Resilience is an individual’s ability to withstand adversity or challenges and bounce back to initial status after difficult life event has occurred. Note that being resilient does not mean that you don’t experience stress, loss, emotional upheaval or tough times.
Can you remember when you faced a challenging situation; roadblock, a tremendous obstacle, an experience that hit you hard and shook every bit of energy out of you? Was it a difficult company project, a family crisis, a personal breaking point, a career cross road or something else that shook you off your grounds and maybe even made you fall?
Challenges and adversities are common to everybody, they are always coming up in different forms!8What is not common to everyone, unfortunately, is the ability to not only overcome challenges, but also flourish afterwards.
You may know some individuals who look strong and “cool”, until they get hit by a turbulence (say a business failure) and they get shaken off their grounds. They get suicidal and lose all hopes that anything would ever work out again. Instead of acknowledging that they failed, they acknowledge that they are failures. Some individuals, on the other hand, experience the same – or even worse circumstances or challenges and yet rise from it stronger and better, as if nothing had really happened.
For every individual that falls under the second group, there is a common theme that makes them who they are – RESILIENCE!
Resilience is standing firm when, and after, everything around you has fallen. It is the ability to retain yourself as a strong and unbreakable force when a challenge or adversity hits. Resilience is having stamina – being able to stand firm and tall regardless of the situation. Resilience is the ability to engage in life with hope and humour, despite devastating losses that would have otherwise crippled you. Resilience is seeing life events and occurrences, no matter how devastating they are, as comprehensible, controllable, and meaningful.
Resilience is not only about overcoming turbulent times, but also about going through normal daily challenges that suddenly require short deadlines, or going through challenges that you treat but didn’t get right within normal time frame. It is the ability to keep doing what’s right and necessary, regardless of what speculations say.
Why Become Resilient?
Resilience frees one from the shackles of past experiences, or social odds, and exposes one to new possibilities. A resilient individual does not accept the victim role or blame others when adverse situations arise, she responds by adapting herself, springing back, and halting the crisis.
Other advantages of being resilient
1. It improves the general wellbeing of the person.
2. Increases workers’ performance on the job.
3. Helps workers to remain focused on personal and organisational goals.
4. Protects against mental health conditions e.g. panic attacks.
5. It equips one to be able to handle life’s challenges.
6. Resilience helps to develop positive mood, which in turn improves emotional and physical health.
The opposite of the above is what happens when an individual has low resilience.
….To be concluded next week with ‘How to become Resilient’.
