Hopeful Thoughts About Resilience
Resilience (noun)
From the Latin, to leap back. The ability to recover quickly (emotionally, physically, & mentally) after hardships.
Redefining Resilience
When I think of resilience, I imagine a bungee cord. It works great for lots of purposes, and it is very difficult to break. Unlike a rubber band that sometimes will just snap, bungee cords can take a lot before they start to fray. Even then, they don’t lose their ability all at once; it happens slowly, strand by strand as the stress of whatever is pulling at it becomes too much.
Life can be like that. Day after day, we do the things we need to do to get by – and we hope that we will be able to spring back fresh tomorrow, ready to take on the challenges that come our way. For some people, this can even be exhilarating! We add on challenge after challenge, pushing ourselves as if to see where our personal breaking point might be.
Others of us might prefer to tackle life’s challenges in a less assertive manner, feeling as if we don’t really want to know where that breaking point might be. We prefer slow and steady, no surprises, thank you very much.
There may come a time in your life, however, when you don’t really get to choose your approach. Life may come at you in a way that forces you to redefine your own sense of self, your ability to face whatever comes your way and not only survive it but thrive as a result. Often, these experiences can seem terrible when they are happening – emotionally, physically, and mentally devastating. We become so overwhelmed that we cannot figure out how to move forward.
Something like this recently happened to me, and my imagination provided an image of me hanging at the end of a long bungee cord. You know the ones in those crazy videos of people leaping off bridges with a bungee cord around their feet? Only in this one, I don’t bounce back at all … because I have brought with me all the baggage I have been carrying around for years and years and years! Regrets, sorrows, times when I said too much/too little, people I have lost. All of it. The weight of all those experiences, beliefs, and fears took me all the way to the bottom of the canyon and held me there.
At some point, in order to deal with the life we have now, we have to let go of our past. We have to recognize that, no matter whether the stuff is good or bad, most of it is keeping us from living the life we really want to live … keeping us stuck instead of resilient, adaptable, and open. It may be the hardest thing we will ever do, but if we are never willing to take that step, how will we ever know what potential wonder we might experience when, freed of all that heaviness, we are able to rise back up from the lowest place we have ever known?
Understanding Our Place in the World
In a world that often seems to run on the “need” to be good enough/better than/greatest of all time, it can be pretty difficult to figure out just how us normal folks fit in. That is most of us, by the way – going about our daily lives, doing the best we can, yet always feeling somehow inadequate.
It is our fear of scarcity … of not enough that causes us to view the world in ways that are dark and sad and lonely. That has a lot to do with how we perceive the universe. Is it a friendly place or a place full of terrors around every corner? For most of us, how we answer that question is based on really, really, really limited experiences that we then use to create a set of beliefs about how all life must be. Even when we see good things happening, somehow we believe those things are outliers – or, more likely, that those kinds of good experiences could never happen to us.
Here’s a surprising idea: we don’t have to disbelieve that something bad is right around the corner in order to also believe that something really good might be walking along beside it! After all, how would we know what happiness feels like if we were never sad?
Life is just life. Beauty is everywhere … and kindness, love, generosity, and acceptance, too – even if we continue to pass them by without noticing. Patient and gentle, they are waiting for us to be ready. When we start to see our lives differently … when we start to understand that all our past experiences are part of a beautiful tapestry that is us as a whole being – mind/body/spirit – all given space to evolve and participate in life, then it all starts to make more sense.
I’m not saying the experience of being human is an easy one. Being the kind of person I am, I’m not even sure I think it should be easy. If we want to believe that there is more to life than what we can experience with our senses … that perhaps there is a reason for all of it, even if we can’t comprehend what it is … then it feels like the striving may be the point. Not immediate success, but the growth and understanding that comes with working toward something we value. Not what society values, although it might be that, too. What we value. The meaning in life might be no more than whatever meaning you choose.
The first step is understanding that you matter. Just as much as anyone else here, you have value! Your hands can reach out and lift another up. Your words can inspire. Your kindness can shine a light. Your struggle can inspire someone to find their best self. You matter. I matter. We all matter.
Nurturing a Way of Perceiving the World
I'd like to share a few observations from my life in the hope that it will resonate for you. I have come to understand, somewhat late in life perhaps, that connecting with and sharing the experiences of our lives helps us to see how we can all find a path forward that is brighter than the one we may currently be traveling.
I have lived the majority of my life from a place of quiet desperation, certain that one disaster or another lurked around every corner. It is a challenging perspective - and one that becomes paralyzing over time. It is also very hard to change once it settles in for the long journey that is a person's life.
I don't really have any excuses for this mindset. Oh, I can tick off the possible reasons - and I have done just that, many times - to justify my slouching through a day with a storm cloud over my head. But, really, my life has been so full of wonderful experiences that I am finding it harder to justify this persona as my real identity. Negative. Dark. Why in the world would anyone want to embrace that as who they are?!
And so ... I am working on changing my perspective ... on seeing the world just as it is. That means I am giving up actively looking for all the ways the world is really messed up, all the ways everything I love is disappearing or being destroyed, all the ways that feed the darkness within.
Instead, I am trying something new: to just see the world with my heart instead. I am not forgetting the experiences that have shaped my life. I am not pretending everything is a lovely postcard version of the world. I am, however, allowing myself to bear witness to the myriad small things that happen every day that confirm that the universe may - just possibly - be a friendlier place than I thought - and that I have a part to play in that more positive version.
In order to do this, I am focusing my mind/body/spirit on small things - things that bring me joy, elicit a laugh, or create a sense of wonder. The world is full of such moments, if we bother to pay attention to them. Colors, sounds, the feel of a breeze, the scent of flowers or food cooking, the sight of a friend or loved one after an absence. Anything can be a reminder that the world is still there, full of possibilities. I am cultivating conversations with people who already have the gift of seeing good around them: hopeful, kind, deliberately and thoughtfully generous people. Their company is a gift I never knew I needed, and I am grateful every day for their presence in my life - and grateful, as well, that they allow me to learn from their open-hearted example.
There are other practices that help: journaling, meditation, listening to & reading books by people who have traveled down these roads before me. And, of course, my art. I'm not yet at the place where I can create bigger works without my inner critic booing and hissing over every line and brushstroke, but I am learning not to listen. I am allowing myself to enjoy the creative act of turning my thoughts and observations into something visual - for the sheer pleasure of exploration and creativity. No comparisons. No not-good-enoughs. No negativity. Just the quiet enjoyment of communion with the joyful inner parts of me that I have kept silent for so many years.
I tell you these things, not to impress you but in the hope that it may inspire you. I share this with you in the hope that you will recognize, as I have, that you don't have to go on living in a world that does not bring you joy! Create a better one for yourself! Our perception is everything ... absolutely everything! There are so many resources paying attention to the wild and ridiculous (but still true) fact that what we think affects everything else! I have chosen to think that the universe is a friendly place, and there is room for - no! there is need for - me (and you!) to be here, now, experiencing all I am experiencing.
So ... this is me saying, "See? Here is a path through the darkness! The journey you dream of making is possible! Others have traveled this way before us, and we can follow them if we choose." I am choosing "yes!" What will you choose?
Note: if you want to check out how powerful your thoughts can be, I suggest the work of Ellen Langer, who has published books (Counterclockwise; Mindful Body, and others) and given TED.com talks on her research. Also Brene Brown, in particular her book The Gifts of Imperfection.