We’ve all heard it a thousand times … resilience is what will get us through 2020.
It’s a grand statement, being used by many. But there doesn’t seem to be a lot being said about what resilience actually means.
Perhaps the best place for us to start is to understand what is actually being talked about.
There are many different definitions of resilience, and it can be applied to so many varied situations.
For the most part, the resilience we hear about when people talk about it being the thing we need to get through 2020 is what is known as ‘psychological resilience’.
Wikipedia describes this type of resilience as:
“… the ability to mentally or emotionally cope with a crisis or to return to pre-crisis very quickly”.
Essentially, this means that you’re resilient when you can remain calm during a crisis and/or chaos, and then quickly move on from the incident without long-term negative consequences.
Supposedly, we have high levels of resilience when we can move quickly from experiencing a crisis to the pre-chaos state. That sounds great, but the reality of life at the moment is that crisis after crisis is hitting us, and the chaos seems never-ending.
None of us know what the new ‘normal’ looks like. So, can we really remain calm when we have crisis after crisis thrown at us? When the world around us is experiencing so much pain and turbulence? When we’re feeling uncontrollable fear and panic about the unknown world in front of us?
Right now, there’s a lot of talk about the way we need to pivot our lives, work on ourselves, grow and develop and emerge as a whole new person. We’re being herded en masse to be motivated and inspired in spite of the chaos that’s happening around us.
But what if there’s another way for us to move forwards?
What’s missing at the moment is the conversation around everyone being a unique individual, and the focus on providing everyone with access to tools and resources that help them to work out what each of them needs to get through these troubling times.
Higher levels of resilience are always needed when you’re under more stress. There is a direct correlation between your level of stress and your ability to cope with what life throws your way. The more stressed you are, the more exhausted you will be, and we all know that everything is much harder when you’re tired.
So, instead of focusing on ways to increase your resilience, perhaps it’s an easier pathway to find the simple and practical things you can do right now to help you reduce your stress in different areas of your life.
The reality right now is this: globally we’re at a tipping point in life. Now’s the time to realise that there are lots of different choices you can make. You’re not limited to staying where you are and being forced to try and build more resilience. You have lots of options you can easily access that support you in finding the simple steps that help you move forwards in a different way.
It might seem like everything you know about life has been thrown into the air – like you have to achieve the impossible, somehow find energy you don’t have from nowhere and become more resilient so you can completely start again. But the reality is that you don’t need to overhaul everything, and if you focus on one or two things at a time, you can make the way forward so much easier.
Resilience is a great skillset to have, but when you focus on reducing the overall stress in your life, you’ll find that you don’t need anywhere near as much resilience when the curve balls get thrown your way.
So, you choose what works for you. Will you fall into line and follow the catch cry of 2020, focusing only on building your resilience and trying to remain calm while the crises keep coming at you? Or maybe instead, you can choose to walk through life in a different way and reduce the overall pressure – by adopting a simple pathway forwards and creating a less stressful life that supports you no matter what comes your way.
If you want some help to move forward in a different way, you can find loads of questions you can start asking yourself in the articles and videos in my FREE email series – it’s a great way to help you begin your journey. Simply click here to start you on your way.
Bronwen Sciortino is a Simplicity Expert, an internationally renowned author and professional speaker and. You can follow her at her website; Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn.