Fortifying Your Resilience
? Matt Zinman ?
Resilience Builder | Burnout Crusader | Author of Z-isms | Speaker | Corporate Trainer | Podcast Host | Happierness Innovator | Mindset and Wellbeing Transformer | Nonprofit Founder
What does it take to thrive and flourish in the face of adversity? Simply put, life gets better when you have the presence of mind to avert and alleviate stressors with deliberate resilience.
There’s a crucial reason why Issue 1 focuses on resilience and presence as the two skills with the greatest potential to enrich people's lives in lasting ways. That inaugural article transitioned into the concept of Happierness to embrace THE BRIGHT SIDE of every situation through free will. Applied resilience involves cultivating a reflex of positivity whenever “life happens.”
Since then, we’ve begun to harness the power of Earned Confidence to outsmart worries and assumptions , as well as to tame overthinking by trusting your intuition for decision-making, problem-solving and fostering healthier relationships.
While decluttering our minds is essential to living in the present, we’ve also gained greater insights into perception being among the primary filters that shape our reality. We’ll explore other filters in the weeks ahead.
Now that we’ve established these foundational concepts and their interactions with some of our other abilities, let’s get practical about strengthening your resilience.
First, let’s address the variables. Resilience may mean different things to different people. Naturally, each of us are more or less resilient than others in coping with various circumstances at any given time. While it's not a one-size-fits-all skill, we all share the common goal of seeking a happier life.
To get us on the same page, here's a summary of core qualities with a little help from Mr. Webster:
Hopefully, you’ll begin to see how the suggestions and tools from previous articles help improve your resiliency skills. You may find it worthwhile to revisit the Perception Snapshot , Earned Confidence , Fiction Filter , and “Have-to-Get” Gratitude Converter . You can also seek opportunities to hone your intuition , catch yourself complain, and strive for the best-case scenarios.
It’s also vital to clarify what matters most to you with respect to taking ownership of your actions, changing what you can control, embracing risks, learning from mistakes, prioritizing well-being, and living your purpose.
It’s a lot. However, the intention for listing the variety of resources and actions above is to help decide which are most meaningful for upgrading your life.
A common misconception about resilience is that it’s only relevant to major life challenges like trauma, relationship issues, financial pressures or serious health problems, especially with the prevalence of burnout.
However, I believe building and relying on resilience is more about daily living.
LET’s GET PRACTICAL
1) Identify self-inflicted stressors (negative behaviors within your control), such as: impatience, complaints, worries, assumptions , road rage, sleep deprivation, over-commitment, loneliness and, especially, relationship issues, such as conflicts and/or residual negativity.
2) Choose the one or two things that stand out, and/or start with something more manageable to practice. Some examples:
● Frustrated in traffic? ?Practice gratitude, select a favorite playlist, or call someone who lifts you up. Share a laugh.
● Feeling burnt out? Take a nature walk, set reminders to stretch and reset, or call it a day.
● Habitually complaining, worrying, making assumptions? Practice the techniques we’ve covered.
● On the verge of an argument? Choose kindness and prevent conflicts from escalating. Give yourself and/or them the benefit of the doubt.
3) Celebrate Your Wins – Take pride with every positive change you make. Recognize the scenarios you avoided or eased. Did you prevent straining a relationship or your day from going into a tailspin? Take nothing for granted. Appreciating improvements goes to the very heart of sustaining your motivation to practice resilience and increasingly enrich your life for good.
While we can't prevent many of life's difficulties, we can control how we respond to them. By purposefully addressing daily challenges, you'll enhance your resilience to confront larger adversities with greater ease and bounce back more quickly. Good luck out there!
And remember, the choice to live on THE BRIGHT SIDE is always yours.
Until next Thursday...
THE BRIGHT SIDE is a 100% Human-Generated Publication
TBS Issue 8 - Personal Message
I hope your resiliency feels fortified by this week's article. Please feel welcome to join me for a few more minutes about:
● Our progress on The Bright Side
● The Audio Newsletter debut on Insights to Live By - The Podcast
Note: The end of the episode reveals topics in forthcoming issues.
To your HAPPIERNESS!
