Kylie’s Tips for Beating Exam Stress https://au.reachout.com/articles/kylies-tips-for-beating-exam-stress Tom: Welcome to Mental Music, a music based podcast for teens by teens. My name is Tom. Gordon: And my name's Gordon. Tom: Now today we will be looking at an interview with Kylie from Reachout. Now Kylie is a youth ambassador from reachout and, Gordon, if you'd like to explain exactly what is Reachout. Gordon: Sure. So yeah, as Tom said, Kylie is a youth ambassador for Reachout, which means she deals with people of our age, under the age of 25 in particular, and helps them deal with the stresses of life, particularly with exam stress. So I know Tom and I are approaching, rather quickly, the exam period in the middle of term and I suppose, now more than ever, we can relate to these exam stresses that people are so, um, subdued to. So in the interview we discuss exam stresses and the different techniques that people can use and different apps that Reachout offers to those students who are experiencing stress and anxiety during these periods. Uh, so just before we hop into that, just like to claim that anything that we do say in the podcast should not be taken as professional medical advice unless there is of course a professional in the room with us being interviewed. Um, so yeah, our first song for this episode is by Jason Demo. It's called Over There. (Over There plays) Tom: So welcome to Mental Music. Today we're going to be talking about Reachout and how it can help students specifically in exam conditions, in preparing for exams. So, welcome to the show. Kylie: Thank you, it's good to be here. Tom: Nice. So just to start off, exams, do you still deal with them in your life? Kylie: I just graduated uni three weeks ago. So no, finally not. Tom: That's good. So, I know I have exams. I've got one next Friday. So I can't wait for that. Kylie: Excellent, I totally don't envy you. Tom: Yeah, well, I've been doing some reading at Reachout. It helps with exams and you just got tons of stories on the website, different techniques that people can use. Uh, can you talk me through some techniques that you've seen people use? Maybe a couple of stories? Kylie: Yeah, I think it's a very individual process like anything. Obviously people deal with exams differently and they have different goals; some just want to get through it, others obviously want to be able to smash it out and get great marks. So depending on the goal, really, depends on how people cope. I think that's the first initial thing to understand. And it doesn't really matter what your goal is per say, each to their own, it's more about, you know, making it work for you. So there's some really basic ones, which I'm sure people have heard over and over again, like getting good sleep and I'm probably gonna sound like your mom, but that's super important. Um, exercise. That's another thing that I really have struggled with my whole way through studying is trying to get regular exercise when I'm ridiculously busy already. How do you do that? I think the key with that one is not necessarily going, okay, I'm going to do an hour at the gym today. But you know, walking to work or doing something basic and just strategically making sure that you're getting out and about, I think that's super important as well. The fresh air, getting some endorphins going, all of those things will obviously help. Um, goal setting is another super important one. So like I said to you, obviously goals are very different for everyone and the way that people goal set is very different. I don't know about you, but I'm very visual so I like to be able to write it all down and color code and I'm very anal retentive about that. I know other people, it's all in their head and that's totally okay as well. It's about having goals and setting them in place and making sure that you've got enough time if something pops up and you need to do that urgently, your family, friends, whatever that is, you don't need that to derail your progress. So I think that's really important in having that as well. And of course there's other techniques, like I always use breathing techniques. So there's heaps of different apps, I know that we have one on our website for breathing and there's all sorts of different ones and once you learn a couple of techniques about controlling your breathing, it's really good to take that break for, you know, 30 seconds to a minute, control your breathing, focus on what you can hear in the room and then get back to it because you need to be able to have that break, that's important. Tom: Okay. So, yeah, it's always good to have a couple of rules of thumb about exams, you know, getting the sleep that you need to exercise that you need and, of course, being able to control a control yourself when panic comes along a couple of days, maybe a couple of hours before the exam.What are some, what are some apps like they'd like to breathing one you talked about that you can find on Reachout that can help with this. Kylie: Yeah, sure. So the easiest way to do this, cause I did this myself just before looking for a list of them, is to simply Google Reachout exam stress and there was a whole heap of apps that come up. So that is one of them called MyStudyLife