Being Resilient is Underrated: Here’s Why

Why Being Resilient Gets a Bad Rap

The definition of resilience is the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties. To spring back into shape. Resilience is strength, overcoming, recovery, but it’s often associated with the difficulties, with it being tough. If I’m resilient, I’ve made mistakes. That means I’ve failed, right? That’s the way we look at it, and that’s why it’s so underrated. Instead, what if we looked at it from this perspective?: If I’m resilient, I’ve taken risks. I’ve put myself out there. That means I have overcome. It’s such a different light to look at it from being a failure versus being a resilient survivor who overcame difficulties. This is why I believe being resilient is underrated, and I’m excited to share all of the beauty that comes from our hardships.

The Advantage You Have By Being Resilient

I look at the people that aren’t resilient. Their problems are often solved for them by their family or their privileges. When one tiny thing goes wrong in their life, they don’t have the capacity to recover from it. They don’t know how to get past it, they act like the world is ending. Resilient people will be like, “whew, that’s nothing!”

You’ve been through some stuff. And there’s no shame in that. It’s actually made you stronger. When challenges come your way, you are now so much more capable of handling it because of what you’ve already gone through. If that isn’t a superpower, I don’t know what is! In Romans 5:3 it says, “We also rejoice in our afflictions, because we know that affliction produces endurance, endurance produces proven character, and proven character produces hope.” Our pain and our suffering are actually transforming us for the better!

Now You Have Emotional Pain Tolerance

New challenges that come your way are there to help you up-level and upgrade your life even more. They’re there to teach you even more. A rock bottom, according to Lacy Phillips from To Be Magnetic, is merely just saying “Hey, what you’re doing isn’t right for you. This isn’t your path, and I’m going to make you fall all the way to the bottom so that you will realize you have to do something different to get back on to your true path.”

The lesson that comes from falling into the rock bottom is just telling us we need to shift something. We need to change. And once we figure out the things that need to change (usually a combination of mindset, where you live, your job, the people you’re around, your habits, etc), you are then **resilient.**

That transformation you had through the pain has made you stronger. It then changes your perspective on the following challenges that come your way. Because the next thing that comes, you’ll be like, “Eh, I’ve done this before. I can handle this.”

Being resilient equips you with the tools to overcome again and again, getting stronger every time.

God doesn’t give us any challenges we can’t overcome. In 1 Cornithians 10:13, it reads, “But with the temptation he will also provide a way out so that you may be able to bear it.” Looking at it like this, this knowledge will empower you to know you can make it through. It won’t be without grit, tears, pain, an entire range of emotions, need for support, and patience, but you will be able to make it through.

Resilience helps you move through what life throws you at a quicker pace so you can become a more evolved, higher version of yourself. Resilience helps you progress. This is why it’s so underrated! What a beautiful gift & skill your hardships have given you. And look at the skills you’ve gained from overcoming! You recover quickly from your difficulties.

Being Resilient Means Being Adaptable

According to Wikipedia, “Psychological resilience is the ability to mentally or emotionally cope with a crisis or to return to pre-crisis status quickly. Resilience exists when the person uses “mental processes and behaviors in promoting personal assets and protecting self from the potential negative effects of stressors”.” So not only are you emotionally resilient, but your mind knows how to work its way through the challenges at hand. Wow! In your next job interview, you can add Resilient Problem Solver as one of your skills.

Over time, you’ve learned how to cope and handle your emotions through the process, AND you’ve learned what specific steps you’ve taken to move through the problems. Now, you can refer back to these when troubles arise again! You’re already equipped with mental and emotional defenses to the challenges being thrown at you, instead of armor-less with no strategy.

For example, if I’m headed into a depressed state, I know exactly what I need to do to get back into a happier place, like dancing, taking a shower, drinking some caffeine, singing, or working out. Because I’ve been there before, and have gotten out of it, I know what I need to do to get out of it again.

Even, when it’s a new challenge, you still have the tools to discover new ways to cope and make it through, because you’ve made it through before. You already have the confidence because you’ve already climbed out of the hole.

All of the Good That Comes From Resilience

And because of this, you get to help others as well! You get to share what you did to get out. We are able to help other people. In 2 Corinthians 2:4, it says, “He comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction, through the comfort we ourselves receive from God.“

So I no longer want you to feel bad about things you’ve struggled with or the challenges you’ve had. They’ve changed you. They’ve made you stronger. The people without these experiences, without the opportunity to overcome, they are worse off.

This is your moment to appreciate all of the challenges that have come to you. You know how to tackle problems now. You’ve endured pain and you’ve made it out alive! And anything that comes your way from now on doesn’t stand a chance, because you are a resilient survivor. You have evidence that you’ve overcome something before, so you know you can do it again, even if you don’t have all of the answers or know the way out yet.

You can come back a million times and you can bloom under the worst circumstances.

There’s a meditation I listened to that featured the Lotus flower. Inside, it said that they grow in muddy waters. And the worse the mud, the more beautiful the flower. So the meditation kept repeating, “No mud, no lotus. No mud. No lotus.” Without all of the muck we go through, we wouldn’t bloom into such a beautiful flower. The pain gives us strength. Those challenges cause us to be resilient when we overcome them. You are continuing to bloom through everything you go through. How magnificent is that?

Listen to my Resilient playlist to be uplifted and empowered.

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