Resilience
We very often hear, “When life knocks you down, get back up again.” It sounds great and can be a wonderful, motivating rallying call. What about when you are feeling down and out and getting back up feels like too much? “Don’t worry, be happy!” This is another piece of advice that doesn’t always hit the mark. It’s great when you are sitting on the beach with a cold drink in your hand but when times get tough, it’s not as easy to simply throw away your worries, be happy, and get back to work. So often, it’s not actually taking the steps that prevent us from moving forward but rather the thought of the next steps that stops us in our tracks.
What does getting back up look like? My favorite, most valued piece of advice to give and receive is, “do the next right thing.” It is such a simple action when life feels too complicated or overwhelming. I talked about it a few weeks ago when we discussed ‘embracing discomfort.’ As much as we would like to constantly focus on the positives, defeat, failure, and heartbreak are unavoidable. The good news is that any step is the right step because no matter what you do, you will either get you closer to where you are meant to go or you will learn a lesson to point you in a better direction. Either way, it’s movement!
Grounded optimism is the best way to handle life’s ups and downs. Lynne Twist defines grounded optimism as “the combination of a positive attitude and a pragmatic assessment of the challenges that lead to success.” Basically, grounded optimists are problem solvers that don’t get down on themselves because of setbacks. In order to be resilient, we need to have hope that there is a solution, even when times are tough, whether it requires us to take action or to simply pause and take a breath.
My close friends will know that when really hard stuff happens, my first instinct is to drop a lot of curse words and acknowledge how truly &%$*@# things seem or feel. However, at my core, I believe I am someone who has an abundant amount of hope and defaults to a “find a way, make a way” attitude. When life knocks you down, there’s only one way to find out what you’re made of, so get back up! Decide NOW that when the next &%$*@# thing happens, you will acknowledge it and then choose to rise up and be resilient. It may take some curse words to get there, but getting to that conclusion is the important part.
This post is written in partnership with #HerGrowthCollective, encouraging women to walk the path of self-development together.
