The Value of Resilience
How often during your struggles with medical mayhem have you wanted to just give up? How often did you say the words “I’m done! I can’t do it anymore!” And when we do manage to persevere through we look back and find it all a blur.
Psychotherapist Margaret McGahon talks about the topic of “reminiscence work”. By “reminiscing we highlight the importance of our resilience especially through difficult periods in our life and its benefits of doing such work. “Memories that have mixed emotions often point to our resilience,” McGahon says. She encourages us to spend time reflecting on the life events where we ‘bounced back’ and ‘got through’ the difficult times. Oftentimes it’s the difficult moments that propel us forward to overcoming new challenges,” Mcgahon says.
Rule of thumb to feel challenging memories in the past is to:
- Recall them and how they strengthened you.
- How they made you who you are
- How you got through them
- What unique coping methods to you use to negotiate them
While sifting and sorting
- What evokes the feelings and emotions you felt – love, affection, comfort, security…
- What were the difficult emotions you felt – fear, pain, loneliness…
Realize that both good and bad feelings can be felt at the same time i.e.,
- Gratitude and sadness
- Apprehension and excitement
What is Resilience?
It is the way we bounce back (thriving) and/or get through our difficult encounters (surviving). Both are great and both are unique to us
When you go back in your emotions and spend time with your grief note
- Feelings that are conjured up
- But also remember perhaps the joy of that person having been in your life, or the people that came along side you during a particularly difficult medical adversity that made life just a bit more comfortable for you.
Bridging the gap between the pain and the good emotions is that usually draws forward our unique resilience. How you got from the pain to the gratitude – that is the important part.
Exercise:
Pick a time of struggle, a tricky time where you bounced back. Pick something a 5 on a scale of 1-10.
Ask these questions:
- How did you do it? What unique strengths did you utilize to get you through it?
- Who helped you and how did they help you?
- How were you prepared to deal with this?
- What beliefs did you have that sustained you?
- What thoughts did you have?
- What was your self talk – How did you keep yourself going?
- How did you keep others going?
Go back to your younger self – what would you say to that younger version of you? There is a tether to that person in that young you and the now you. Affirm and console them.
What did you learn from this struggle and how did it help you approach the future?
The Message? Sometimes the struggles actually makes us better than before.
In closing, McGahon reminds us to be proud of our resiliency and to acknowledge that we’ve accomplished so much to get to where we are now. Source: Aging with Dignity – online www.agingwithdignity.org
Thank you for reading my post. If you have found it encouraging please consider liking, commenting or sharing it. Feel free to even re-blog – may these words take flight!
I have additional insights I’d love to share with you found in the pages of my debut book: Surviving Medical Mayhem – Laughing When It Hurts. To order a copy or learn more go to my website at www.lorettaschoen.com
Blessings for Health & Wellness.
Loretta