Mindset Mondays: How to foster resilience in challenging times.
This is the transcript from the live video published on my Facebook Group The Empowered Badass Club,
You can join us here to attend and be part of our community.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/theempoweredbadassclub/
Scroll down to the end for the additional tools discussed.
1- How resilient are you? Take a little quiz to test yourself
2- What are the elements of resilience? Identifying the best elements of resilience and what it means in the current environment.
3- How to develop resilience? Practice effective skills to strengthen and build resilience during challenging times.
All the tools used are peer reviewed by different psychology bodies.
Alright, guys so welcome to this mindset Mondays. This is the first official mindset Mondays where we're actually going to discuss subjects. And today I wanted to talk about resilience. So normally we do mindset Mondays every Monday and then we do science Fridays, on Friday evening, and the only issue with some friends that for the last three days is that I can't do them live on Instagram, because I do share screen on Facebook and on zoom so if you find that those talks are actually quite interesting to you. We are going to go, and I'm going to add you to the group so you can then attend on Facebook and on zoom and ask questions. Obviously, you can post your questions on here if you have the discussions I wanted to have today about resilience is that we are pretty much all going through a bit of a shift time. And let's face it, we are tested on our resilience and how we handle all the challenges and really difficult situations that we're going through right now. So I thought that discussing it on sort of a more of an actual life coaching position. Obviously, I've done my research, I have friends who are NLP coaches. I also use actual psychology tools that I go and search from reputable sources. You know, not free actually sources that I have to pay for that in order for me to help my clients get better in their mindset in general so for me that's really helpful to dive a bit deeper into the psychology of your mindset and that's why I'm thinking, I was thinking of sharing it with you guys and sharing it live so we are going to explain. Pretty much what resilience is and you are going to actually actively take part in this talk, and I'm going to give you a couple of exercises, I'm going to give you a couple of things to do for yourself, and you are probably going to need a pen and a paper. So go and grab quickly quickly, a little pen and a paper, just a basic pen and paper. We're just going to take some questions, and take notes as well because that might be really useful to you in the longer term. All right, so remember any questions that you might have do send them to me directly through the zoom chat or the Facebook chat or here on Instagram. Okay, so let's start with a very nice. Let me take my notes first. And you, I want you to take your pen and paper.
All right.
And we're gonna do an exercise to actually define how resilient, you feel. Yeah. So let's take your pen and paper, take a nice deep breath in. Nicely breath out. Okay, try and clear your mind as much as possible and try to be as unbiased as possible for yourself. Yeah, so, as unbiased as possible. All right, so let's. This has been created by the late owl Siebert witch who has got a Ph.D., and who has funded the resiliency Centre in Portland, in Oregon. So he developed a quick resilience test, and which is adapted from the book called resilience advantage. Okay, so I want you to rate yourself from one, which is strongly disagree, to five strongly agree, I'm going to actually do this with you guys. Because, let's, let's do listing work on that. Okay, so take, you know, just take like your pen and paper, and you are going to rate yourself. Alright,
so
let's go with statements that strongly disagree or agree, five yes but 12345. So let's go. The first is unusually optimistic. I see difficulties, as temporary and expect to overcome them. So write down what do you think do you strongly agree with that statement or not. Okay, the second statement, feelings of anger loss and discouragement don't last long.
The next one, I can tolerate high levels of ambiguity and uncertainty about situations. This one is like super important right now right. Next one. I adapt quickly to new developments. I'm curious, ask questions.
Next one. I am playful, I find the humor in rough situations, and I can laugh at myself.
Next one. I learned valuable lessons from my experience, and from the experiences of others.
Next one.
I'm good at solving problems. I'm good at making things work well. Next one. I am strong and durable. I hold up well during tough times.
Last one. I've converted misfortune into good luck and found benefits in bad experiences.
All right. I'm just going to quickly repeat the statements. Yeah, you have 1234567899.
First one,
number one, I'm usually optimistic. I see difficulties are temporary and expect to overcome them. Number two, feelings of anger. anger, loss, and discouragement, don't last long. Number three, I can tolerate high levels of ambiguity and uncertainty about situations. Number four, I adapt quickly to new development. I'm curious, ask questions. Number five, I am playful. I find the humor in rough situations, and I can laugh at myself. Number six, I learned valuable lessons from my experience, says, and from the experiences of others. Number seven, I'm good at solving problems, I'm good at making things work well. Number eight, I'm strong and durable. I hold it while during tough times. And when I, I've converted misfortunes into good luck and found benefits in bad experiences. Alright,
so
now let's have a look. So what you're doing now is scoring all of your totals so you tally up everything so if we all knew from one to five, you were kind of like voting, putting yourself and deciding which one was applying to you if you were agreeing strongly disagree. So start making your Tally.
