You're in a leadership role and you're struggling. How can you develop resilience?

Building resilience is a long term process and learnt over time. Thus, it is impossible to build resilience overnight. Taking a step back to objectively analyze the situation is important to understand how big of a struggle it is. Besides, communicating with others in the company can set stage for further work towards the task one is struggling with. Dividing the tasks into steps can further reduce anxiety. Consequently, reducing anxiety over time and working on things successfully can help build resilience.

To enhance my resilience, I prioritize self-care through regular exercise, mindfulness practices, and seeking support from mentors or peers. I also focus on problem-solving skills, adaptability, and maintaining a positive outlook in the face of adversity. By fostering emotional intelligence, building a strong support network, and learning from setbacks, I aim to strengthen my resilience and lead effectively through tough times.

It's important for you to first identify what it is you're struggling with. The more clear you are on the problem, the better your strategies will be for building resilience. I find it particularly useful to compartmentalise when I'm overwhelmed. As a visual learner, I like to write and mind-map. Start by writing down all your frustrations. Use affinity grouping to identify emotions, thoughts and beliefs. Identify what's triggering you, and recognise your response. This technique helps you build emotional awareness and thought awareness, the first step in building resilience.

I'm not a fan of the term "managing your emotions", it's human to experience our emotions, the good, bad and ugly. And we can only manage our response. Emotional intelligence helps with building resilience when you do the inner work required to identify your triggers, recognise your default responses (aka reactions) and change these patterns of thoughts, beliefs and behaviours on purpose. It's the "on purpose" part where most of us get stuck.

For the most part of our human experience, we live our life through others' eyes. We only get to know ourselves by it being reflected back to us. If you are really struggling with resilience, it would be good for you to seek feedback from professionals such as coaches and allied health providers who will give you judgmental space to learn and grow, as well as tailored strategies for you.

It's important for you to take a step back and think about things that are no longer serving you. Beliefs, thoughts and behaviours may have got to where you are now, and it might be time to let some of those things go. This is definitely easier said than done. Because for the most part you've lived your life with these survival techniques. It would be helpful to find a mentor or a coach that's specialises in growth mindset.

Practicing self-care also includes building up a positive support system especially if you find yourself struggling with resilience. Sometimes it can feel like you are the only one suffering, and remember this, you aren't alone even if it may feel lonely. Joining a new community group, or trying a new activity can help you build new connections outside of your current circles. I find it helpful to tap into my inner child and think about all the fun things that I'd love to do. And I make time to do some of those things.