Developing Resilience: How Leaders Bounce Back from Life’s Letdowns

Life has never been easier but if it was, we would never get a chance to grow.

Challenges and difficulties are building blocks of our personality because everytime we bounce back from life`s letdowns, we learn, mature and grow as a person.

Over the past week I had work cancelled that had been booked almost 6 months ago, due to a variety of reasons, budget cuts not withstanding.

With bills to pay and food to put on the table, it does hurt and I admit to feeling pretty disappointed and frustrated by decisions made that are outside of my control.

As a business owner, these are the trials and the opportunities we face. Which got me thinking....

As leaders and managers out there, how often do you have a difficult business decision to make or receive news that is unfavourable that you have to work through and still keep smiling?

Its seductively tempting to want to voice your frustrations to all and sundry, to look outward and blame and judge or even to look inward and blame and judge. Yet, how helpful is this approach? And, how is it going to help you move forward?

DEVELOPING RESILIENCE

Developing resilience is an essential ingredient in helping you to bounce back from and over the many small, medium and larger challenges that come our way when dealing with the many people you daily have to influence to get tasks completed.

A definition from Australian Psychologist, Andrew Fuller says:

Resilience is the the happy knack of being able to bungy-jump through the pitfalls of life

I love this definition because it helps me to focus on the positive gifts we find in our adversities, rather than labouring under their weight.

That I can, if I learn to use my ability to bounce, leverage both the positive and negative within the situation to help me to keep moving so I don’t become stuck.

USING YOUR STRENGTHS TO DEVELOP YOUR RESILIENCE

And so, as I was doing my preparations and research for this week’s workshops, I was challenged to find examples of where I authentically practice the stuff I teach in my own life.

I realise how much I underestimate my abilities and capabilities – especially my strengths when it comes to resilience.

Do you find you do the same? If you do, you are not alone as I find this a common trend with those I work with.

And, if you’d like to find out what your strengths are, try out a free resource below that helps you identify your key strengths in 5 minutes or less.

Created under the direction of Dr. Martin Seligman, the “father of Positive Psychology” and author of Authentic Happiness and Flourish, and Dr. Christopher PetIerson, distinguished scientist at the University of Michigan and author of A Primer in Positive Psychology, and validated by Robert McGrath, Ph.D., the VIA Survey is regarded as a central tool of positive psychology and has been used in hundreds of research studies and taken by over 3 million people in over 190 countries resulting in better workplaces… schools… teams…LIVES the world over

Check it out here

Mine in order are :

Its seductively tempting to want to voice your frustrations to all and sundry, to look outward and blame and judge or even to look inward and blame and judge. Yet, how helpful is this approach? And, how is it going to help you move forward?

My short but powerful answer to dealing with the problems I face is a simple acronym:

STOP!

S STANDS FOR STOP

Take Time-Out to Reflect on what has happened. Often it can be tempting to go into action mode in order to get some sort of result. My experience is that its only when we stop, sort through and acknowledge our feelings and thoughts that we can sort through the problem in order to objectively address our response to it. Some useful questions you can ask yourself:

T STANDS FOR THANKFUL

Some questions to ask yourself to help you re-frame your situation:

O STANDS FOR OPPORTUNITY

In most instances, the let-down we have opens the way for other opportunities to come our way - if we are open and ready for them.

Have you ever had a difficult/sad/frustrating situation happen which you had to let go of? Then once you had to courage to surrender and let go, something else MUCH BETTER came along?

Some useful questions to ask yourself when exploring opportunities:

P STANDS FOR PROCEED

Once you have worked through your thoughts and feelings about a situation, you often feel lighter and less weighed down. The science behind this is that negative emotions have a frequency and the more intense the negative thoughts and feelings associated with them,the heavier,more dense and sluggish the frequency. It's why we often feel "weighed down" in adversity and why when we begin to take positive actions, we start to feel "lighter". The feelings we have when we take action are usually higher frequency emotions like "resolve, focus, energy". We are designed for deep insight and thought BEFORE responding with ACTION. That's why if you proceed without doing steps 1, 2 and 3, you will get stuck and your results won't be as successful in most instances.

Some questions to ask yourself once you are ready to proceed:

It's useful to note that this process of moving through and working through the 4-step STOP process can take as a little as 7 minutes or as long as a few hours. It really is up to you and the intensity of the thoughts and feelings brought up in such a situation. 

What words of wisdom do you have around dealing with and responding to life's let downs? I'd love to hear your stories and insights, please share in the comments section below this article....

See you at the top,