Tag Archives: Resilience

Nov9

Bounce Back After A Setback With These 10 Tips

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Bounce Back After A Setback With These 10 Tips

Resilience is our capacity to recover quickly from difficulties. With all that is happening in the world today, it can be said that resilience is an extremely important skill to have. While physical toughness is good to have, everyone must work on improving their psychological resilience or mental toughness. Being able to emotionally or mentally cope in times of crisis or challenges can help strengthen your mental fortitude.

Calmness and clarity in the face of adversity will only come to you once you learn the art of resilience. Here are 10 tips to help yourself bounce back from a setback.

  1. Learn from your mistakes – Our ability to learn from our mistakes is one of the best ways to gauge personal development and progress. The only person you should compare yourself with is your old self. So strive to be better than who you were yesterday. 
  2. Be honest with yourself – accept yourself for who you are. When you are honest with yourself, you can focus on the things you want to improve on. 
  3. Vent out – let’s face it, we need others to stay sane. Friends and family can only be too happy to share the load with you. So if the burden is getting to be too heavy, learn to reach out and ask for help from loved ones who are willing to listen. 
  4. Keep it short and sweet – there is a time for wallowing and a time for grieving. Go through that process, it is healthy. But do not dwell. It will keep you stunted and staying in a dark place, somewhere you don’t want to be. Do not wallow over your regrets for a long time. The key to bouncing back is to know when to dust yourself off and get back up.
  5. Revisit your why – when you experience a setback, it is human nature to keep revisiting the reasons why it went wrong. While you are in this process, revisit your reasons for pursuing the thing you were pursuing. Remind yourself why you wanted to reach that goal in the first place and recalibrate accordingly. 
  6. Maximize your strengths – it is always a good idea to hone your skills and look for ways to improve yourself. Focus on what you are good at.
  7. Look forward – forward-thinking is a great way to bounce back from any setback. It helps you set your sights on a goal. This means being hopeful about something in the future and always being on the lookout for opportunities.
  8. Set goals – establish realistic goals. You can read all about goal setting here.
  9. Find happiness – Don’t forget to stop and smell the flowers. Sometimes, we get all shortsighted and too focused that we don’t take some time for ourselves to relax and enjoy the process. Don’t forget to celebrate wins and enjoy life.
  10. Lend a helping hand– shift your focus from your setback to helping others. Knowing that you are part of something bigger always helps put things in perspective.

Do you have any tips on how to bounce back from a setback? Share them with us in the comments. Remember to work smart and be a blessing to someone today. Stay safe and healthy!

Apr14

Coronavirus Quarantine Preparations Part 5: How to stay optimistic and resilient in the face of uncertainty

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Coronavirus Quarantine Preparations Part 5: How to stay optimistic and resilient in the face of uncertainty

Many of us are experiencing anxiety over the uncertainty that the next few days will bring. Not even the world’s health expert can say for sure how the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is going to affect us in the foreseeable future. This is why a lot of us are struggling with keeping our mental health and our optimism in check.

Our brains like predictability and order. Which is why we look for patterns, rhythms, and routine. When we go out of this comfort zone, our brain perceives this as a threat and tells our body to go into stress response mode. We feel agitated and on high alert because our body responds as though it is under attack.

We might feel worried, short-tempered, distracted, unable to focus, temperamental, or scared. We might even exhibit physical symptoms like insomnia, muscle aches, headaches, faster heartbeat, tension, neck pains, etc. All of which are stress responses. It’s our mind and body going through its fight or flight programming in response to stress.

We won’t be able to cure uncertainty for we will never know what the future holds. However, there are some things that we can control. We can teach our brain to actually reframe our way of thinking and create a few strategies to build resilience and keep our focus.

Rest
Restful sleep is the first thing to go when your mind is full of worry. However, rest is essential in order to boost your resilience. A well-rested mind and body is more equipped to combat stress than a tired one. Make sure to prioritize sleep by working out how many hours of sleep you need to feel well-rested and then make that a daily target.

Move
Outdoor activities may be hard to come by when you’re in quarantine or self-isolation. However, there are exercise videos on youtube that you can move along to. There are also a lot of movement apps that you can follow along. A few things you can do at home include yoga, Zumba, Kinect games (if you have an Xbox Kinect), bodyweight exercises, jump rope, etc. If you’re lucky enough to live in a neighborhood where outdoor exercises can be done while still practicing social distancing, then go for a quick run, hike, or even walk the dog. Exercise will help you release those valuable feel-good hormones called endorphins. You will need that so that you can stay resilient and optimistic.

Connect
For the sake of our mental health, all of us need to feel that we are part of something greater than ourselves. Our sense of belonging and of the community suffers when we put ourselves in quarantine or self-isolation. This is why we have to stay connected. Schedule calls to family and friends. Commit to giving back to your community. Find ways to help out, even from your homes. You can donate, help organize a feeding program, purchase and send protective gear to frontliners. Thinking of others helps build resilience, and being able to help creates optimism and spreads hope. We all need those during these dark and uncertain times.

What are your tips to stay optimistic and resilient? Let us know in the comments. Remember to work smart and be a blessing to someone today. Stay safe and healthy!

Written by Jaie O. TheHelp