Thanks to my company, I was fortunate to have been able to watch a webinar on resilience from the WellnessConcepts company earlier this year. Here are some of my takeaways:
Resilient people tend to have a positive attitude, are optimistic, flexible, and exhibit grit. But you don’t have to be born with those traits! Resilience is a learned skill, one you can get better at with practice.
Most of us have been getting a lot of practice with resilience over the past couple of years! Before early 2020, most of us couldn’t have imagined working from home, wearing masks, or most of the changes we made in our lives due to the pandemic. We have been resilient—we have adapted to changes beyond our control with changes we have made to our lives.
Here’s how to build a resiliency:
Be willing to adapt to change, have a flexible attitude instead of a rigid one, develop strong social connections, have a sense of purpose, be open to feedback (don’t be defensive: those giving you feedback want you to be your best), stay hopeful (find positivity instead of looking for doom and gloom), and learn from experiences, good and bad (without failure, there is no growth: as one of my mentors taught me, there are two teams, the winning team, and the learning team).
The presenter also recommended practicing self-care, including eating nourishing foods, exercising, breathing/meditation (breathing suffers when we are stressed), taking breaks, getting quality sleep, building strong relationships, talking to others, and getting rid of a perfection mentality (no one is perfect).
If you fall off your plan, know that you can bounce back.
Stay well and be resilient,
David