Can Resilience be developed to help people cope better?
Adopting a resilient attitude is imperative for personal growth! When a person is resilient they feel self-confident and comfortable about making decisions. They are better able to reflect, adapt and drive things forwards in the right direction again, despite initial setbacks. Resilience is the capacity to overcome life’s hurdles and challenges. It is often described as the ability to “bounce back”. Others think of it as the ability to “spring forwards” as this implies progress, growth and positive acceleration. … It’s about one’s ability to perpetually adjust and adapt to environmental circumstances, changes and challenges, whilst embracing self-efficacy and remaining self-assured. This culminates in self-actualisation!
What is Resilience?
noun
1. the capacity to withstand or to recover quickly from difficulties, toughness.
How does Resilience look in real life?
Managing strong emotions and impulses is a key factor in resilience. … If someone gets frustrated, they can either choose to misdirect their anger, taking it out on someone nearby, or they can learn to move on, stay focused and apply their energy to target and manage change for good. Focusing on events you can control is a great example of resilient behaviour.
Resilience and Positive Psychology
There are several dimensions when it comes to positive mental health, one of which is resilience.
Resilience is the process of being able to adapt well and bounce back quickly in times of stress. This stress may manifest as family or relationship problems, serious health problems, problems in the workplace or even financial problems, to name a few.
Developing resilience can help you cope adaptively and bounce back after changes, challenges, setbacks, disappointments, and failures.
Research has shown that resiliency is fairly common. People tend to demonstrate resilience more often than one thinks.
Demonstrating resilience doesn’t necessarily mean that you haven’t suffered difficulty or distress. It also doesn’t mean you won’t have experienced emotional pain or sadness. … Often, the road to resilience is paved with emotional stress and strain.
Resilience involves developing thoughts, behaviours, and actions that allow you to recover from traumatic or stressful events in life. Resilience can be learned!
What works well for one person may not necessarily work for another, which is one of the biggest reasons to learn multiple techniques for enhancing resilience.
Traits, qualities, and characteristics of a Resilient person
Viewing change as a challenge or opportunity
Commitment
Recognition of personal limitations
Engaging the support of others
Close, secure attachment to others
Personal or collective goals
Self-efficacy
Strengthening effect of stress
Past successes
Realistic sense of control/having choices
A sense of humour
Action-oriented approach
Patience
Tolerance of negative effects
Adaptability to change
Optimism
Faith
They conclude that resilience is quantifiable and influenced by health status, is modifiable, and can improve with treatment. Individuals with mental illness, for example, tend to have lower levels of resilience when compared with the general population.
It is possible to perform well in one area such as work, in the face of adversity, but function poorly in another area, such as personal relationships.
Resilience may either be a determinant of response to stress or an effect of exposure to stress.
The main factors contributing to Resilience
There are many ways to increase resilience. Some of those include having a good support system, maintaining positive relationships, having a good self-image and having a positive attitude.
Other factors that contribute to resiliency include:
Having the capacity to make realistic plans.
Being able to carry out those plans.
Being able to effectively manage your feelings and impulses in a healthy manner.
Having good communication skills.
Having confidence in your strengths and abilities.
Having good problem-solving skills.
Developing resiliency can help you maintain caring relationships with others and help you maintain a positive and easy-going disposition. It can also help you develop good coping skills and improve cognitive thinking skills.
Some people are naturally more resilient; however, you can work to enhance your level of resilience. You can learn how to bounce back from adversity in a healthy manner.
In the end, resilience is a skill that can be cultivated and nurtured.
Is Resilience a skill or character strength?
Those who are more resilient have learned to move past obstacles and challenges in a healthy way. Resilient people learn and know how to weather life’s storms. They’ve learned how to set themselves back on even ground after a stressful event and have the strength to continue on the path that they know to be true.
Although a character strength, resilience can be compared to learning a new skill. … It requires one to push past the initial discomfort to achieve joy and greater satisfaction.
The 4-factor approach
A great option for building resilience is the 4-factor approach created by Deborah Serani, a Clinical Psychologist (2011). This simple strategy enables individuals to conceptualise resilience and train their brains to think differently. One can thus learn to look at situations differently and to find that silver lining:
State the facts.
Place blame where it belongs.
Reframe.
Give yourself time.
Resilience strategies for coping and bouncing back stronger
Self-care is essential in avoiding burnout. These may seem like simple tips, but they’re important to keep in mind to retain a balanced outlook and approach to life:
Exercise.
Make time for solitude.
Engage in positive self-talk.
Get out more and experience life.
Learn from failure.
Cultivate both humour and curiosity.
Have realistic expectations for yourself and others.
Exercise provides a wonderful opportunity for stress relief. Doing some kind of daily exercise like walking in nature or yoga can go a long way to helping you cope with combating burnout.
It’s also important to make time for solitude and remember to engage in positive self-talk. Association with others can be psychologically intensive. It’s important therefore to take some time to detox and self-reflect. Meditating, journaling and repeating positive suggestions can go a long way to helping one feel more balanced.
Setbacks and failures are a natural part of life, so learning when to take a step back and spend time with family and friends, people who really know you, is important. Humour and curiosity are essential to cultivate. They help you remember that learning to be more resilient is a process and requires continuous self-assessment and reflection.
Different types of Resilience
1. Natural Resilience
Natural resilience is the resilience you are born with; the resilience that comes naturally to you. This is often referred to as your human nature or your life force.
Those with natural resilience are enthusiastic about life’s experiences and they are happy to play and learn and explore. Natural resilience allows you to go forth and do your best even if you get knocked down and taken off track.
2. Adaptive Resilience
Adaptive resilience might be thought of as ‘trial by fire.’ This occurs when challenging circumstances force you to learn and change and adapt. Learning how to roll with life’s punches can help you build resilience and grow stronger as a result.
3. Restored Resilience
Also known as Learned Resilience.
One can learn techniques that help build resilience and, as a result, restore that natural resilience one had as a child. Doing so can help you deal with past, present and future traumas in a healthier fashion.
Each of these methods can be thought of as a “Resilience Tank”. Most people are stronger in either one or two of these three types of resilience. However, greater amounts of resilience in one type can compensate for lower amounts in others.
Stress and trauma tend to lower resilience over time, especially multiple repeated incidents of trauma. Trauma tends to get stuck in the brain continually leaving you on high alert or fight-or-flight mode. This can continue to manifest, even if the trauma is no longer present.
Being in a constant state of trauma can be emotionally and physically draining.
To Conclude:
Each of us is, in essence, hard-wired for survival. The oldest part of your brain, the reptilian brain, is always working to protect you and guard you. While this may serve you well, it doesn’t necessarily help you to feel calm or relaxed.
Therefore, adopting a resilient attitude is imperative to overcoming hardships and supports the ultimate achievement of self-actualisation. Actively practising self-care helps one relax and gain perspective.
The following techniques are designed to help one elicit the relaxation response, which includes:
Deep abdominal breathing.
Focusing on a soothing word like “Peace” or “Calm”.
Visualising a tranquil scene like a beach or a park.
Engaging in repetitive prayer.
Doing something physical like Yoga or Tai-Chi.
The relaxation response is a simple technique that one can apply to counteract the toxic effects of chronic stress, which often manifest in physical, mental and emotional illness.
If you’re looking to improve your Resilience skills, we offer bespoke Resilience Coaching.