Undergraduate Mind Management Skills Workshops

The University’s Psychological Therapies Training and Research Clinic is running four 90 minute, individual workshops to support you with the mental and emotional demands of studying. These have been designed after discussions with your fellow-students about the issues that are most challenging in student life.

You can sign up to as many as you want, depending on the issues you are facing. The workshops are a great space to speak to other students, learn skills and techniques that may relieve some of your anxieties, and introduce new ways of approaching your problems. They are developed from the evidence base of what we know works and are run by two fully-accredited Cognitive Behavioural Therapists.

All of the workshops cover how to understand and map out the relationship between thoughts, feelings and behaviours and how different situations can set different problematic cycles in motion. The specific situations they focus on differ for each workshop. Please see the details below, we would love to see you at one!

Workshop 1: Striking the Balance

Tuesday 8th March 12pm-1.30pm / DMBB Room 2.15

“I need to work, sleep and enjoy myself with my friends, but I only have enough time to do two of the three” “There’s always so much going on, it’s relentless going from one assignment to the next”

Do this resonate with you? Then this workshop could help. It covers mind management skills to help you lead a balanced life in the face of university demands

It covers:
• Mapping out the vicious cycles of thoughts, feelings and behaviours that happen in response to triggers that can make you feel ‘out of balance’.
• The science behind motivation and what we can do about procrastination
• Different kinds of life activities and strategies you can use to improve your sense of balance

Sign up here

Workshop 2: Prioritising what Matters

Wednesday 9th March 12pm-1.30pm / DMBB Room 2.10

“There’s so many things competing for my time – friends, my course, societies, socials, my job… It’s overwhelming what to do when. I feel like I’m always on the go, but always missing out on something”

Sound familiar? This workshop focuses on mind management skills to help you identify your priorities and focus day to day on doing what matters

It will cover:
• Mapping out the vicious cycles of thoughts, feelings and behaviours that happen in response to triggers that can make you feel ‘down’ or ‘unfulfilled’.
• The relationship between meaningful activity and wellbeing
• How to assess and identify what is important to you
• How to align the things you do with your priorities

Sign up here

Workshop 3: Adjusting to University Life

Thursday 10th March 12pm-1.30pm / DMBB Room 2.08

“Everything feels chaotic. We find things out at the last minute. I don’t always know what I need to do or understand what’s required. We can’t get in touch with anyone to find out or people take ages to get back to you.”

The system is definitely imperfect and that’s stressful. Whilst this workshop can’t change that, it can give you more skills to deal with those stressful thoughts and feelings and help you deal as best you can with the ‘imperfect’ university system

It covers:
• Mapping out the vicious cycles of thoughts, feelings and behaviours that happen in response to triggers that can make you feel stressed
• Understanding the psychological and physiological mechanisms of stress
• Helping you bring your coping abilities in line with your demands
• Problem- and emotion-focused strategies for dealing with stress

Sign up here

Workshop 4: Social Compare and Despair

Friday 11th March 12pm-1.30pm / DMBB Room 2.10

“Everywhere I look there is someone smarter than me, someone who dresses better, someone who’s more popular, someone who’s got it together so much better than I have. Sometimes I feel like I don’t really fit in anywhere and there’s no one quite as much of an outsider as I am”

If this sounds familiar to you, then this workshop could help. It covers mind management skills to support you to stop comparing yourself to others

It covers:
• Mapping out the vicious cycles of thoughts, feelings and behaviours that happen in response to triggers that can make you feel down or anxious due to comparing yourself to others
• Understanding why we compare ourselves to others and what happens when we listen to those inner negative thoughts in social situations
• Learning & applying attention training - a specific, evidence-based, strategy to deal with unhelpful comparisons
• Learning about unhelpful thought patterns that enable unhelpful comparisons to re-occur

Sign up here

Please note, spaces are offered on a first come, first served basis. If you cannot get a space on these workshops, please look out for future opportunities!

These workshops are new and we need to be as systematic as we can in identifying the impact they have. As such, you will be requested to fill in an anonymised questionnaire about how you are feeling pre- and post-workshop, and again in four weeks. Although this is optional, it really helps us out and it will take no longer than five minutes to complete.

All sessions will be held in the Dame Margaret Barbour Building, opposite the new sports centre on Newcastle University Campus.

Last modified: Mon, 28 Feb 2022 16:12:28 GMT