2 Ways To Build Resilience (the key to handling anything)

Let’s start at the beginning: what is resilience?

A useful definition is that it is an ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change. Being resilient doesn’t mean being unaffected by the tough stuff that comes your way in life; it means that you are able to work through challenges with the knowledge that you’ll soon return to a state of equilibrium.

Resilient people approach the hardest of life’s events with realism. They accept difficulty, and they know that they will be alright. Crucially, they know that they’ll be able to learn something from their challenges — whether that’s an external lesson about the world, or a deeper understanding of their own strength.

In 2014, this paper created from a transcript of the panel discussion of a multidisciplinary team of psychologists, neuroscientists, sociologists and mental health professionals explored what makes some people more resilient than others.

And while some people may have genetics to thank for their tendency to show resilience, everyone has the capacity to build their personal resilience.

Here are 2 ways to do just that.

1.     Practise taking a ‘big picture’ view

If you find yourself getting caught up in every painful detail — both real and imagined — of a problem or potential problem, you can cultivate your own resilience by working on your ability to see the bigger picture.

For example: you and your family are considering moving abroad. On the one hand, you’re excited and you think it’s the right move for you, your partner, and your kids. On the other hand, there are so many things to worry about that you can’t embrace the future and fully appreciate the positive elements of this move.

If you allow yourself to focus on all the minutia of what could go wrong, you’ll never make the move. If, instead, you can let go of control of all the little details and take a wider perspective, you can move forward with confidence.

To practice your ‘big picture skill’, imagine that you are high up in the sky, looking down on the world. You are up there unaffected by the pressures of human relationships. You can see this as they really are. Think about your problem, or your decision, from up there. It’ll look clearer than it does down here on Earth.

2. Focus on your strengths

During difficult times, it’s very easy to focus on your weaknesses; everything that’s ‘wrong’ with you and the way you’re dealing with the situation.

Start to practice focusing on your strengths instead. This does not mean underplaying how hard things are to ‘just think positive!’. It means giving yourself permission to acknowledge how well you are coping. How well you handled that emotional conversation with a relative. How open you were during that upsetting event. How honest, how loving, and how courageous you are.

Every time you catch your internal chatter judging yourself harshly, see if you can switch it around to look at yourself with kindness. Even when you think you’re doing everything wrong, you’re always doing lots of things well.

By focusing on your own strengths, you will develop a stable base on self-knowledge that will be unshakeable. Your strengths will carry you through to the other side of this tough period. And you won’t need anyone else to tell you how strong you are, because you’ll know it in every cell of your being.

Love & Gratitude Always

Julie xxx

#resilience #strength #actingpure #recover