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According to the American Psychological Association, “Resilience is the process and outcome of successfully adapting to difficult or challenging life experiences, especially through mental, emotional, and behavioral flexibility and adjustment to external and internal demands.”
In more straightforward language, resilience defines how well you compete with stress, demanding situations, or trauma. Nowadays, it’s primarily associated with work, but I firmly believe resilience is built elsewhere.
During your early years up to puberty, you experience many challenging life situations. Unfortunately, you adapt your parents’ behavior in the early years, and they might not be good at dealing with stress or traumatic situations.
Thanks to my own experience, I discovered that whatever happens to you in your life hardly determines the outcome of your life. Your parents or first caregivers might have never experienced real traumatic events so far or never learned how to bounce back from those situations. I think my parents were not good at that at all.
Life is less about control and more about modification and growth. The more resilient you become over time, the more you learn how to deal with difficult circumstances. This also empowers you to grow and improve your life in the long run.
Here are a few tips that helped me build my resilience over the years
Personal Relationships
Personal relationships are crucial for your development. The more you connect with understanding people, the more support you can get in difficult times. Unfortunately, the older we get, the less likely we will win new friends as there are often too many other distractions like family life, kids, work, etc.
Finding trustworthy friends, helping you out, and acknowledging your feelings will help you build resilience during demanding or traumatic times. If you are of a personality that isolates you, please make sure to accept the help of those that support and care about you.
May it be the death of a loved person, a brutal end of a long relationship, a sudden lay-off of your work, or anything else, go ahead and try to plan some activities that lift your mood. You need to be around friends who give you the support you need and can especially connect with you.
Take care of yourself
Take care of your body and health
Taking care of your body and health can help you build resilience significantly. I know self-care is used way too often lately, but you should still consider it a practice to improve your strength. Have you ever experienced that feeling of feeling better after a good workout or some other form of training?
Stress is more likely to peel off you when you are physically in good shape. But why is that? Stress not only does affect your mind but also your physical health. Start today by living a positive lifestyle, taking care of your sleep, proper nutrition, hydration, and exercise routines.
Emotions like fear, anxiety, depression, and self-isolation will be less likely to surface when you are physically in good shape. I can tell from my own experience that training in Aikido and Iaido 4 – 6 times a week helped me get through the most stressful times at work.
Take care of your soul and mind.
As I’ve written in my article about meditation, this can help you build more resilience. It would be best if you considered combining it with the other two things for the maximum positive effect. Of course, there are other things you can do, like journaling or getting enough me-time daily.
Personally, the other things are less effective than meditation, but that can be different for different types of people. Whatever you do, focus on the positive aspects of your life, things you are grateful for, or things you enjoy. Stop being afraid. I genuinely believe that life means well to you.
Don’t let things get from the outside near your inside, as you can’t influence many of them. Don’t get bothered by the dump-ass colleague that diminishes you or when you do not receive the recognition you deserve. Those are unimportant facts, and sooner or later, your time will come. Only the circumstances may be different.
Avoid distractions
When I speak about distractions, I mean alcohol or drugs. All those substances prevent you from feeling and experiencing that life-changing event to its fullest extent. There may be recreational use of cannabis which is good for your well-being, but alcohol, for me, is the worst drug humanity has ever invented. Seriously.
You should try not to eliminate the feeling of stress or any other hard time you are going through, even if it might be the easy way out – for a while. The problem for me is that alcohol is socially accepted, and you can quickly get your hands on it.
I have not drunk since I was 18 years old and am more than glad about it. When I talk about not drinking, this does not include a good glass of Japanese whisky for pleasure very few times a year. I am not drowning any feelings with alcohol, and I don’t get people that drink it regularly or even daily to calm down or relax.
Find your purpose
I so much wanted to write misconceptions here. I believe finding your purpose is one of the hardest things to achieve in life. Most of the time, you will find it just by accident. But before I write an article about how to find your purpose, I want to touch on at least some of the common conceptions here.
Many will say that being rich, helping others, doing something for the environment, and doing something good should be your purpose. But it not necessarily has to be that way.
One excellent example would be supporting friends when they have a rough time. That way, you can build resilience while you connect with other people and learn how they can cope with stress or any additional hard time they experience.
Whenever you experience a hard time, you must ask yourself what you can do about this specific problem in your life. If it’s a huge problem, slice it up into smaller parts and move forward step by step. The same goes for finding your purpose.
Sometimes it’s a natural development out of something you’ve already started. Sometimes, it can even be the opposite of what you’ve done your entire life.
Take mental health seriously
The better your mental health is, the more resilient you can be. But how can you improve your mental health during good times to harden yourself for difficult times to come? Meditation can be one part. Practice it while you feel great, and continue your routines when you don’t.