Okay. Everybody's got the turtle. All right. Now, let's have a look at the results. Okay. Okay. So, if you replied, under 20 if your tally is less than 20. You have low resilience, you may have trouble handling pressure setbacks may feel deeply hurt by criticism when things don't go well you might feel helpless, without hope. And, basically, this is where you probably should try and get actual help from the professional to kind of ramp up that's when like right now is going to be very very hard for you to deal with this situation right so if you're under 20 your resilience is not at the best, and you are going to be struggling quite a bit for a bit right now. So, if you're under 20 in the current situation where Riyadh, I would suggest that you try and find ways to get some help. So, obviously, there are a lot of resources which I tend to put up on the group and blogs and things like that so just obviously you can ask me after in dm I can send you but I would recommend that because you need to develop resilience and if you don't have any, I think it's super important that you do. So between 10 and 30, you have some resilience so you have some valuable pro resiliency skills but also plenty of room for improvement. Strive to strengthen the characteristic you already have and to cultivate the characteristic you lack. You may also wish to seek some outside coaching or support. If you have between 30 or 35 adequate resilience. You have your self motivated learner who recovers well for most strategies learning more about resilience and consciously building your resiliency skills will empower you to find more joy in life, even in the face of adversity and from 35 to 45, highly resilient you bounce back well from life since back and can thrive even under pressure, you could be of service to others who are trying to cope better with adversity. Alright. If you want to share your results with me. You can still comment, even in the replays, you can still comment now. My result is that 35 so I'm basically between adequate, and highly resilient. So I'm quite lucky. In a way, because I've had a fair amount of difficulties in my life that actually made me quite resilient so I myself had been through quite a lot in my childhood First off, but also I had to be very resilient when I had my surgery so I had a lot of corrective surgeries when I was 10 1112, I was in a wheelchair for quite a big part of my recovery so I had to be quite resilient and I was bullied at school for it as well for being in a wheelchair and so on. So, for me resilience comes, I would say comes quite easy but at the same time right now. If you want me to be honest with you. I'm getting resilience exhaustion, which means that, sometimes I just keep pushing and I keep pushing through and then I get freaking exhausted and at the moment that's how I'm feeling a little bit feel exhausted of like being strong it's very very hard. So I think that's where I'm like, not going from the. I'm still Addy do I consider myself on the adequate but not high because just because I sometimes forget to take care of myself in terms of being resilient so this is what we're talking about in terms of resilience is the ability to adapt and change and make things make the best out of any situation so any challenge that might come across. You try and take it as a lesson as a learning opportunity to make you and turn you into a better human new better person. And right now we actually have to focus on that because there is not a lot we can change in the current situation. Okay, we can't change. We can't tell COVID to fuck off, that's, that's not happening right now. Yeah, we know that. And we can't obviously change what the government is saying we can't change the rules we can't change anything, there's a lot of stuff that we can't actually change and we don't really have much control over. So, resilience is like finding this kind of peace and acceptance in the current environment in the current situations and trying to overturn all these challenges and struggles and trying to turn them into opportunities and sort of benefit from him.
So,
I know that sounds a lot easier than said than done, you know, obviously, it's very hard. And for a lot of us there is that resilience that we have to build around the financial scarcity, and the issues of work, uncertainty and just that the actually dealing with the uncertainty in general right now I think is what people really struggle with. So, what we can do in terms of tools is. It's quite nice so you basically have to try. Okay, I know it sounds really freaking lame. But we need to try and look towards the future. You need to still think about what you want from life regardless of what the situation is right now you have to believe that this shit is going to get better. And that you still have a future to look forward to. That's number one. You still have to take this vision for yourself, you still have to believe in your vision you still have to believe that there is something after COVID. It's so important. It is something in life after this pandemic and you got to believe it. You got to develop this mindset, which I see a lot of people don't have any more they see no end to it. They see everything getting worse by the day. And they don't really see an end to it, but there will be. And you have to believe that you literally have to keep faith in it. Okay. You still need to establish goals. You need to still have life goals regardless again of the situation, try and have some realistic goals, even if it is about learning a new skill and trying to do something from home right now, or even if it's just trying to take care of yourself a little bit more, just try and have a few more goals. Okay. Also the best way to build resilience around that is to plan coping strategies.
