How to grow your resilience muscles

Whilst we regularly recognise and celebrate resilience in people who have overcome extreme adversity, we rarely pay the same respect to everyday resilience.

We don’t think much about the challenging conversation we’ve had to have with a colleague, the tight deadline we’ve hit for a client or the emotional support we’ve provided a family member, and yet these are all examples of resilience.

You see, resilience is in all of us. We are not born resilient people nor are we born non-resilient people; resilience is a muscle and it can be developed overtime with consistent practice and focus.

With the ever-changing modern workplace, our ability to adapt to change and recover quickly from set backs is imperative and resilience is quickly becoming a key differentiator amongst the workforce.

So, how can you strengthen your resilience muscles and ensure your not only survive, but thrive, under challenges?

Take positive action: think about what you can do, big or small, to move closer to a difficult experience or task – this may be as simple as asking for help, creating a ‘To Do’ list or devising a plan of attack. Taking a step towards the challenge, big or small, may not remove difficultly but it will boost your confidence and sense of control allowing you to move forward more easily.

Celebrate: why do we always leave our celebrations to the end? Celebrating small wins throughout the process trains our brains to look for the positives rather than automatically seek the negatives. Celebrate wins along the way and reward yourself in the moment for an achievement that has brought you closer to success.

Maintain perspective: remember ‘this too shall pass.’ The challenges that we face today are unlikely to factor on our radar in a few weeks time. Think about past experiences where you questioned how you would come out the other side. Remind yourself that you survived that, and you will survive this.

Want to become a resilience heavy weight? I'd love to see you at one of my resilience workshops as part of the #TheResilienceSeries.