There's more to Resilience than Bouncing Back

When we hear the word “resilience,” we often think about this in terms of “bouncing back”. Bouncing back from setbacks or adversity. Much of the literature that exists refers to resilience as bouncing back. By looking at resilience in this way however, it paints a picture of the ease with which we overcome setbacks or adversity, when in reality it is more complex than that. If it really were just a matter of “bouncing back” then there wouldn’t be such a thing as resilience because it would be so easy to overcome our challenges!

What do we mean when we talk about developing resilience? Michael Neenan, Associate Director of the Centre for Coaching and Centre for Stress Management, prefers to describe resilience as “coming back” rather than bouncing back. Coming back acknowledges the effort, time and process involved in overcoming setbacks and adversity.

It is important to recognise that different people will respond to the same event in different ways. For example, if two people were to lose their jobs, they will likely respond in the same way initially – with anger, fear, embarrassment and the like. After a period of time however, one person will take proactive steps towards finding another job, while the other person continues to wallow in their misery, pining for their old job and blaming others for their misfortune rather than accepting what has happened and looking for a new job. The first person ends up getting another job after a little while and carries on with life, learning new skills and building new relationships. They have “come back” from their setback. Why do people respond differently to the same event?

Our individual responses to any event are defined by our beliefs, values and experiences. This also influences our levels of resilience. If you tend to be less resilient, then don’t worry. It is a trait that can be developed so that it becomes a habit. Keep in mind here that you may be more resilient than you realise. Think about the day-to-day activities that you do – the ones that you would rather not do. Cleaning, the school run, grocery shopping, exercise, socialising? Being resilient doesn’t just mean coming back from adversity and setbacks. It also refers to your ability to come back from the day-to-day tasks that you find unpleasant or uncomfortable. But you do them anyway.

How do you become more resilient? To start with, by changing your perceptions. Our perceptions make up our reality. How I make sense of something will be different to how you make sense of the same thing. As mentioned earlier, this is because of our different beliefs, values and experiences, meaning that there is more than one way to look at the same thing. Knowing this, it also means that we have the ability to change our perception of an event and subsequently, our response to it. This is the essence of developing resilience.