So,
what I find is that most of us as well. struggle to actually find healthy coping strategies we just tend to like grab the bottle of wine we tend to go for the ice cream we tend to do all the sort of slightly unhealthy coping strategies so try and define what coping strategies you actually find toxic and that are not helpful and try and find a better and healthier way to replace them with healthier coping strategies so if you find that the days are really freaking long, at work, and that you always are taking like the bottle of wine after work, then maybe try and switch that habit for another habit and maybe keep the wines on weekend on Friday nights maybe Thursday Friday night and maybe Monday Tuesday Wednesday, get yourself to put a 2025 minute yoga class or something that will find you a way to feel still better about yourself but is not going to build towards a toxic relationship towards yourself remember you want to try and limit the self-sabotage during this time it's quite difficult. I would say that because I have to work on that myself. So, if identify your toxic coping strategies and try and increase to positive and coping strategies that are going to benefit you, rather than, bring you down physically and mentally. Okay, also identify your strength, be confident in yourself, always, always, always, always, always realise that you are stronger than you think. Always realised that you do have strength and that you will make it through. You will make it through. And if you struggle with that, if you don't think you make it through, then that's why I've got this group on Facebook. That's why you can message me that's why we do all these things, obviously, it's not always that, you know, everyone is able to help, because, it's quite a lot. But, you need to have network support. Right, so also learning from experience, so that probably will come a bit long. A bit later in, the process. Maybe when we're going to start coming out of this whirlwind and the scales we're going to start realising that it was a really good lesson then you're going to realise how strong and resilient, you have been during this time. And trust me, whenever you're going to have crazy at times, whenever you're going to come across a challenge, you're going to feel like everything is a piece of cake, more or less because you're like right I've been through works right now. If you feel that this is literally one of the worst experiences or worst time you're going through. Trust me, you will be able to get through a lot in your life from this, this will impact you so much in such a positive way that you are going to have so much more reverence for life and gratitude for life after this. So, this will be like a really good lesson. So, also it's quite important to introduce a positive way of thinking and focusing on the current good things in your life.
So
focusing on what's actually working quite well what is quite good, even if it's just about being able to sleep in which we don't if you were always like going to work, and we can about a stupid amount of time stupid o'clock, doing a stupid amount of hours during this during that if you're struggling with the kids at home, and just trying to find ways to be like right at least I've got this at least I've got that, at least I can wake up whenever I fucking want. You know, it's, there's always little things that we can be grateful for. So, developing gratitude is increasingly important in this time, and I do recommend because of gratitude. Practice it every day, every day. And even when the time is crap, it's every day that practicing gratitude. So this is like super important as well. Then you have to try and make time to do the things you enjoy. Yeah. So try and really even if they've changed sometimes like around, around a pandemic now under lockdowns your interest might have changed, you know, I'm not doing any aerial hoop under a moment, I don't really feel like training myself like I usually do when I'm going to the gym and when I'm going to the studio.
However, there's a
lot of other stuff that I really enjoy doing. I enjoy journaling a lot more I enjoy reading a lot more I enjoy just like spending time on my business a lot more. So, those are things that you can amplify the stuff that makes you and bring you joy. Does this bring you joy? Amplify it. Yeah, it makes it sounds really silly but it's actually you know it makes sense, right, take care of yourself, keep healthy keep fit, going back to all sort of coping mechanism, make sure that you still keep healthy keep fit, you know, I, for one, don't sleep very well and don't really take care of my sleep hygiene and I know that I have to take care of that for example. So, again, identify and try and really take care of yourself and limit the damage physically and mentally as much as possible because we can easily enter the sort of sub destruction cycle and it's really really not what we need right now. Really not right. Then connect, you have to build healthy relationships with family, friends and teachers so this one. Yes. So if you have really good network support, and if you are okay, being online. Just go and connect and get your networks to report going. And just like don't hesitate to find a person that you can really offload, and you know that you can be the support, the support network for someone else as well. Yeah, that's quite important. I think that you know, for me, I think it's quite important for me to connect with my flatmates and try and like, go for walks with some people because I spend so much time online that I'm not feeling like having long conversations online with friends and family. Unfortunately, and that's that sucks a little bit but I do things that make me feel connecting to people differently at the moment. So, and then we try need to try and put the energy into the present moment. So we can't dwell on the past because what we used to have and what was is not the same now it's gone. And what will be is still uncertain so again you have the power to change the things that you can change in the now. Yeah. So, This is like the sort of little tips. Yeah. Also, you can have. There's a really nice little resilience-building plan worksheet that I will post to the group. I found this again it's from the wellness programme in a faculty in Australia and Sydney from a Ph.D. again in psychiatry, which discusses like creating a plan for yourself and practicing the resilience skill. So, it talks about recognising the signs of stress when you feel them in your body, what is your bad habit when stress so again coping mechanism and building physical hardiness such as making a small change to improve health. And for me, it can be really simple it's, it can be even if it's just moving a little bit more sleeping better eating better. Staying hydrated better you know everything, it can be just one thing again don't overwhelm yourself with a million things is one thing but start with the one that you know, you will matter most to you. And that's the mote that the most that is the most important to you.