Always make sure that you accept that change is something you should embrace instead of being afraid of. Ideas or goals that you set months or years ago might no longer fit your current situation that you are in. Embrace that change and be grateful for it.
Even if something terrible happens to you, this is hardly an indicator of how your life will continue to be in the future. Try to visualize what you want to have in your life instead of focusing on what you are afraid of. This will change your mental health tremendously as you learn to see the good things in life instead of only the bad.
Ask for help if needed
Don’t be afraid to ask for help if needed. One of the best examples of my lifetime was our Japanese neighbor who moved into his house several years before coming from Japan. He was in a difficult family situation as his wife was still at home, he wanted to take care of her in Japan, but his seven cats already came with him.
In that situation, he went to his neighbors nearby, and since they knew that we had four cats at that time, they brought him over to us. Long story short, just because of his initiative, we were able to take care of his cats for more than three months in a row, and an excellent, grateful relationship developed thanks to that.
Don’t be afraid to admit that you need support. I’ve learned that sometimes you have to ask for help, and you will receive support. But help does not necessarily only consist of friends. You sometimes need to see a professional psychologist to get the help and support required.
Turn off the noise
Let me ask you a couple of questions first:
How often do you watch, read, or listen to the news? Several times a day, once a day, once a week, or not at all?
Years ago, I listened to the news several times during the day. And the news, especially for US citizens, is most often packed with cruel stories, war news, crime, and whatnot. I stopped regularly listening to, reading, or watching the news several years ago.
And to be honest, I feel way better without it. Would anything change for you if you don’t hear them regularly? I would almost bet and say it does not. It’s not essential to be up-to-date. It most likely won’t even inflict your life in the tiniest bit.
Social media is the other noise you should consider shutting off to be more resilient. Facebook, Instagram, and many other platforms are wastes of time, and I try to limit my time to the minimum amount possible. Remove that additional psychological stress from your life.
Speak up for yourself
Speaking up for yourself is something you have to learn. Some families are good at teaching their children that they have their voice and must be heard. Others aren’t. You might be good at that or not based on your upbringing.
Your opinion is always worth being heard, and your questions must be asked. Most of us must learn that a crucial skill you should adapt to your life. It would help if you also learned to say no to things you don’t want to do.
Of course, in some situations, there are things that you have to do even if you don’t like to do them. Otherwise, you would lead your life while procrastinating and not reach any of your personal goals.
Learn more about the proper perspective
I believe that many people do not have the proper perspective on things. Just think about times in the past when you experienced a hard time. Were you able to move on? Did life provide good things for you after all? Remember that when you are stressed out because of something, the next time.
I firmly believe that some things happen to help you grow. Don’t fear the future, learn some relaxation techniques, and think positively about everything on your way. You already have everything you need to get through bad times, so go ahead and face your fears, take a deep breath and calm down.
There is one Zen quote that I love the most: “I follow four dictates: face it, accept it, deal with it, then let it go.” – Sheng-yen
Questions I get asked
Here is a collection of questions I get a lot when discussing resilience with someone.
Resilience is crucial because you need it whenever you overcome hard times. If you lack resilience, you may easily get swamped away, run over, or overwhelmed by your feelings. Finally, this may lead to unhealthy behavior. Stability is also about using your strengths to overcome or work through any problem.
You can do an online check at everydayhealth.com. Even if that test is quite simple, you can see how resilient you are as long as you answer it with complete honesty. With the help of that test, you can also learn which skills you should work on to become even more resilient.
The 7 Cs are confidence, competence, connection, character, control, coping, and contribution. But let me explain to you in detail what those are about.
Confidence: I think this is strongly related to competence. The more competence you have and the more you can demonstrate it, the more likely you will become a confident human being.
Competence: Competence is about knowing your stuff. Knowing what you do based on experience and observations means you can trust your judgments. The more competent you are, the better you can make reasonable and responsible choices in your life.
Connection: The deeper your relationship with others, whether it’s family, friends, relatives, or colleagues, the more resilient you can become. The better your support network, the more likely you can cope with difficult times.
Character: As children, we learn right and wrong from our parents. If they did a good job, you should have a basic understanding of it, can make responsible choices, and contribute to society.
Control: Learn how to stay in control of the outcome of your decisions. You need to understand your internal control because it will help you solve problems effectively instead of being a victim of circumstances. People with that quality most likely view themselves as confident.
Coping: To become more resilient, you must learn how to cope with stress. The better you are at that, the less likely you will experience a hard emotional time when times get rough.
Contribution: Even if I do not necessarily agree with the 7th C in that list, I can see that many feel better while contributing to the people around them.
There are four types of resilience that you can work on or develop:
mental resilience
emotional resilience
physical resilience
social resilience
I hope I was able to define resilience for you and provide you with some insights about what’s essential to learn to become more resilient over time.
