Volume 3, Issue 7, August 2024
Welcome to Volume 3, Issue 7 of The Root.
In order to support our growth, we require a strong network of roots. They anchor us and serve as a conduit for nutrients to help us develop and deliver on our goals.
I’m always learning new concepts in leadership for myself and my clients.
A theme that keeps resonating for me this month is Resilience.
Whether it’s stories about Olympic athletes or people within my network, resilience and well-being are common threads.
This month, I’d like to provide key concepts I’ve learned in the past few months about this important topic. I hope they will be helpful for you on your own journey towards resilience.
Thank you for following along our journey to Aspire to Grow.
To see previous Volumes and Issues of The Root, please see: Aspire To Grow, Blog
Off the Shelf – My Book Pick
Arrive and Thrive – 7 Impactful Practices for Women Navigating Leadership – Susan MacKenty Brady, Janet Foutty and Lynn Perry Wooten
In the book Arrive and Thrive: 7 Impactful Practices for Women Navigating Leadership, the authors provide their insights on these important 7 practices. While I’m still reading the book in its entirety, I was happy to see a full chapter (1 Impactful Practice) is Resilience.
Regardless of your gender, age or background, these concepts hold true. I like that they remind us that resiliency takes many forms:
- Individual Resilience
- Family Resilience
- Organizational Resilience
- Community Resilience
- National Resilience
For the purposes of this blog, we will focus on individual (and perhaps a bit of family) resilience. Within the last few years, we’ve seen resilience take many forms.
The Skill of Resilience
Resilience is a skill.
As we’ve seen in the Olympic athlete stories, many have faced multiple challenges throughout their individual journeys. To overcome these, many have leaned on the skill to build internal strength, flexibility and support from others.
Resilience may look different depending on our upbringing, identity, race or religion.
“Resilience is persevering and experiencing a growth trajectory in the middle of challenges, changes, disruptions and adversity”. – Brady, Foutty & Wooten
Fostering resilience is the act of responding to these changes including:
- Self-awareness
- Self-empowerment
- Self-assurance
- Self-alignment (flexibility in the face of change)
How are you aware of this need within yourself, and in which ways are you building your confidence and empowering yourself to overcome these disruptions or challenges?
Small changes can be powerful. 🔥
Building Resilience
Part of building this resilience includes:
- Having the desire to make positive adaptations in the midst of challenges
- Utilizing our resources, ability and strength to push through and overcome
The authors suggest that we are able to build resiliency (rather than turn back when things get tough), by employing these tactics:
- 1. Take Action: Four modes of action to foster resilience
- 2. Become a Positive Deviant
- 3. Create Circles of Support
- 4. Foster Well-Being
- 5. Understanding resilience using the “S Curve”
For this blog, let’s focus on #1 and #3.
Take Action
Taking action when we face challenges is a way to keep moving forward, and not retreating due to uncertainty and fear. There are four described in this book.
- Noticing Fear
- This may be first noticed as flight, fight, fawn or freeze (and it’s a normal first reaction)
- Having self-awareness will allow us to know if we are triggered to be in one of these states
- Pausing for Reflection
- Next, it’s important to pause and reflect and ask “What am I fearing, and what is my reaction”
- This will restore you to your normal, non-triggered self
- Create plans for Inner Work Room
- Ask yourself, “What do I need to learn”
- “What’s the pathway moving forward, what do I need”
- “What do I need to know or do to make take the next step”
- Meditation is a practice that can help us calm the mind and find clarity
- Learning
- This is taking action to learn more about the situation
- Leaning into understanding the situation more
- Acquiring knowledge and staying curious
- Reach out to others to learn and reflect
Creating Circles of Support
This section calls upon the HBR article by one of my favorite researchers Dr. Rob Cross and his colleague Dr. Danna Greenberg entitled The Secret to Building Resilience.
Remember the difficult time you faced as a leader or team member during the Covid-19 pandemic? During this time, one of the best ways to work through this was reaching out to my team and my friends.
Cross and Greenberg agree that during challenging times, we become more resilient when reaching out to others.
- During difficult times, who do you reach to for inspiration and advice?
- Are there others that may have gone through what you are finding to be challenging?
- How might they help you?
Lastly, while we won’t go into well-being as part of this blog issue, I’ve touch on this concept in many of the previous issues of the Root.
To revisit:
Above all, align with your values when things get difficult.🍃
My Article Pick
The 5 Pillars of Resilience
In the article from last month, this article from the Wellbeing Project, outlines The 5 Pillars of Resilience. You’ll notice this article is written for the UK, but its concepts apply universally. It also takes on the perspective from a workplace point of view.
This author defines resilience as:
“The capacity to steer through adversities, stress and challenges”.
When we develop a growth mindset, we can overcome these setbacks and rebound from tough times. They reiterate that resiliency is a SKILL, not a trait. Most everyone has the ability to develop it.
The 5 Pillars
The Wellbeing project conducted research to define the 5 pillars (including physical, emotional, social and mental aspects):
- Energy
- This involves physical energy including regular movement, sleep and good nutrition to allow us a good quality of life.
- Future Focus
- This pillar is our compass to help us know where we are going. It is closely tied to our purpose (Spiritual Energy).
- Inner Drive
- This is our self-belief, confidence and our motivation
- Flexible Thinking
- Fight or flight thinking (initial response to challenge) is black or white thinking that can limit us.
- To become more resilient, flexible thinking and optionality are important to solve problems.
- Strong Relationships
- This is the belief that our families, networks and positive relationships help us through difficult times – it’s not a one person job.
Working Together, these pillars work together to help us balance each aspect to build strength and adaptability in the face of challenges.
The Importance of Rest
I’m lucky to be within a community of wonderful coaches. At our last meeting, we shared our own tools for building resilience for our clients. This article was shared! The 7 Types of Rest That Every Person Needs, by Saundra Dalton-Smith, MD, reminds us that rest takes on many forms.
- Physical Rest (passive or active)
- Napping
- Yoga, stretching or massage
- Mental Rest
- Schedule short breaks between energetic sprints
- Sensory Rest
- Time away from bright lights or computers
- Quiet breaks
- Short, unplug breaks from electronics
- Creative Rest
- Nature or the arts allow our brains to break away from problem solving
- Emotional Rest
- Requires us to be with our authentic selves and being okay with needed a break
- Social Rest
- Surrounding ourselves with positive and supportive people
- Spiritual Rest
- Connect to things beyond physical and mental – where we find a connection and belonging toward our overall purpose 🌿❤️
Which rest are you in need of the most?
Continue to do great things 🌿
Thank you
My hope with this issue was to inspire to know we all experience challenges, and that we all have the ability to be more resilient in ways that align with our purpose in life.
You’ve got this,~Kathleen