and basically it's to help you schedule in what's happening. It's essentially a timetable on your phone so that you can pop things in and it'll come up and remind you of things that are going on so that you don't rock up on a Friday and go, oh my goodness, that's right, that exams today. Which I've done before and I'm sure there's plenty of people that have. So that's another basic one for me. I like, I'm still old school, I still have my diary and things, but for other people, if they want to be able to use their phone then go for it, that's a really cool one in just being able to break down and I'd even go as far as breaking down and saying, you know, alerting myself that, okay there's a week before the exam, now I need to be looking at these things so that I know, um, you know where I'm at with that rather than waiting for the last minute. Cause cramming never helps anyone. The other one that I touched on before is called Reachout Breathe, which is a really cool one that we've initiated, which I use, even to help me sleep. Essentially you can choose a couple of different functionalities on it and you hold a finger and it'll tell you to breathe and so you literally follow it and I couldn't hold my breath for that long. I couldn’t breathe in that long initially. So it takes some time and then it'll tell you to hold and then breathe out and you follow that for however long you want. And that's a really good one to regulate breath and just calm yourself. And to me that's been one of my hard ones, being able to regulate breath when I am really starting to stress and so that's a visual one for me that I use for everything. And there's another cool one called HabitBall, which may or may not be good for some people. It might potentially, I know it would make me a little bit more anxious, but it basically shows you how much of your time you've been spending on things. So you log in, you know, I did this exercise and I did this and that, and it'll give you a rundown over the week, what your time was spent on and I know that for me, there'll be way too much social media logged on that for me to want to look at. So again, each to their own that totally could be a thing and that's a really good one as well. Tom: Okay, right. So, are there any stories of Reachout’s clients, let’s say, they've come back with after using your stuff? Kylie: Well, I guess there's plenty, I mean I'm technically a Reachout client just because I'm a youth ambassador involved in many different aspects doesn't mean that I don't use it. So for me, like I said, I've been able to manage breathing better. That's the big one, I love the breath one. But recently I did Supanova last year with Reachout and we had a really cool, basically destress room. Everything was blue, of course, and you could come in and just chill out cause Supanova has obviously lots of costumes, lots of noise, extremely intoxicating but can be difficult so you can come in and chill out and there was a whole heap of people using that app cause we had tablets there and what not to use. And the feedback was incredible because they came in really flustered and panicked and they walked out ready to keep seeing what they needed to see. That's a really awesome one where I got to see hands on how it impacts people. Tom: Okay. So do you have any personal stories of how you've been able to cope after using these apps and these techniques? Kylie: Yeah, I think because I've come just come to the end of my studies, apps haven't necessarily been as important to me. Mine have been habits, getting into good ones. I know that I can stress eat and being high on sugar and nothing else with no substance of food has been a really bad habit of mine. So I had to change and make sure that I'm getting the nutrients cause when I'm stressed I don't eat well. So that's been a really super important one for me as well. And like I said to you, regular exercise. So whilst I might not get to the gym as often as I want during a hectic semester, I'll try and alternate and you know, go for a walk around the block or something basic. It's not necessarily super strenuous, but it's getting me out and changing my focus. And that's the key for me is changing my focus and allowing me to think about something else just for that little bit in time to give my brain a breather. Tom: Okay. So, as a Reachout ambassador, do you feel that you've been able to give any tips? How do you feel you've been able to spread the word across society? Kylie:It's hard, you know, because initially I started nine years ago, so initially people couldn't understand that there was an online platform that helped people and it was purely online, you know, initially that was, that was difficult to overcome. Now it's easier and easier because we're getting out further, we're doing events like Supanova, I'm talking to people like you. But I think it's just been a case of having all of us youth ambassadors all around the country being prepared to stand up and say, “hey, this is what we're doing.” And what's so cool about the site is a lot of the content on there is created by us, so this is stuff that we've lived through, This is stuff that we've done. It's important for people to know that they're not alone, the way that Reachout is different to other people is that it's not necessarily one psychologist writing it or you know, a staff member. It's all of us collaborating together. I know I have four or five different articles on there from me and there's plenty of other youth ambassadors I know that have put in that. So being able to share that this is us, this is real, this is what we've done, I think that's been the easiest way to spread the word, because people see it as real life. Tom: Yeah. Okay, and do you believe that, Reachout can become an integral part of most people's lives, especially people under the age of 18, still in year 12, year 11, doing exams? Do you think they can still take Reachout into consideration when it comes to exam prep? Kylie: Yeah, of course. I think that it's definitely become more integral than when I was in high school. I started as a youth ambassador at 16 and people looked at me bizarrely about, you know, all of these types of things. But now mental health is less taboo, there's more understanding that hey, you know, it's really important to be physically healthy, but it's just as important to be mentally healthy. So I think getting the word out there that you know what, there are all of these cool new age digital stuff, but there's also the basics that we can do like sleep and eat to keep, to keep our minds and bodies on track. Being able to integrate the apps and everything else is just a little bit of a reminder of how you can make it easier and jumping on the forums is a really good way to continue that, is having us them, you know, youth ambassadors, moderators, staff, there's plenty of us on there that have been there or are willing to at least listen and see what's going on. So I think that's super important is sometimes all you need to do is just vent. Sometimes I come home from uni or work and I go, oh my goodness, I just need to tell you this. I'm going to tell you you don't need to do anything. Just let me blow it all out. Tom: I’ve been there. Kylie: And I think we all have, and that's why the forums especially are super cool because there's a real person sitting behind there and we're all willing to get involved and integrate our experiences and try and pass on advice Tom: Of course. Yeah. And uh, how do you feel that you've gained from the past nine years of working as a Reachout ambassador? Kylie: Oh my goodness. If you had met me nine years ago, I was a very different person. I've gained so much knowledge, so much experience, I've done things like, you know, advertising campaigns for one of the biggest banks in the country to standing on a footy field and talking about mental health to people that had been affected. I can't express how grateful I am for being able to have chats with people that are so passionate about mental health because that's something that I love and obviously am passionate about. And through that, has helped my mind incredibly, because if something else is stressing me out, I can come to Reachout and I can, you know, put all my time and energy into that for a little while and really use my own experiences to try and help somebody else. Tom: Of course. Well, thanks for coming along. I'm certainly feeling a lot, a bit jealous of your chair. I'm hearing lots of it, The Supanova event. Kylie: Yea,. It's pretty cool. Tom: When you started, when you were 16, you said. I'm 15, I can relate a lot to that, so yeah, it's been wonderful, so thanks. Thanks for tagging along. Kylie: No problem. Thanks for having me. Tom: Cheers. Gordon:Thank you for the interview. And next up we'll be listening to a song called Runes by JBanimepiano and we will follow on with the discussion in the outro. (Runes plays) Gordon: Thanks for listening to today's episode and we hope you enjoyed that interview with Kylie from Reachout. Now, if you would like to listen to any of our past episodes or this one again, please go and check us out on Soundcloud or on the iTunes podcast app. Tom: And as always you can find us on the Mental Music website at www.mentalmusic.org and as a special mention for this episode, we thank Reach out for helping us, you know, put it out there. You can find their website at www.reachout.com. They have tons of good resources, we touched on that and as always you can find the music that we used in this podcast in the description. Uh, so yeah, if you have any advice for us, maybe some feedback on how to make this podcast more enjoyable for you to listen to, that's always helpful. Gordon: Whether your feedback be positive or negative, it is always appreciated. If it's positive, you make us feel happy and if it's negative we get to know what we're doing wrong. And how we can improve it. Tom: And then we can make you happy and that's the important thing. Gordon: Along with this feedback, if you have any suggestions for episode topics, that'd be greatly appreciated because we want to know what you're interested in hearing and that way if you send us in a suggestion, we can do that for you. And of course you'd be sending this into either our respective emails gordon@mentalmusic.org or tom@mentalmusic.org or follow us and send us a message on our Instagram that I know we have. Yeah, so we hope you enjoyed it and we'll see you guys next time.