A short reflection on resilience
I attended a webinar on resilience yesterday and I don’t know about you, but I’m past the point where a simple acronym framework of best practices is all that useful. Yes, we should be eating well, getting good rest, meditating and exercising and yes, we should be finding meaning and purpose in what we do and helping others as much as we can. But if you’re like me, that’s maybe not all that we need right now.
Here in Québec, we’re squarely into a third wave of the pandemic dance; with lockdowns, curfews, hospitals filling up and a race against time of vaccine delivery. Things open up and then close down again. Vaccines are dangerous or not and work or don’t against this or that variant. People are still getting sick and dying. We’ve been on this rollercoaster for well over a year now and we’re all tired.
What I think we need now is hope. We need to believe that we’re near the finish line, or at least that there is a finish line, and that this current darkness finally signals the coming dawn.
Hope is a tricky thing though. Does it come from without or within? Is there anyone out there with enough credibility left that they can tell us “it’s going to be ok” and we’ll believe them? I don’t know. But I do know that at some point we’ll be able to look backwards at this experience, just like we’re able to look back on all of the other hard things we’ve been through in our lives. And maybe that’s where hope can come from - the realization that we’ve done this before and we made it through. We will again.
So my advice to you (to me!) is to not give up. To keep putting one foot in front of the other and to make plans for the future. Book that vacation even at the risk that you’ll have to cancel it. Give yourself something to look forward to and actually look forward to it.
And yes, do all the right self-care stuff, but also (and perhaps most importantly) realize and hold on to the fact that this too shall pass. We will get out of this and things will get better. They always do.
** In offering this reflection I do want to acknowledge that my experience is incomparable to the suffering that many others have faced and are facing in this pandemic and beyond it.
Inspirational Leader & Board Member
3 年Thank you very much, Mike, for this uplifting message! I would add to your advice, which is critical, to never hesitate to show others that you care about them
Socio-explorateur adepte de décélération, du répit et de la nature. NUMANA ~ Macroaccélérateur écosystèmes tech pure et modèles émergents - Focus: les enjeux de santé territoriale et populationnelle
3 年Just taking the time to help out someone who is in a much more bigger need then ourselves. An example, last week I helped a man who had injured his back in 2020 simply walk 4 corners to the grocery store. He did not want me to go do his errands for him. He wanted to walk, and the company. It took us 40 minutes for a usual 5 minutes to walk those blocks to the grocery store. We talked. Even laughed. But most powerful, we were in silence for him to be able to foster his breathe. His resilience thought me another daily lesson. To love others as we simply wish to be loved in return. And that has powerful resilience energy. And deep humanity. Which is what we truly need to embrace.
Partner, Canadian Strategic Operations Leader
3 年Thanks for sharing Mike. The show must go on! Lets stay strong. May our hope irradiate every people that surrounds us (beyond 2 meters)... faut pas lacher !
Team and Leadership Coach and Facilitator.
3 年Appreciate this, and you!!