Strengthening relaxation responses so find activities at home that help you relax activities at work, helps you relax even when sitting down at a desk all day here right now. Are you able to stand off your desk and take like five minutes break Are you able to go maybe outside and breathe some fresh air? Trying out relaxation strategies mindfulness meditations self-soothing by doing something comforting related to one of these five senses I love doing this stuff I've been discussing this. When we do meditation, but even, even in real in life, you know, in the daily life, what to do like that makes you that conflict, you can be tactile holding something comforting and grounding smelling something, looking at something puppy videos puppy photos looking out towards the trees, auditory music sounds of nature and taste tea chocolate something, if you know that it's a bad coping mechanism then change it for something else. For me, it's cuddling the cat. I always take moments to go and bother the cat and give him. Give him a big cuddle so the cat is underneath my table, He's got his own like little king bed and I go downstairs and I just like, just give him a little cuddle play with the cat, you know that's grounding for me is very important. Using a strength, and that also little visualisation exercise that you can do and that you can journal about describe the time you were able to overcome or handle a major challenge in your life. This is not the first time we are struggling, or we are coming across a challenge you've been there before. You probably don't realise it because this is quite a big one and this is like a collective challenging time as well so the empathy and compassion towards others make it make you feel like it's even, it's more intense obviously more intense the vibe and energy right now is collectively heavy, right, it's like, is, is there for everyone so obviously we feel that bouncing off each other as long as it's very very very strong. So, but you can still do retrospective work where you can remember a time where you had to overcome a handle a major challenge in your life, and then try and journal about what did you learn about yourself. During this challenging time. What personal strength, did you draw upon. Yeah. And you can even draw an image of when you are your most resilient so it can be anything like it can be a symbol, it can be, like, you know you doing a power pose like whatever makes you feel like you identify yourself as a strong being, you can just visualise it as well. Close your eyes and visualise that inner strength within yourself so we do this a lot during meditation we kind of visualise ourselves like different characters and then all of a sudden we kind of build upon that strength and we visualise it so you can draw any major you can visualise, and then how can you apply and feel that strength. Now, so this is a really nice little exercise, and it's not complicated. Just visualise turn draw that strength into your visualisation and try to materialise it into this kind of
world so
this is a really nice exercise when you feel like you need it. Increase positive emotions on a daily basis as soon as much as possible obviously try and decrease the negative emotion so that can be, let's start looking at the news let's start looking at Facebook and people arguing about BS. I'm trying to stay polite but let's face it, I'm not being very polite during this talk, but you know, try and also have like gratitude, you can even, you know, practice gratitude is also remembering, reminding other people of like how grateful you are for them so just maybe say thank you to someone who's been there for you just anything, Just try and also list, your accomplishment, just kind of like
have a look
back as well and like what you've been able to do in the last year, and try also and drawback all the stuff that you've been learning and like how far you've come. You've come already we've survived like another year of craziness, and that's in itself is a big achievement, engaging in meaningful activities, and try. So as I was saying I explained to people as well to try and keep a diary, even if you don't really have much to do try and keep a diary, where you try and like build up into routine because when you try and engage in a meaningful activity you try and remember your day each day. Try to remember meaningful moments in your day, even if you are locked inside, and that there is not much going on. Yeah, and try and associate these activities with a flow so that sensation of flow is, for example, when you see dancers and they're just flowing through flow is associated with a sort of meditative state. So where were you doing something and you don't see time passing by, to try and find an activity that really creates that flow. So, countering unhelpful thinking. Also, a bit of work, write down what you're thinking about when you're stressed and then ask yourself what is the worst that could happen. And how could I survive it? So, I like to do a worry list like this sometimes it's really, really helpful. Writing worry list best that could happen worst that could happen. Most likely that could happen what could I tell a friend in a similar situation so if you had a friend that was in a similar situation that you're feeling right now, what would you tell them. If you can't stop thinking about the situation, write about it a couple of times over four weeks. What 15 minutes each time and see how your story changes and becomes clearer.
