Resilience is referred to as the ability to combat the setbacks and misfortunes of life. It is people with strong resilience who can harness their internal strengths and meet the pressures from challenges such as loss of job, illnesses, or the demise of a loved person. On the flip side, less resilient people are unable to cope with such situations and get overwhelmed and find solutions in escape routes such as unhealthy practices and substance abuse. Such people are prone to developing mental imbalance and other health problems and suffer from a lack of confidence. Although resilience does not imply that problems are absent, but there is strength in such people to surpass adverse situations and they are able to handle the adversities of life without stress and negative impact on their wellbeing.
The power to become resilient comes from a supportive and caring family, trustworthy friends, and in having the willingness to keep trying until the desired mental state is achieved. One must have the ability to overcome anger, set realistic goals, and be confident in his abilities in being able to communicate with people to solve problems. Such traits can be built-in people to create a support mechanism to meet the challenges of life’s hardship that are confronted by all in this world. It is very helpful to connect with as many people as possible by making friends, forming teams of like-minded people, and involving oneself in group activities and desired entertainment means since connectivity with people makes a lot of positive difference in life. One should never give up since we are all faced with challenging situations in our day-to-day life. There is a strong need to have a positive attitude and be spontaneous in one’s actions and reactions for life is never too easy and it is always better to take all life developments in their stride and face them with a positive attitude. Changes, both negative and positive are a part of life and must be seen as opportunities for betterment and not as a signal of things coming to a stop. If one can set realistic and proactive goals, and then work on them systematically, things are bound to improve because no one situation remains the same for long. As one achieves a goal, he can move forward in achieving the next higher goal, which will become an established pattern in his way of doing things and thus set the stage for him to look forward in life for all that he aspires to achieve.
There has been a lot of research in resilience especially amongst children who have lived their lives in extreme poverty, alcoholism, and abuse within families, yet almost 35% of them can overcome the negativities associated with the kind of lifestyle that they are exposed to in their childhood, which is considered the stage of life’s foundation when attitudes are formed and there is every likelihood for such children to adopt the same negative attitudes that they have been brought up in. Yet it was found that 35% of such children grew up by having a determined desire not following the undesired life of their parents and displayed extreme resilience in altering their thought patterns to respond positively and creatively to what life had introduced to them. Their positive responses to the adversities which were repeated before them became strongly embedded in their psyche to become lasting strengths in pulling them through and towards a more rewarding life. Researchers found that resilience in such children came from the strong desire to maintain high self-esteem since troubled families tend to instill a feeling of pessimism and lack of power amongst their children. Hence this was a true example of how resilience works in increasing the capacity of a person to continue with being in a high state of self-esteem, despite the negativities at home, and further making way for more positive developments in life. The research studies done on the extent of resilience working amongst such children though quite exhaustive provides ground for more diversified research to study the pattern of behavior and resilience amongst such children to find more opportunities to reduce negative influence amongst them. Certainly, the subject matter is much worthy of further exploration in view of the immense potential in finding further means to increase resilience amongst children. These efforts will go a long way in improving the abilities of children who ultimately become the next generation to carry the world forward and to make it a much better place.
References
- Hara Estroff Marano, The Art of Resilience, 2003, Psychology Today Magazine
- Resilience: Build Skills to Endure hardships. Web.