Top 10 Life Skills

If we asked someone on the street what they think are the most important life skills, they would surely tell us many, but all They would be directly related to three main aspects: social relationships, development and good use of cognitive abilities and management of emotions.

There are several skills related to these three aspects that are present in practically everything, whether at work, at school, with family, with friends or with a partner.

Out of all the proposals there are about life skills the most important and considered the most “standard” is that of the WHO 1999, ten skills in total that we will see in more detail below.

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What are life skills?

The world is a diverse place, made up of nearly 7 billion people, each with their own unique personality, characteristics, and abilities. There is no person equal to another, but within this diversity we all need to have developed specific capacities to be able to prosper in life. These life skills are what

enable us to survive and cope with the social, physical and emotional demands that our existence throws at us.

There are several skills that we could consider as fundamental for life and, even, each one could have their own list of what they are. Most would agree that it is important to have a good relationship with others, recognize our emotions and manage them, accept ourselves as we are and know how to make the right decisions. They would also emphasize that it is very important to understand others without making hasty judgments about what they are like and to say assertively and kindly what our opinions are.

But out of all the life skills lists we could mention the most important is the one proposed in 1999 by the World Health Organization (WHO), an organization that specifies in 10 the most important Life Skills or HPV, defining them as those skills necessary to be able to behave appropriately and positively, allowing us to effectively face the demands and challenges of the daily life.

In its origins these 10 vital skills were raised to prevent directly related problems with public health, including the use of drugs such as alcohol, tobacco and cannabis at ages early. They were also aimed at avoiding high-risk behaviors in the population, improving the health habits of the population, prevent discrimination, promote self-esteem and positive social relationships, and improve performance academic, considered important not only in health, but also in the cognitive and social.

The main life skills, and their usefulness

According to the WHO, there are ten most important life skills, the first four being social skills, from 5 to 8 cognitive skills and the last two skills for the control of emotions.

1. Self-knowledge

As its name suggests, self-knowledge is knowledge in oneself, that is, to recognize how we are in terms of character, personality, strengths, weaknesses, tastes and aspects that we do not like so much. Having developed this ability allows us to easily recognize which are the aspects that we must improve, allowing us to progress as people.

It is also important because before you can deal with others it is essential to know yourself. It is necessary to know how we are to be able to see to what extent we are at the level of what our society demands of us and, therefore, if a change is more or less urgent. Knowing ourselves will allow us to motivate ourselves in life, to know what we need to achieve our dreams and achieve greater well-being.

2. Empathy

In essence, we can define empathy as the ability to imagine what other people's emotions and experiences are like, even in unfamiliar situations.

This ability is essential to be able to understand how other people are, accept as they are even if are very different from us and, thus, establish social interactions based on mutual respect and understanding.

3. Assertive communication

Assertive communication is the ability to express themselves appropriately, socially adequately, but without hiding what we really think and want to say. It involves both verbal and non-verbal skills and the particularities of the cultural context must be taken into account when communicating with others.

Having this skill well developed enables us to achieve our personal goals in a way that is socially acceptable and does not harm others. It is very important to take care of the way we say things, without disturbing our interlocutor, but expressing ourselves clearly and concisely.

This ability allows us to ask for advice or help in times of need, something that is not often easy for us. In addition, it not only involves asking others but also asking them if they are okay, listening to them actively to know what their dreams and emotions are and thus try to help them as much possible.

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4. Relationships

Relating in a positive way with others is a fundamental skill to be able to survive from day to day since the human being is a social animal. The skill of interpersonal relationships is a necessary ability to start and maintain good relationships with others, whether with a friend, a family member or with a partner,

This is a fundamental skill to develop a good social and mental well-being, not only helping us to have good social relations but also facilitating when to cut with those that are toxic and do not provide us nothing. Knowing how to have interpersonal relationships is not only having good friends, but also cutting with those people who endanger our mental health.

5. Decision making

In order to have a successful and fulfilling life, it is necessary to know how to make good decisions. Of course, throughout our lives we make mistakes, but in most situations, as long as we have thought about what action to take, we can survive from day to day.

Make good decisions It implies knowing how to choose, behave in a proactive way, with initiative, decisive and being able to anticipate problems or needs. It implies being consistent with those decisions we make, previously evaluating what we are deciding and knowing which is the best way to take.

6. Problem and conflict management

Closely related to the previous point, the management of problems and conflicts can be understood as the ability to solve problem situations assertively, peacefully and functionally.

All problems in life require some response from us, since it is not as simple as simply ignoring them: problems do not magically disappear.

As a skill, managing problems and conflicts allows us to face the wide range of problems that occur in life, avoiding that these situations can become chronic and crystallize in the form of damage at a physical, mental, emotional and psychosocial. Among the skills within this skill would be the ability to reflect, analyze, change and improve any situation, learning from it and growing personally.

7. Creative thinking

Creative thinking is a very important skill in this life, directly related to problem management. it implies consider and make decisions that are outside the norm, considering that a new alternative could give better results than what has already been previously tried for the same problem.

Creative thinking involves imagining possible scenarios before applying a new way of solving a problem, trying to understand if it is really worth trying and, in case it has failed, try to recycle that same idea but taking a new one perspective.

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8. Critical thinking

Critical thinking is the ability to objectively analyze the information and experiences that occur in our lives. Many times the information we receive from our family, friends, school and, above all, the media is biased or misrepresented in a way that encourages opinion concrete.

Critical thinking would be the ability to try to go beyond what we have been given, seeing to what extent what we have been told is true and how much information we have been omitted. It is necessary to analyze, compare and objectively judge the information that is told to us in order to have our own opinion about a concept or social issue.

9. Managing emotions and feelings

Knowing how to recognize our state of mind and understand what is the best way to modify it in a functional way is a key aspect for our mental health. Managing emotions and feelings is the ability to learn to feel, express ourselves emotionally and manage our feelings, understanding what we are feeling and how to deal with it, preventing it from damaging our day to day or damaging our social relationships.

10. Managing tensions and stress

Finally, managing tensions and stress is a very important life skill, directly related to the previous one, which involves know how to recognize when we are stressed, apply relaxation techniques and eliminate this stress or channel it to make it constructive.

It also implies recognizing what are the sources of that stress, what effects it has on our lives and how its appearance can harm our social relationships and labor productivity and academic. Since stress is already considered an epidemic, having well-developed stress management and stress is considered an extremely adaptive skill for 21st century society.

summarizing

Although there are many criteria used to define what are life skills, the WHO considers that ten are the most important for our day to day. These skills take into account social relationships, the cognitive field and the management of emotions, three fundamental aspects to be able to develop and progress as a person fully functional.

Having a healthy life does not only imply avoiding risky behaviors such as using drugs or having unprotected sex. but it is also having a good social life, feeling that you are having success in life and that emotions. Have an assertive style of communication, a satisfactory handling of emotions and behave in a prosocial are aspects that allow us to survive in the middle of the complex and diverse jungle that is the society.

Bibliographic references:

• Mantilla, L (1999). Skills for life: An educational proposal to live better. Bogota
• Melero, J (2010). Life skills: a model to educate with meaning Zaragoza
• World Health Organization. (1999). Guidelines: Life Skills Education Curricula for Schools. Geneva, Switzerland.
• Cuartero, N. (2014). From self-awareness to social dexterity. Pedagogy Notebooks (442), p. 65.