College Is Fine, Everything's Fine - #4 Why It Can Be Hard to Find Your People, and Keep Them (5 Interpersonal Effectiveness Obstacles)

#4 Why It Can Be Hard to Find Your People, and Keep Them (5 Interpersonal Effectiveness Obstacles)

10/04/22 • 37 min

Finding your people in college isn't always easy. Keeping them? Sometimes that’s even trickier. On today's episode, we talk to our first expert guest, Professor Amy DiBernardo. She’s a licensed clinical social worker, an instructor at New York University and a former J.Crew junkie (emphasis on former).
We chat about the 5 obstacles we see on campus that keep our clients stuck in a whole range of social situations:
1) Not knowing what to do (lack of skill)
2) Thoughts getting in the way (worry thoughts, “what if’s”)
3) Big emotions (being too dysregulated to communicate well)
4) Indecisiveness (can’t make a decision about what’s right)
5) Environment too powerful (people in power positions not cooperating)
We all open up about our than-professional moments in college. But good news, we all managed to push past “the regrets” to live another day. And so can you.
As you listen this week, think about which obstacles sound the most familiar. We’ll be coming back with specific tips in the following few episodes. Use today’s chat as your guide to honing in on what future episode you want to listen to.

Want to share your story, give us feedback or offer up an episode idea? Reach out! We'd love to hear from you.

Insta: @collegeisfinepodcast
Tik Tok: @collegeisfinepodcast
Email: [email protected]
Music is Deadbeats by Rex Banner

Want to share your story, give us feedback or offer up an episode idea? Reach out! We'd love to hear from you.

Insta: @collegeisfinepodcast
Tik Tok: @collegeisfinepodcast
Email: [email protected]
Music is Deadbeats by Rex Banner

Previous Episode

#3 Finding Balance in the Extremes: Part 2 (Dialectics)

Are you seeing dialectics everywhere now? It is Part 2. We are back hearing from more students about the common dialectics they experience during the college years. In this episode we speak with a freshman and senior in college and see the interplay between the discourses of "carpe diem" and "focus on your future". They speak about how difficult it can be to navigate the social demands of college.
Some common themes were:
-struggling with feeling excluded and included at the same time,
-making new friends while also maintaining past friendships, and
-navigating a romantic break-up.
We'll teach you how to listen to your intuition and make more mindful decisions. We explain how adopting a dialectical stance can open yourself up to the possibility of thinking and acting in more effective ways. Listen for concrete tips based on some core principals from Dialectical Behavior Therapy. Try them out and tell us if they worked for you!

Want to share your story, give us feedback or offer up an episode idea? Reach out! We'd love to hear from you.

Insta: @collegeisfinepodcast
Tik Tok: @collegeisfinepodcast
Email: [email protected]
Music is Deadbeats by Rex Banner

Next Episode

#5 Two Tried and True Ways to Combat Socially Anxious Thoughts

Ok, so we all agree that making friends was easier when we were younger. We were spoon fed neighborhood friends, teammates, fellow band members. Then comes college and you start from scratch. Last week we talked about the 5 ways students can struggle to make friends, and/or to keep them once they do.

In a follow-up to Episode 4, we narrow in one of the most common friendship obstacles: worry thoughts. Two college students open up about the anxious thoughts they experience in friendships. You’ll hear them talk about:

Self-judgements (“I’m too shy.”)
fear of rejection (“I’ve never shown myself 100% to people.”)
indecision about which friend group to focus on (“sorority vs. freshman dorm crew?”)

Based on their stories, we offer two ways to notice, manage and reduce socially anxious thoughts. You can challenge them, and if that doesn’t work then you can “unhook” from them. You’ll hear us offer tips to our guests directly throughout the episode, but if you want to skip straight to the skill, go to 24:25.

Want to share your story, give us feedback or offer up an episode idea? Reach out! We'd love to hear from you.
Insta: @collegeisfinepodcast
Voice memo: (929) 500-2231
Email: [email protected]
Music is Deadbeats by Rex Banner

Want to share your story, give us feedback or offer up an episode idea? Reach out! We'd love to hear from you.

Insta: @collegeisfinepodcast
Tik Tok: @collegeisfinepodcast
Email: [email protected]
Music is Deadbeats by Rex Banner

College Is Fine, Everything's Fine - #4 Why It Can Be Hard to Find Your People, and Keep Them (5 Interpersonal Effectiveness Obstacles)

Transcript

[00:00:00] What were some of your anxious thoughts? Like what were some of your anxious predictions about meeting new people? I was scared going into it because first off, my roommates were from completely different parts of the country. So we were all very different. And I think there is like the thought like, Oh, like what if people don't like me?

And I mean, like, I know I was not the only person thinking about that. Every teenage girl is going to be. nervous