Author of “Z-isms: Insights to Live By ” (free eBook and Audiobook)
Host of “Insights to Live By – The Podcast ”
Contact: [email protected]
PAYING IT FORWARD
Please accept my warmest thanks for being part of this week's milestone with more than 2,100 subscribers! I know you could spend these minutes 100+ other ways and you can count on me to give this my all to make it worth your while. My only ask is for you to consider inviting others you know who will enjoy this content. There's no time like the present to share THE BRIGHT SIDE !
CURRENT PODCAST
Welcome to the first installment of the audio newsletter, covering the first 7 issues! The Bright Side embodies an abridged version of some of the key concepts from the Z-isms book and Matt's training courses to make them most accessible, consumable and practical with the goal to help improve mindset, wellbeing and personal effectiveness. Did you get all that?
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:
Does your company embody a culture that’s innovative, agile and energized and what does it take to do? Joining the show to answer those questions and share his insights is the founder of Culturology, Steve Van Valin . He’s a culture-shaping strategist, engagement expert and author of the new book, “The Search for Meaning at Work, Unleashing the Hidden Power of Purpose to Engage Your Workforce.” For 14 years, Steve led the culture initiatives at QVC to make collaboration their ultimate strategic advantage. Here we discuss amplifiers of meaning to create cohesiveness, especially for hybrid cultures to thrive.
HAPPENINGS
● On "Get Authentic with Marques Ogden ," Matt focuses on intentional happiness and self-improvement along with ways to defeat burnout and elevate your life. (27 min.)
● Matt's interview about "Beating Burnout" is on Stories with Traction , hosted by Matt Zaun (26 min.)
● On April 11th, Matt will lead a keynote as part of a "Meet the Author" panel at The Pyramid Club in Philadelphia. His topic will focus on keeping burnout at bay with uncommon ways to hone presence and resilience. If you're local, you can register here .
● Interactive WORKSHOP-inars: "Instilling Presence and Resilience with Uncommon Skill-Building Techniques”?
Matt routinely presents this program to various professional organizations among talent development, human resources, organizational development and other networking groups. If you would like to view a recording of this presentation, one is available through the Global Institute of Organizational Development (GIODN). However, to participate, you'll need the program activities worksheet. Please email Matt (above) if you'd like him to send you that and the program link to experience it for yourself.
ADDITIONAL TOPICS FOR WORKSHOPS, KEYNOTES AND LEARNING PROGRAMS
● Extinguishing Burnout: Personally and Organizationally
● Recouping Productivity by Taming Overthinking
● Managing Energy Personally, Interpersonally and Universally
● Defeating Depression for Good
● Foundational Skills for Emotional Intelligence
● Honing Your Intuition for Personal Effectiveness
● Living Your Best Life with Happierness
To consider having Matt keynote your next event or support your people with workshops, retreats and other custom training programs: Book Matt's Calendar to explore this together.
TO KNOW MORE ABOUT MATT's LEARN-BY-DOING EXPERIENTIAL COURSES: The Mindset Reset, WellBeing Reset, Life Upgrade modules (click here )
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MORE FREE RESOURCES
REVISIT PAST ISSUES
THE ESSENTIALS
Z-isms: The inspirational pearls of wisdom, life lessons or personal experiences people share to positively impact the lives of others; Insights to Live By.
Happierness?: A life-enriching mindset combining presence, resilience and free will to be intentionally present and have a reflex of positivity by choosing to embrace the bright side of every situation.
Earned Confidence: An logic filter based on one’s life experiences that proves it unnecessary to worry, be anxious or make assumptions about uncertainties because one is fully capable to cope with actual occurrences in real time.
Resilience: The capacity to withstand or to recover quickly from difficulties; remain unaffected by insignificant occurrences; adapt to challenges; and, keep things in perspective.
Presence: The conscious state of observing, noticing and/or experiencing life as it happens while remaining free of distraction; intentional engagement to tune-in to the moments that matter.
Objectivity: Expressing or dealing with facts or conditions as perceived without personal biases, distortions or interpretations; to consider what’s happening from an impartial standpoint.
ENCORE NEWSFLASH:
It's now FREE to download the Z-isms eBook and audiobook -
"I wrote it to positively impact as many people as possible and invite you to experience it for yourself..."