It does not matter how many times you get knocked down, but how many times you get up. Vince Lombardi
re·sil·ience (noun)
1.
the power or ability to return to the original form, position, etc., after being bent, compressed, or stretched; elasticity.
2. ability to recover readily from illness, depression, adversity, or the like; buoyancy.
Life happens. Things change. The going gets tough. When life knocks us down, the best thing we can do is lick our wounds, survey the damage, take what learning we can from the experience and get back up!
I like to use the analogy of driving down the highway and your car breaks down. Most of us probably spend a few minutes surprised and frustrated, possibly scared or angry or both! We may spend some time lamenting our situation, blaming ourselves, some one else, or the universe for our circumstance, but sooner or later, most of us get busy figuring out what to do next and how to solve the problem. We remind ourselves that we won’t be stuck on the side of the highway forever and that things could be worse; perhaps we think, at least I wasn’t in a terrible accident or at least I’m not in a desolate or scary area. I venture to guess that most of us would not think the reasonable solution would be to just stay on the side of the highway, sad, angry, and scared, watching cars go by, unhappy with the circumstance, but not doing anything about it!
And so it is with life! Resilience is adaptability, flexibility, and ultimately the ability to recover; adjustment to change and coping with adversity. What helps us be resilient? Allow yourselves to have your feelings. Express your anger, sadness, or fears. Tell your story to others and hope for some compassion and understanding. Going it alone is tougher, asking for help shares the burden. Take care of yourself. Remind yourself that the current circumstance won’t last forever and that some things in your life are going well. Believe you can cope or find solutions. After all, most of us have gotten ourselves through a tough time or two. How did you do it? What resources did you draw on? You had what it takes to make it before and you can do it again!
What can you learn from the situation and what options do you see? As with the car on the side of the road, most of us would not see our only option as staying on the side of the road with a broken car! We would find a way off the highway. Sometimes we are better prepared for life’s challenges and other times not. Sometimes it is easy to see what we might have done differently and other times there is nothing we could have done; sometimes life is just unfair and bad things happen to good people. Nevertheless, we must find our way through the challenge. When we are knocked down, we can get up and try something new. If it doesn’t work, we can try again. We can rest awhile, we can call for help, we can nurse our feelings, we can imagine things getting better. Ultimately, we must try again.