So,
this is one of the reasons I meditate every day right now is that I've got mad anxiety, this is just been something that I've been dealing with. For me on the gauge. And the thing that is the most common with anxiety is like this cloud this clouded judgment and all of a sudden everything. Everything just kind of
gets
you lose the sense of clarity so it's quite important to take a step back and really kind of observe, observe the thoughts that we're having
and kind of establish the like okay, what's actually real in that thought, How can I handle, if this thing turns out to not work very well. How can I provide solutions to this problem? What's the best I could happen. What's the worst that could happen. What can I do if the worst happens, right? So, it's important to have a look like this and it's important to not be hard on ourselves and practice self-compassion, so important. Remember what someone who is inspiring to you, a hero coach, a mentor that encourages you, especially when you are doubting yourself, and maybe write it down on postage or something, and just leave it there. And, you know, just try to remember that you can do so someone says I've seen you can take on anything. Just put it up and just like watch it and repeat it to yourself like a mantra. Yeah. So, always, always kind of like use anything positive to really nurture, all that self-confidence when you are doubting yourself.
You are coming across that without, and then try and create this caring community so remember if you want to come into my Facebook group. This is a very very safe space where we nurture people to feel like they can tell what the thing how they're feeling. We're trying to help each other feel better. We're trying to interact with each other a lot. And obviously, find a support network, you know, your community work colleagues, friends, family practice good communication try and minimise the conflicts, as much as possible the difficult conversation maybe as much as possible what you can just try and really kind of help yourself. Stay into a positive bubble as much as possible and nurture the positive sides and try and minimise the negative impact that it can have. Yeah. So that's pretty much how I want to, I wanted to approach this sort of resilience training with you guys, I hope that you found this helpful. And I'm really really hoping that this was useful, I will post the sheet. The resilience-building plan worksheet so to stop the approach and the second part, and I will probably post a little quiz that we did the beginning in the group as well so please send me a DM and I will send you the link to access the group it's called the empowered badass club. It's amazing. We've got quite a lot going on everyday questions every day we make sure we nurture everything to make sure that you are engaged in that you feel that you have a community to speak to and to connect with. And we do this mindset Mondays talk science Fridays talk. And, yeah, so now the mindset Mondays will also be live on here, and I hope that this was really helpful. Any questions, any comments that you might have just let me know you can either DM me or commands. If you thought that this video was really helpful. Just please make sure that you share it with other people. And that you get to practice the exercises that I've just mentioned. And on this note, I will thank you very much, and I will wish you a really good Monday evening, and I will see you next week. The topic will be posted on the group, and on Instagram, and I will try and bring some guests in as well. Quite a lot so lots of collaborations, but any topic please do let me know, send me your suggestion, I will do polls. So every talk will be based on what you want to talk about and do the research for you. I will put everything for you. And this is what this is about. It's all about you and making sure that I answer everything that you need. So have a really nice evening guys be your end kind of badass, and go forth.
Resilience building toolkit:
Take your Resiliency Inventory
The late Al Siebert, PhD founded The Resiliency Center in Portland, Oregon. He developed a quick resilience test. Take this quiz, adapted from The Resilience Advantage (2015).
Rate yourself from 1 to 5 (1 = strongly disagree; 5 = strongly agree):
I’m usually optimistic. I see difficulties as temporary and expect to overcome them.
Feelings of anger, loss and discouragement don’t last long.
I can tolerate high levels of ambiguity and uncertainty about situations.
I adapt quickly to new developments. I’m curious. I ask questions.
I’m playful. I find the humor in rough situations and can laugh at myself.
I learn valuable lessons from my experiences and from the experiences of others.
I’m good at solving problems. I’m good at making things work well.
I’m strong and durable. I hold up well during tough times.
I’ve converted misfortune into good luck and found benefits in bad experiences.
Convert your scores with the following key:
Less than 20: Low Resilience — You may have trouble handling pressure or setbacks, and may feel deeply hurt by any criticism. When things don’t go well, you may feel helpless and without hope. Consider seeking some professional counsel or support in developing your resiliency skills. Connect with others who share your developmental goals.
10-30: Some Resilience — You have some valuable pro-resiliency skills, but also plenty of room for improvement. Strive to strengthen the characteristics you already have and to cultivate the characteristics you lack. You may also wish to seek some outside coaching or support.
30-35: Adequate Resilience — You are a self-motivated learner who recovers well from most challenges. Learning more about resilience, and consciously building your resiliency skills, will empower you to find more joy in life, even in the face of adversity.
35-45: Highly Resilient — You bounce back well from life’s setbacks and can thrive even under pressure. You could be of service to others who are trying to cope better with adversity.
