start of the pandemic, including the “lingering, and still very, real fear of the disease itself.”
“There are students still not comfortable about being on campus, you know, regardless of the mask mandates and vaccination mandate, so that causes a lot of distress and issues,” he said.
Due to these ‘issues’ arising for people, there is a ‘higher demand’ to schedule counseling appointments and book check-in sessions at the university’s counseling center.
Marjan continued: “This [pandemic] wasn’t an [re]adjustment anyone expected having to make, you know, two, three years ago,” later saying that nobody was prepared nor “expected to be going from one extreme to another in terms of how you learn.”
Marjan further reiterated that while he ‘definitely’ thinks people are struggling at this time, he also mentioned, “It’s about coping more with the emotional side of the change itself,” and not just in a school or social environment.
Marjan claimed that these workshops will help students regain self-control and maintain these skills necessary ‘to have control over.’ This allows them to better “tolerate and cope with the uncertainty and other areas and aspects of your life,” stated Marjan.
Marjan and the Counseling Center faculty and staff members look forward to meeting all attendees who sign up and join the virtual workshop series of events.
Those interested in participating in the info sessions could RSVP on The Den. Others with additional questions, comments, or concerns are to contact the Counseling Center at counselingservices@sxu.edu or call 773-298-404 to request more information.
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