12 Ways to Cope With Frustration: How Effective Are Yours?

Frustration and Its Many Discontents

How many times have you, anxious to remedy a perplexing problem, encountered so many obstacles that you threw up your hands in defeat? And when you readied yourself for another chance to resolve it, how did it go?

Sad to say, like everyone else, you will confront situations that bedevil you because they turn out to be more complicated and difficult than you could have imagined.

Even when you believe you understand the matter in question well enough to deal with it successfully, all too often, it will begin to aggravate you.

It hardly matters whether the particular subject is political, cultural, religious, literary, or anything else: like your computer seemingly laughing at you for your futile efforts to implement something that worked just fine when you did it in the past.

Following are 12 methods that people frequently use to cope with adverse circumstances, which, given their assumptions and expectations, cause them considerable frustration.

I’ll start with the least helpful approaches so you can estimate how often you may unwittingly have defaulted to them.

Then, I’ll enumerate more positive ways of dealing with bothersome problems. That is, ways that likely would work better for you, especially because they avoid the various downsides of what in the moment might seem to work but later turn out to hurt you (and your relationships).

Least Effective Ways of Coping With Frustrations

1. Anger and Aggression: I list this maladaptive track first because when people are frustrated, they feel out of control. Here, anger is an immediate, ready-made (pseudo-)solution for restoring control. For you’re blaming another person for your burdensome feelings.

In so doing, you’re proclaiming that your frustration doesn’t have anything to do with your inadequacy or incompetence, but theirs.

Plus, however short-lived, vengefully acting out against others provides you with a handy, self-confirming sense of interpersonal power. But—as in revenge begets revenge—such retaliation endangers relationships. So this is hardly the way to go.

2. Avoidance: Perhaps the single most common escape route from the vexing feeling of not knowing how to handle something effectively is to avoid it entirely—to put it out of your mind; to “exile” it.

In fact, virtually all the adverse ways of dealing with frustration can be viewed as avoidance-motivated.

Yet ignoring your distress or relying on procrastination to evade it indefinitely will not make the issue go away. Over time, such avoidance will probably make things worse, exacerbating the frustration you experienced originally.

3. Abusing Substances or Activities: Whether it’s seeking to revivify your comfort level through drinking, drugs, emotional (i.e., not hunger-related) eating, misusing any other potentially detrimental substance, or engaging in physically distracting activities—from sports to (excessive) shopping to gambling—these all-too-convenient “frustration detours” will eventually prove toxic to you.

For one thing, you can become addicted to anything you use repeatedly to evade coping directly with what’s frustrating you. And for another, as you increasingly depend on these escapist ways of liberating yourself from unpleasant emotions, your health—mental as well as physical—will suffer.

Your life will become unbalanced and overloaded with unresolved annoyances, worries, and hang-ups.

4. Withdrawal From Others: If your frustrations concern relationships, it’s natural to be tempted to retreat from those who have caused them.

But while it may offer some relief from interpersonal frustration, such isolation (whether from friends or family) is also likely to augment whatever anger, depression, or anxiety you experienced with them earlier.

Moreover, the loneliness that will likely ensue from this social flight will probably feel more painful than whatever precipitated your disengagement earlier.

More Effective Ways of Coping With Frustrations.

1. Mindfulness: Practicing mindfulness is about focusing on the present, moment to moment, nonjudgmentally observing your feelings without falling victim to them. Being mindful endows you with more clarity about present-day circumstances and will accurately align your behaviors with your sense of purpose.

2. Various Self-Calming, Emotional Detachment Techniques: Meditation, deep breathing, visualization, guided imagery, and other beneficial relaxation methods can reduce the heightened stress levels linked to personal frustrations.

You’ll cope with your indecisiveness and inner travails much better when you can reduce a level of emotional arousal that may have left you feeling muddled and disorganized.

3. Exercise and Physical Activity Generally: Before exploring the deeper roots of your frustrations and reasoning your way through their thickets, you need to get yourself into the right frame of mind.

You’ll manage your frustrations more effectively when you can lift your spirits through movement. And it may not matter whether that movement comes from yoga, bicycling, running, dancing, or even gardening.

It’s often noted that getting physical releases feel-good chemicals. And biochemically, these endorphins can prompt you to take resolute action to settle what’s been so unsettling.

4. Activating Your Support Network: When you feel unsteady or discombobulated, you may be overreacting to a minor situation, exaggerating its relevance or importance to your welfare.

Sharing your concerns with a friend who knows you well, or with a therapist can offer you a revised and far less negative perspective on what’s causing you frustration, so you’re better prepared to handle it.

Hence, don’t hesitate to avail yourself of the more measured insights that another, less emotionally involved individual might provide you.

5. Journaling: Writing down worrisome thoughts and feelings is another way to clarify whether your viewpoint may be incongruous with the actual facts of the situation.

Similar to external support, it can also be a valuable tension reliever.

6. Cultivating an Attitude of Gratitude: Overly focusing on unresolved frustrations makes them harder to address logically.

On the contrary, temporarily redirecting your attention to more favorable aspects of your life can foster a more lucid mindset, which then can facilitate developing a more objective appreciation of what’s troubling you. That way, you’re empowered to return to your dilemma with more understanding and openness.

7. Reexamining Your Goals: It may be that your feelings of overwhelm are mostly related to the goals you’ve set yourself. These goals may be too ambitious, too daunting, and unrealizable. Therefore, consider revising these goals to make them more modest and, thus, more achievable.

8. Problem-Solving: Obviously, this is the single, most important step in resolving your frustrations. Everything I’ve discussed so far is to assist you in tackling this final step with maximum confidence and minimal self-doubt.

You may need to (a) “chunk” large tasks into smaller ones so they feel more manageable, (b) brainstorm, (c) systematically evaluate potential solutions, and (d) revise parts of your plan as you recognize their deficits.

Cultivating the healthiest possible attitude toward what’s been keeping you stuck will enable you to finally move beyond the impasse that’s so agitated you.

Approaching your frustrations proactively and with (unsentimental) optimism almost guarantees that you’ll discover the most tenable solution for them.

And remember, not all problems are resolvable—so, ironically, your ultimate solution could be accepting what, practically, is unchangeable.

© 2024 Leon F. Seltzer, Ph.D. All Rights Reserved.