Sometimes despite doing lots of planning and preparation, things can go wrong and often the reasons can be completely out of your control. It’s important when this happens to avoid feeling angry, irritated, upset, disappointed, anxious, scared, frustrated or fall apart, instead it’s time to think about ways in which you can bounce back from the setback.
Protect yourself
That’s were resilience comes in. Resilience is your ability to adapt to life’s misfortunes and failures. But it’s not about putting up with something difficult, figuring it out on your own. No, true resilience is about being able to reach out to others for support. And being resilience can also help protect you from various mental health conditions, such as depression and anxiety.
Recently I have been feeling a bit rubbish, turned out that I needed an urgent operation. I’m now one week post op and I’m not back at work yet, but I am taking it easy, looking after myself and calling upon friends and colleagues when I need help. It’s also given me an opportunity to revisit my expectations and plans, make some tweaks and remain so grateful for so many things.
Rediscover enjoyment
Resilience won’t make your problems go away — but resilience can give you the ability to see past them, find enjoyment in life and better handle stress. Becoming more resilient takes time and practice. If you aren’t as resilient as you’d like to be, you can develop and learn skills to become more resilient, here are a few tips to help you improve your resilience and mental wellbeing:
- Reactions – pause and think about why you’re feeling the way you are. Try to understand your emotional triggers and learn to cope with them.
- Flexibility – reassess how a change affects you and whether you are able to manage and accommodate it simply by doing things slightly differently.
- Solutions – is there something else you could do, another way or a different outcome, or do you just need to recalibrate your expectations to make them more realistic.
- Relationships – Build strong, positive relationships with loved ones and friends can provide you with needed support, guidance and acceptance in good and bad times.
- Experience – learn from experience and remember how you’ve coped with hardships in the past and what skills and behaviours you need to draw upon to get you through.
- Time – build extra time into anything that you are doing, that way you won’t feel rushed or be adding any extra stresses if something unexpected happens.
- Proactivity – don’t ignore problems, work out what needs to be done, make a plan and take action.
- Hopeful – by accepting and anticipating changes will make it easier for you to adapt and view any new challenges with less worry.
- Take care of yourself – look after your own needs and feelings, whether that’s more sleep, or a healthier diet, building physical activity into your daily routine, practicing stress management and relaxation techniques, such as mindfulness, or meditation regularly.
- Make every day meaningful. Do something that gives you a sense of accomplishment and purpose every day. Set clear, achievable goals to help you look toward the future with meaning.
Sometimes life just gets in the way of all your best laid plans. When this happens, keep an open mind and remember that setbacks and disappointments can happens to the best of us. What will make a difference to the outcome is whether you can keep an open mind, focus on finding solutions, and work on being more flexible. For help with becoming more resilient, please get in touch 07780 692784 or debby@total-spectrum.com
